"Non-Standard PCs"

From: Douglas H. Quebbeman <dquebbeman_at_acm.org>
Date: Thu May 2 06:38:06 2002

> What's always annoyed me with "brand-name" PC's is that the packaging ALWAYS
> deviates from the "norm" established by the DIY market. Consquently, your
> DELL, Gateway, or Compaq was never upgradable, because the CPU or hard disk
> wasn't supported by the BIOS, or some peripheral wouldn't fit in the system
> because of address conflicts. Simple things like the on-board video caused
> problems when they failed because one couldn't disable them, or, if one did,
> the now-broken native video interfered with the replacement. Even printer
> ports posed such problems. Many times the packaging itself was the problem.
> Have you ever tried to replace or upgrade the CDROM drive in an HP PC?

It just depends on the model.

We bought several Dell Precision Workstations, 410s and 420s.

They use non-standard mobos and non-standard PSUs. Everything
else is standard. We also have Dimensions, which have similar
attributes w/r/t peripherals.

-dq
Received on Thu May 02 2002 - 06:38:06 BST