My Wonderful Computer I am Totally Satisfied With
Written: May 30 '02
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Pros: Fast, fast, fast..nothing beats an AMD Athlon
Cons: Gateway does not sell "Select" Models anymore
The Bottom Line: Once I purchased my Gateway Select 1200 with the AMD Athlon chip "Intel" became a dirty word.
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| lyoness913's Full Review: Gateway Select 1200 |
When you work for Gateway for over a certain minimum period of time, employees get a nice perk called "Gateway-4-All" which allows them to choose any selected computer for free. There are of course strings attached but they are irrelevant for this review.
I sold the computers and I knew what was least returned, most wanted, and most popular with the 'techie'customers who called in and only wanted to talk RAM, Hard Drive and Megabites. I knew the Athlon, at 1200 Mhz, outperformed the P4 at 1600Mhz. I attended several training sessions with Athlon representatives who compared their product to Pentium. In other words, I wanted my freebie to be an Gateway Select 1200!!
The Select series at Gateway had Athlon chips. Gateway terminology used to be in terms of 'Select,''Performance,' or 'Essential.' Select was again, my beloved Athlon chip, the Performance was the Pentium 3 or 4 and the Essential was the Celeron. You won't find this anymore. Gateway no longer sells Athlon systems. I feel personally that this was a very bad decision, but nonetheless...I didn't make big decisions like this.
Many people haven't heard of the Athlon chip. I was trained to tell 'the average person' about the computer, so I think I'll just list a couple of things I would say to someone who'd called in and asked about the Select series.
1)Gateway's Select series are NOT Pentium computers. AMD Athlon is a company who has been around a lot LONGER than Pentium.
2)The reason you do not see Athlon advertising and you are not very familiar with it if you are the 'average' computer user is because Athlon goes out of its way NOT to advertise. They believe that Pentium spends too much money on their little aliens and little green and blue guys and not enough on progressing a product that will ultimately cost less and be more efficient.
3)Athlon targets a specific group of users in the PC world.
The first words out of the average consumer's mouth is "I want a Pentium 4." I used to mention the Select series and people were uncomfortable with it because they'd never heard of it.
I chose the Select 1200 for my personal computer because I knew it had neat features like a bigger cache, a fast side bus speed on the RAM, better video graphics, a bigger pipeline, and a better performing computer.
What does this mean to the average computer user? It means an Athlon or 'Gateway Select' model is ideal for you if you:
1)Play a lot of video games or use high graphic programs.
2)Want something extremely fast and efficient.
Of course, Gateway builds you your computer from the ground up, and customizes it for your needs. (**remember that the Gateway Country Store is like a Petting Zoo, you can't buy anything there, but you can look around and see what you like )
I chose to go on the web (www.gateway.com) and build myself my dream system which I have had for well over a year and am completely happy with it. These are the components I chose and I'd still recommend choosing:
*19" monitor with 18" veiwable (by LG Electronics)
*256 Mhz of RAM or more
*40 Gig Harddrive 7200 RPM (you'll probably never use more than 40 and computers with 80 and 120 are ridiculous in my opinion, especially with cdrw ability)
*CDRW drive (mine is 12X8X40 but they are available in much faster speeds)
I do not have an extra CD rom because I prefer to copy to my hard drive and burn on a blank disk instead of the hassles of disk to disk (easy to make frisbies and coasters that way)
I do not have a DVD because I do not watch movies on my computer or have any DVD software, but I left a bay open in case I want to add it in the future.
*32MB NVIDIA GEForce2 Graphics ...I know there are much powerful graphic cards available but this one still works for me and I can always just pop out the old, and pop in the new.
*10/100 ethernet adapter (for your cable or DSL, I use RoadRunner)
*3 year Limited Parts and Labour, one year on sight, lifetime phone support warranty
*Microsoft Windows 98SE, NT or XP (I HATE ME)
*4 USB connections, 2 in front, 2 in back, 1 parallel, 1 serial port
*Mid Tower Case with 5 PCI expansion slots and 1 AGP
*Floppy drive of course
*Sound Blaster Live with digital audio output and Boston Accoustics Speakers with Subwoofer
My family and I have been thoroughly impressed with the Gateway Select 1200. We have been most impressed by its speed. We haven't had one problem with it in over a year, and we are confident Gateway's tech support will help us if we run into trouble. I would NEVER go back to an Intel chip like Pentium or Celeron now that I have experienced the absolute dominance of the Athlon.
The best way to still obtain the Select Series (The highest Select Gateway ever sold was the Select 1400) is to frequent their Remanufatured side at www.gateway.com. Occasionally, you can find a loaded Select 1200 or 1400 at a great price.
I hope this has been helpful. Remember, just because Gateway doesn't sell computers with the Athlon chip doesn't mean you can't still buy them!! Visit www.athlon.com or AOL KEYWORD "Athlon" which will take you to their direct sight!
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): $1299
Operating System: Windows
Processor: AMD Athlon (K7)
Processor speed: over 1000
RAM: 256
Internal Storage: CD-RW
Hard Drive (GB): 31-40
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lyoness913
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