So I got this seven year old Dell..

[Viking1]

the power supply went about 3 years ago and I wrote it off by shoving it in the back of my closet. Well I'm gunna resurrect it, it is a Dell Dimension 8100 with a Pentium 4 with Hyperthreading. I am wondering if I can case swap this into a tower from newegg or tiger direct or wherever. I know Dells are just awesome due to their proprietary parts and because of this I am lead here bothering you guys.

Also my old man has a dimension 3000 and wants to upgrade from his 80gb hard drive to a bigger and better unit. Would he be able to buy a new one from the previous sites I mentioned and it will work. I know Dell has those sweet green flanges and I would assume you would have to bolt those onto the new hard drive if possible.

Thanks in advance for your time.

 

[Jesusfrk611]

I just looked up the 8100. If this is actually a pic of one like it says it is, no it will not fit in a regular case as it is a proprietary style motherboard.

I know Dell made some regular style mobos, but I don't think this is one of them. Just use the same case. Not sure if the power supply is proprietary though...as I have seen some Dells with proprietary PSUs as well... Regular ATX style PSUs have this type of connector. If yours looks like the picture, you can pick up like a 300-400 Watt standard ATX power supply to replace the dead one and just use the old case. If it looks completely different, just toss it in the trash or give it to someone that doesn't mind paying for Dell proprietary stuff...

Hard drives are a part in Dells that are not proprietary, so you can get any hard drive that used the same interface. Since it's a Dell Dimension 3000, it was built during the time IDE hard drives were used. So any IDE hard drive should work just fine. Yes the green mounting things on dells screw off one hard drive and screw right onto another and then you can just slide them into an empty bay.

 

[Legodude522]

the power supply went about 3 years ago and I wrote it off by shoving it in the back of my closet. Well I'm gunna resurrect it, it is a Dell Dimension 8100 with a Pentium 4 with Hyperthreading. I am wondering if I can case swap this into a tower from newegg or tiger direct or wherever. I know Dells are just awesome due to their proprietary parts and because of this I am lead here bothering you guys.

Also my old man has a dimension 3000 and wants to upgrade from his 80gb hard drive to a bigger and better unit. Would he be able to buy a new one from the previous sites I mentioned and it will work. I know Dell has those sweet green flanges and I would assume you would have to bolt those onto the new hard drive if possible.

Thanks in advance for your time.

The only issue with your Dell 8100 will probably be the CPU cooler/shield. Dells usually have a special CPU ventilation configuration. If you move it to another case, you might have to get a new heatsink/fan. Otherwise everything else should be ok. I'm making assumptions here.

According to Dell's support page, 3000 has (2) IDE ports. You would have to make sure you get an IDE hard drive. http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/SYSTEMS/dim3000/en/SM/specs.htm#wp1075776

 

[Mutant Corn]

^ It might be better to buy a PCI SATA controller and use that. It'll have faster speeds, and there's little price difference in them.

 

[Jesusfrk611]

The only issue with your Dell 8100 will probably be the CPU cooler/shield. Dells usually have a special CPU ventilation configuration. If you move it to another case, you might have to get a new heatsink/fan. Otherwise everything else should be ok. I'm making assumptions here.

I've never seen a Dell CPU cooler that didn't fit in another case... The issue with this particular model is that it won't fit in a standard ATX style case as it is a proprietary style made only to fit in that case. (see picture I posted above...)

 

[lhuser]

Looking at the first pic, and the system one of my buddy had...I HOPE they don't have RAMbus in there...oh god no. If it is, that RAM is expensive to get.

The motherboard won't fit on another one because of two things: The design may not fit properly, and they don't screw the board. They have a latch and you slide the board towards the left (or right) to remove them. The holes are tiny rectangular things to fasten the board to the case.

I'd stick with the case, get a hard drive, DVD Burner (If needed), and prey for it being DDR.
RAMbus is faster than DDR, but the price...oh god. I mean, it's not like 300 bucks for 512, but it would be around 60-85 for a 512 stick, while DDR, I can have some at 15 bucks for the same ammount of memory.

 

[Legodude522]

Looking at the first pic, and the system one of my buddy had...I HOPE they don't have RAMbus in there...oh god no. If it is, that RAM is expensive to get..

I just looked it up, it is indeed RAMBUS. OMG run to the hills!

 

[Viking1]

First, I am impressed by the responses, I was hoping for like one or two and then I would have to answer some question pertaining to some connector or style of hardware. I did not txpect full size pics with others also talking about them and whatnot.

Secondly, my case sort ate it when I tore all the internals out since the fancy plastic had taken its 9 lives with it after 3 years of lanning.

So I have no case, maybe I will get lucky and find a case with the appropriate power supply.......well probably not haha.

Well I guess I can say my dell is done unless I can find a used PS from a dell for it. The comparison of the oneabove is mine has more wires.

 

[GibsonSGKing]

I've never seen a Dell CPU cooler that didn't fit in another case... The issue with this particular model is that it won't fit in a standard ATX style case as it is a proprietary style made only to fit in that case. (see picture I posted above...)

yeah, I've seen them, they have it really messed up...


It's got a big square aluminum heatsink on the CPU, and a weird plastic scoop tunnel thing going from the top of the heatsink to the rear fan, so it uses the back fan instead of a separate fan for the heatsink. It's awful.

 

[lhuser]

Well, you could find a case...on Ebay or a used PC shop...where they recycle old computers.

Other than that...I'm afraid it's worth to sell...if you want.