Gateway DX310X @ [H] Consumer

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To help introduce new [H] Consumer Editor Scott Unzicker, we have the DX310X from Gateway.

Like VM, Gateway has been with [H] Consumer since the beginning, and we always enjoy getting a look at what the Tier I's are up to. This type of machine is one of the reasons we built this program: a general use system that you can recommend (or not recommend) to friends and family who just need a "normal computer."

The target market for this system is what we would call the “average consumer.” This is definitely not an enthusiast’s machine. The DX310X is designed and outfitted for those who want to surf the Web, send email to Mom and Dad, balance their checkbook, encode some video or music, and occasionally indulge in escapism through some very modest gaming. For those tasks, this machine is very well suited and well priced.
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Thanks for reading!
 
Another very informative review as always :p Ill probably never buy a prebuilt machine again, but i still love reading them :D

Flattery will get you everywhere eh?

I cant believe the gaming performance was so horrendous! did you try disabling turbocache or adjsut the amount of system ram it uses? its only got 1gb and game like BF2 are fairly heavy on that so adjusting the ram used to a smaller amount might have increased performance :) on my 6800 its unplayable at medium with 512... 1gb makes it happy at high/medium... NFS:MW was also fairly uncontent :p
 
I thought this was another good review but I do think the rating of a 5 for gaming ability was rather harsh. The machine isn't really marketed as a gaming machine, nor is the video card marketed in the same league as a 7600+ card.
 
Great review. I like to look at the guts of these things to see just how little one has to do to make the computer work.

Looks like the Gateway support was very good.

A couple of my first machines were Gateway models and the thing that drove me away was bad support......

I agree that the gaming portion was a little harsh. This video card is barely above on board and to scorch it is a little unfair.....asking a Yugo to go from 0 to 60 in 6 seconds....can't be done.
 
It appears that Gateway removed a previous comment in their configurator that described the 7300LE as a powerful gaming video card. Not to mention the quote that we pulled from the NVIDIA site (although Gateway can't be held accountable for that).

We realized that this machine was not listed in the gaming subsection of the Gateway site, regardless of how the card was initially marketed, so the gaming score did not affect the final score for this machine nearly as much as the other categories. The Gaming score did not bring the final score down, in other words.

The 7300 performed below our expectations, but you are correct in that this is not a gaming system, so the Gaming category was scored accordingly, as were the Value and BL.
 
0mega said:
I cant believe the gaming performance was so horrendous! did you try disabling turbocache or adjsut the amount of system ram it uses? its only got 1gb and game like BF2 are fairly heavy on that so adjusting the ram used to a smaller amount might have increased performance :) on my 6800 its unplayable at medium with 512... 1gb makes it happy at high/medium... NFS:MW was also fairly uncontent :p
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Yes, we had Turbocache run all the way up to maximum. Whenever we tried to decrease it, we either saw a dip in performance, or no effect at all. On BF2 especially, we tried to back it off so that it left more system RAM. No dice. It actually made it worse.
 
DNA Doc said:
We realized that this machine was not listed in the gaming subsection of the Gateway site, regardless of how the card was initially marketed, so the gaming score did not affect the final score for this machine nearly as much as the other categories. The Gaming score did not bring the final score down, in other words.
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I'm glad that it didnt affect the final score as much, it just still seems...a tad untruthful? I mean, the way its scored that is. Not really making an issue out of it, because otherwise the review was good. :)
 
I would have been interested to see how it performed if you put the 6600GT that you have laying around the [H]ard Bunker. I think the gaming ability of the machine woud have been a lot better with that card instead of the 7300.
 
Oh, undoubtedly.

Indeed, it would have been interesting, but I think our conclusion on the matter would have been the same.
 
I see nothing wrong with the score of 5. It may not be on the market as a gaming machine, but that doesn't mean people wont' try to play games on it. I've seen it happen a few times myself. Somebody buys some low end machine from gateway or dell then wants to know why they can't run some game on it because it is a new machine so it should be able to run the game. Since this type of stuff does happen it is nice to see they they didn't inflate the score just because you wouldn't want to do it. Its not meant to be a gaming machine so it should get the score of a gaming machine in that area. However not giving it that much weight in the end makes up for that fact in the end so it all works out.
 
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