Complaint Review: Gateway Computers - Nationwide

I bought a Gateway about 2 years ago. It was fine as long as I never tried to do anything to it. However, I wanted to remove some of the preinstalled software I never use to get back some disk space. None of the install programs would work because it had been installed from a network or something (a U: drive). So I had to poke and around and try to hack the stuff off.

Then, I decided to do a simple hardware upgrade -- in my case, a new video card. It wouldn't work with my Gateway because according to the video card documentation I needed to turn off the Video BIOS shadowing. No problem; being somewhat technical, I poked around in the CMOS -- no luck. I checked Gateway's site -- no luck. I asked for on-line help and got a know-nothing bozo who fed me canned responses and told me a tech rep would contact me in 24 hours. No response. A week later I tried again and got the same thing, except that in about 2 or 3 hours I got an e-mail explaining that they didn't provide support for that kind of thing and I'd have to use their pay support if I wanted help.

Gateways are fine if you just crank them up and never change them. However, to remove some of the preinstalled software I never use to reclaim disk space. None of the install programs would work because it had been installed from a network or something (a U: drive). So I had to poke and around and try to hack the stuff off.

Then, I decided to do a simple hardware upgrade -- in my case, a new video card. It wouldn't work with my Gateway because according to the video card documentation I needed to turn off the Video BIOS shadowing. No problem; being somewhat technical, I poked around in the CMOS -- no luck. I checked Gateway's site -- no luck. I asked for on-line help and got a know-nothing bozo who fed me canned responses and told me a tech rep would contact me in 24 hours. No response. A week later I tried again and got the same thing, except that in about 2 or 3 hours I got an e-mail explaining that they didn't provide support for that kind of thing and I'd have to use their pay Gateways are fine if you just crank them up and never change them. However, to remove some of the preinstalled software I never use to reclaim disk space. None of the install programs would work because it had been installed from a network or something (a U: drive). So I had to poke and around and try to hack the stuff off.

Then, I decided to do a simple hardware upgrade -- in my case, a new video card. It wouldn't work with my Gateway because according to the video card documentation I needed to turn off the Video BIOS shadowing. No problem; being somewhat technical, I poked around in the CMOS -- no luck. I checked Gateway's site -- no luck. I asked for on-line help and got a know-nothing bozo who fed me canned responses and told me a tech rep would contact me in 24 hours. No response. A week later I tried again and got the same thing, except that in about 2 or 3 hours I got an e-mail explaining that they didn't provide support for that kind of thing and I'd have to use their pay support if I wanted help.

I could understand that, but it sure took me a long time to find that out. Then, when I called the support line (at $1.50/min), they spent the first minute or so asking me for my Name, my e-mail address, and my phone number, and finally, what my serial number was. Here I am scrambling around trying to read my serial number and all the time the meter is running! When I finally told him my problem, it was dead silence, followed by, "I don't have any idea where to start, but I have to charge you to research this anyway!" I said, "Thanks, but no thanks" and ended up getting charge to find out nothing for the 3rd time!!

No more gateways for me!