Comments on: Dell Inspiron 530 & Vista 64-bit Home Premium

By: brian b

brian b — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 14:06:47 +0000

I had the same problem with my Dell that was listed above. The SD card reader started to act up on me & it didn’t recognize the sd hd card when I put it in. I had to use the usb adapter that came with my sd card. Pain in the butt that I had to do this (because I didn’t know where I put the adapter after I put my trust in the card reader, so after hours of searching, I found the reader), but at least I could get the files off my card again.

Otherwise, I totally love the machine!

By: Adam

Adam — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 02:57:42 +0000

Looks like a good rig. I have been running Vista 32 bit on my home PC and my work laptop since it launched and have had not problems except on the work laptop with the network performance. This was a known issue and we would not put Vista on other systems at my work (as I do I.T. support) due to this network problem. SP1 resolved this and my laptop has worked flawless since SP1 and a few of the systems at work that run Vista as well (more recently purchased and came with Vista) have ran fine as well. My home PC gets the workout and it runs well. I have had some driver challenges with my home rig as it is a performance system but that is the problem of the hardware manufactures not releasing quality drivers for their products (looking at their support forums shows that!). But so much time has passed now that they all offer solid Vista drivers so the devices are fine (around the time of SP1 did the drivers for hardware seem to reach the state of maturity they should have shown when Vista launched).

I have had people say to me ‘Vista sucks, blah blah’ so I ask them why they say that and they all say ‘because that is what i heard’!!! LOL I inform them of my experiences and what is needed to know (such as there is a good chance your Windows 98 PC won’t run it …) and they usually walk away with a new attitude.

It was the lack of hardware vendors not having proper drivers for their video cards and sound cards, etc… that really hurt Vista when it launched but after a year and SP1, it balanced out fine.

I am still with 32 bit because there is still software released that isn’t 64 bit friendly (such as some Photoshop plug-ins). If you are 4+ gigs of RAM you need 64 bit to address it, however if you are < 4 gig, 64 bit is not the correct way to go and simply Googling it and learning why will explain that.

Have fun with the new rig. New hardware is always fun!

By: Micah

Micah — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 23:56:47 +0000

1) I have yet to find a good internal card reader. I think they don’t exist. No decent brand makes one. I just stick with the fast san-disk externals and be done with it.

2) It varies with the month, but last year, it was possible to get an awesome machine with almost everything built onto the board. This is the only way that Dell/HP/Gateway make a machine that doesn’t suck. Wait a month or two and you might get a similar model with sub standard parts for the same price. Premade computers are always a gamble. I wish you luck with your new one.

3) I think I’m going back to firefox 2. It was just as fast on my fast machine, and some of my plugins are still buggy in three. What was wrong with FF 2.x? Nothin.

4) Macs are a fashion statement. It’s a shame that some software developers and users have been cowed into the hype. They’re not bad–but they’re overpriced. And with the pace of technology, you don’t get what you pay for with them these days.

By: Stephen Steele

Stephen Steele — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 20:27:02 +0000

So I have faced this problem many times. I do video editing as a living, and I need to have final cut pro to work with a lot of my clients. I have two other suites that work just as well, and in some cases better, than final cut pro, but the client is boss. So a few years ago I bought a Mac Book Pro and liked it. I enjoy the user experience, but the cost just makes no sense to me.

There are several arguments about the reliability of a closed system. To a point I can even accept them. But, the mac is no longer really a closed system in a lot of ways. They realized that the PC hardware done by Intel was outpacing them and went that direction.

So recently I my mac book pro is pretty close to being dead, as well as my desktop PC. The PC gave up the ghost first so I figured it was best to replace them both. I build my own computers, so I am pretty cheap when it comes to cost. I got to the point I could build an equivalent power PC for 1/4 the cost and use parts and manufactures I trusted. So I built my PC and it was fast and slick and did everything I needed it to do. Then I was reading on lifehacker dot com, about a make a hackintosh. So I pulled the hard drive from my new computer and put a spare one in. I bought a new copy of OS X Leopard. I used the instructions give by lifehacker. Within three hours I had a newly working “Mac” that ran just as well, if not better, than what I could buy in the store. I was amazed. So I built a second computer with the same specs, and now I have a hackintosh.

I love Mac’s OS X. I hate their cost of hardware, which should never be as expensive as they make it. I hate that they have always tried to be a lifestyle brand, and not a competitive brand. I need final cut pro, and that is the only reason why I stick around.

Oh and that Firefox issue can be a little more easily remedied. If you download an extension called IE Tab it essentially opens the IE browser in a specific tab without having to leave Firefox. It actually uses it’s rendering engine. You just set a specific website to always be loaded with IE Tab, or you can switch between rendering engines on the fly.

Good luck.

By: Peter C. Krieger

Peter C. Krieger — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 14:17:27 +0000

I bought a new-build PC w/ VISTA last year, and I cannot fathom why so many people are anti-VISTA. Admittedly, I am not a power-user, and I don’t even have Photoshop. But I do store and process a lot of images, an I have not had either a crash or a BSOD (Blue Screen of Death) in the year that I have owned it.
Strangely enough, every time that I go to http://www.apple.com I keep trying to justify purchasing a laptop for travel purposes. One of these days….

By: Fedka the Convict

Fedka the Convict — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 10:28:51 +0000

Its too late now but you could have saved considerably more by purchasing from http://www.ibuypower.com

In my opinion iBuyPower is the best alternative to building a Windows PC for yourself. And a self-build would have cost even less and since you’d be picking the parts yourself you’d have the confidence that they would work as expected. Given the lack of support from Dell/BestBuy/Geek Squad you’d be better off building for yourself.

Assembling a PC is slightly harder than putting together TinkerToys or Legos.