Need computer help

[shane]

Ok, so I have a gateway desktop and all of my usb ports stopped working. I was using it the night before and it was fine, but the next morning my mouse did not work. Tested my mouse on the usb port of my laptop and it worked fine. Pull the case cover off and check for power in the usb port and its fine. I then deleted all of my usb drivers and reinstalled my drivers back onto the computer. Still no usb ports work. Did a bit of research and people reccomend updating my bios on the mother board. Did that and its still not working. So I have an old hard drive laying around. Took my hard drive out and reinstalled windows on my old hard drive and still no usb ports work. Also, I checked them in the device manager and it says they are working fine. Do you think my mother board itself is faulty? Any input would really help out. I'm using windows XP.

[DrSmile]

I've heard of USB ports dying. I had this happen on an IBM laptop at the school, it needed a new motherboard to fix it.

[TuRBoTaLooN95]

I've heard of USB ports dying. I had this happen on an IBM laptop at the school, it needed a new motherboard to fix it.

agreed

plus Gateway = poop. I just spent the last week or so trying to fix my girlfriend's gateway laptop. Apparently when their "recovery software" backs up your hard drive, it also doesn't let you access the files! :x

[shane]

I was afraid it would be the board...

[TuRBoTaLooN95]

My advice...

Take all the parts from your gateway desktop (cd drive, hard drive, keyboard, mouse, memory, and anything else you can salvage.) Go to Newegg.com and buy yourself a fancy new mobo and CPU and piece a new PC together. Then just buy the cheapest version of Windows XP you can. You can get away with like $100 and a sweet new computer.

If you need help picking out parts, I can help. I can even build it for you if you want.

[shane]

it has a invidia motherboard, should i stick with invidia or go another brand? should i just use the processor i have? its an amd duel core 64 bit. i forget the speed, but its pretty decent. or would i be better off buying a combo off of new egg?

[TuRBoTaLooN95]

I'm a fan of ASUS boards with an AMD CPU. You should be fine with that processor, and dual core AMD will hold up. Here are a few things you need to find out to get a new motherboard:

Find out what socket the CPU is (probably 939 or AM2)
Find out what pin and speed your memory is. If you have 240 pin, you're golden as 90% of new boards use 240 pin and 240 pin memory is cheap! If your old memory is not 240 pin, I'd recommend just buying 1GB or 2GB of new memory as you can find it cheap enough on newegg.
If your Dell had internal video card (your monitor plugged into the mobo), then make sure the new one has an internal card. Otherwise you'll need to buy an external video card.
Does it support IDE (ATA) and/or SATA/SATA II hard drives? You want to make sure your old hard drive will plug into the mobo.

There are other specs to compare, but it all depends on what you're doing with your computer.

If you need any more help, feel free to PM me.

[Phreak]

It's Nvidia, but that's the chipset, probably not the board manufacturer.

dual core 64 bit, this sounds relatively new, it's not under warranty?

[DrSmile]

A lot of motherboards have spare connectors for additional USB ports. If you can get one of those connectors maybe you can use it that way, assuming they're not all dead also.

[shane]

hey guys a little update as to whats going on. so i ordered the new motherboard and thought i had it all figured out, but the pci slots are not in the spot i need on the motherboard itself. luckly i ordered through new egg and they will return it. let me show you guys what i mean.

gateway list the motherboard as a NVIDIA GeForce 6150 AM2 uBTX 1394 Motherboard if that helps.

motherboard in the computer:

http://supcontent.gateway.com/support.gateway.com/s/MOTHERBD/shared/4006136R/4006136R_MV2.jpg

motherboard from newegg:

http://c1.neweggimages.com/NeweggImage/productimage/13-128-043-03.jpg

so from what i gather i have a ubtx form factor motherboard and the one i ordered was an atx form factor, please let me know if i am in the right direction here or not. so is it going to be easier for me to get a atx case and swap everything over or find a ubtx motherboard? which it seems no one carries.

[TuRBoTaLooN95]

never even heard of ubtx. find a cheap atx case to fit your new mobo. much easier and cheaper solution.

[gtluke]

yeah just find a nice case and swap it over. i splurged and bought an expensive case (omg $100) like 2 years ago and i'm glad i did. i can pop a hard drive in and out in like 10 seconds. not that i ever do that but i added a new drive this year and it was stupidly easy. plus it has USB ports all the fuck over it :)

[shane]

I can get a case off Newegg for 35 shipped, so it looks like I'll just get the new case and swap evertying over. Thanks for the input, ill let you guys know what happens once I get it all together.

[T_K]

A more expensive case is absolutely worth the extra few bucks.

[TurboMike]

Case decisions should be completely based on cooling decisions.

[shane]

well i got a new case and installed my motherboard and all the usb ports now work. only downside was the cpu cooler and power supply unit were differnt from the atx style so i had to get those as well. oh well, at least it now works. i doubt i'll ever buy another computer its really not bad building one.

[TuRBoTaLooN95]

It's super easy if you follow directions and have a half working knowledge of computers. I built my first one about 3 years ago and I'm never looking back. Still runs BEAUTIFULLY, just upgraded with another 1GB of ram a few months back and a new vid card and I'm playing COD4 and all the rest fine, mutlitasking, video editing, sound editing, web surfing, programming, etc.

[shane]

well its always something, ya know...i wanted everything to be fresh and new, so i installed win xp on an old drive so i can use to one inside for media, but it turns out that the product key for my copy of xp is no good anymore ( i got the copy from the student software i get). do you think that i can just buy a new product key for cheap? what are some options you guys have? i tried this code generator thing that just fucked up my computer and i had to reinstall xp again to get rid of the virus.

[TuRBoTaLooN95]

As far as a legal means to do this, you have to purchase a license from Microsoft. For XP that will probably run somewhere between $50 and $100. I'm not sure as I havn't looked at prices yet.

As far as other means, you can search the web for "cracked" product keys. However Microsoft has been pretty good at nailing them down. It's a bit of a hassle and can be risky.

[shane]

yeah, i got a virus trying to find a cracked version. 50-100 though, i may just be better off getting vista. i'll ask around school, maybe someone has a product key.

[T_K]

As far as a legal means to do this, you have to purchase a license from Microsoft. For XP that will probably run somewhere between $50 and $100. I'm not sure as I havn't looked at prices yet.

As far as other means, you can search the web for "cracked" product keys. However Microsoft has been pretty good at nailing them down. It's a bit of a hassle and can be risky.


a 100% not genuine xp 64 passes the MS genuine check with flying colors, so yeah sure. :)

Building your PC is the right thing to do. Else you get the cheapest crap stuffed inside by them big brand names.

[shane]

i was running 64 bit and have a valid product code for it, but my nic will not work with win xp 64 bit. its kinda comical at this point :roll:

[TuRBoTaLooN95]

screw it.....go linux! (http://www.kubuntu.org).

or even try running Mac OS X. there was a write up somewhere on how to get it running on a PC. you need to legitimately purchase the operating system, but you can get it to run on most pc's now.