Another Dell

Almost four years ago I bought our first Dell machine. And almost four year after, that machine died. Not a really long life.

Since we need a computer, we acquired another Dell… again. This time it is a refurbished Precision 390. For the first time ever, I haven’t rebuilt that machine yet. I am using Dell’s factory install, cleaned up a bit, to remove the extra junk. I am starting to doubt my choice of both: buying Dell again and not completely wiping out the system.

It seems that the Quadro FX3450 that comes with it has problems. It started freezing on me while playing Warcraft, it would at times stop sending video (monitor will go into sleep mode) and Windows (XP Professional, that is) has given me a few blue screens with a “nv4_disp” error. This error refers to video card problems and/or video drivers problems. I have ruled out not to be the drivers, since the card is giving me screen artifacts even at POST time. The replacement should arrive today. Keeping my fingers crossed.