I've always have had good luck with HP. Their MOBO's and Ram are usually trash brands. And there is a "high failure" rate on most of their products, but only because everyone buys HP. But oddly enough, I've never had a Mobo or ram crash on me, it was either the seagate HDD or the AMD processor that failed on me.
Edit: Also, with HP desktops, switch the case out, their cases suck butt. They are small, and only have one case fan, which I think is which could be why people are reporting a high failure rate. I put mine in a new case, stuck a new GFX card in it, and I have it since '08 with no problems other than Vista 64 being a piece of junk, upgraded to Win 7 64 and haven't had a problem.
For example, my last HP the processor failed on it after 3 years and I never switched the case out. I think the temps where just too hot for it on a consistent bases.
My experience though.
As far as gateway goes. I have a gateway laptop from uh..2004? that would still work if I put win 7 and the power supply didn't fail. So, I say gateway is a good brand.
Stay away from Emachines, and Acer. Other than that you should be good.
Edit: Also, with HP desktops, switch the case out, their cases suck butt. They are small, and only have one case fan, which I think is which could be why people are reporting a high failure rate. I put mine in a new case, stuck a new GFX card in it, and I have it since '08 with no problems other than Vista 64 being a piece of junk, upgraded to Win 7 64 and haven't had a problem.
For example, my last HP the processor failed on it after 3 years and I never switched the case out. I think the temps where just too hot for it on a consistent bases.
My experience though.
As far as gateway goes. I have a gateway laptop from uh..2004? that would still work if I put win 7 and the power supply didn't fail. So, I say gateway is a good brand.
Stay away from Emachines, and Acer. Other than that you should be good.
