Gateway SX2865-UR26 Desktop (Black)

CUSTOMER REVIEW



My wife was running a 2007-era hand-me-down PC with an old quad-core Q6600 Intel processor. Her setup looked somewhat fast on paper, but the machine still felt old, tired, hot, and loud. I decided to replace it with this Gateway unit (SX2865-UR26) that I saw while strolling through my local electronics store (rhymes with Buys). Original price was $450 but they price-matched Amazon for $399. Yee haw.



As for the computer, I am not a fan of Windows 8 which it comes with. But aside from that, the computer is excellent on almost every level.



Fast? VERY.

Quiet? YES -- nearly silent (you have to strain to hear the hard drive heads clicking....but otherwise, it's hard to tell when it's running vs. off). If you swapped the 1TB drive for a solid-state one, it would be virtually silent.

Cool? Absolutely....much cooler than the old q6600 beast it replaced.



NOTE -- I wanted to see how much power this thing actually used when running. My 8-core AMD desktop pulls around 210 watts, and her quad-core Q6600 was about 150 watts. These numbers are important not just from an energy efficiency standpoint, but they are also an important measurement of how much heat the box generates. This mattered to us since we live in Arizona and the last thing you want is a small heater near your feet blowing out hot air in the summer.



According to my Kill-A-Watt meter, the Gateway box consistently pulls less than 30 watts during basic use. That's EXCELLENT! My wife doesn't play any hard-core 3D video games, so I don't know what would happen at 100% CPU use, but for her basic needs, this machine is AWESOME. In fact, I just ordered a 2nd one for myself...



Any complaints? Not really...well, if you want to nit-pick I am slightly disappointed that the machine lacks USB 3.0 ports (it only has USB 2.0). I sometimes use an external hard drive for backups, and USB 3.0 is noticeably faster...but this is a minor quibble. I also wish that Gateway allowed users to customize their boxes....I would have skipped both the optical drive and the old-format 1TB hard drive and chosen a solid-state drive instead...but again, minor quibbles.



If you need a small, quiet, reasonably powerful machine for basic home computing, I'd say look no further than this one...