I work at one of the Dell certified retailers (we are the only Dell distributer in the south east), so i can tell you by first hand experience how good the 2350's are.

the 2350's are our flagship product. they are pretty decent computers, other than the fact that there is no agp port or that it's all integrated parts.

It's not true that you would have a heaping amount of difficulty by upgrading the motherboard. The hard drives are Westren Digital out of the box hard drives (at least the 60gb blend), so you can put them in any system and they will work. The CD burners are mixed bag as far as manufactuer, they are either Mitshubishi, MSI or Phillips - which are all good CD burners. they are all 52x, with overburnning technologies and everything you'd expect from a 52x cd burner software wise. the only problem you'd run in to with upgrading the motherboard is that the Dell 2350 cases only support the microatx architexture, so you would have to install a micro atx case, which limits your expandability. Mostly they come with one agp port and three pci, where most full atx boards comes with 1 agp slot, 6 or 7 pci slots and a cnr riser slot.

the processor is socket 478, so transfering your processor is a breeze to your newer motherboard. it does have a heatsync without an attached cooling fan, but the case fan and air transferer works just as good - and it's practically noiseless, running at 32-35 db. personally, i wish i could get one for my athlon xp box at home - it's a pretty ingenious idea.

with any major upgrade, you would probably want to do a clean install of windows, since the build of windows distributed is designed for the intel 84x boards (there shouldn't be any problems, but product activation might give you a problem) - luckally Dell distributes an oem copy of XP that would work fine for the clean install.

that might answer some of your questions with the 2350.

my current problem with them is that there is a lack of support with older operating systems. i can't find a working lan and audio driver for windows 98 to save my life.

well, i hope that answers some of your questions.

-superterran
http://www.superterran.com/

I downgraded XP to win98. My machine refuses to accept either a nvidia PCI video card. I could not figure out how to get the dirvers for the onboard sound card so I put in a diamond PCI sound card. The machine still does not recognize it.
Dell "does not support win98"...
Any ideas?

Are you using the same PCI slot? Maybe it is a bad slot?

have only 1 free slot, since the other two are occupied by the modem and a DLink NIC card (guess what - could not get drivers for the on-board NIC for win98).

Tries the sound card in each of the three.

Did not work.

why is life so much easier on the cheap ASUS motherboard that I bought off ebay?

Hi I am a 2350 owner, I want to install AGP, I have a 1.8ghz P4, I was wondering if you knew what the best motherboard for me to buy is?

I don't like this Doug guy, coming in here and running and advertisement for a Dell PC on a custom-built PC forum. To this guy I say "Leave us alone. We build our own computers here. Please don't advertise on our forums."
This guy lives the general attitude of Dell, going to one place, pitching their crappy hardware, and leaving people with the idea that Dell is some foundry of wizards and magical things. It won't work on us Doug, so leave.

Well maybe he's not that bad, he did post some vital information.

And DON'T ever use any parts from a Dell in a new build. They are notorious for rewiring them so they can't be used elsewhere. If you buy a new motherboard, for god's sake buy a new powersupply as well!!!

Hi!

I´m using a Dell Dimension 2350 too. It has a Mitac-Mainboard with Bios A02. I don´t know, which Mitac-Board it is, because there is no Label with a Name on it.

Is there an alternative Bios i can use?

(Sorry about my bad englisch...)

> I don't like this Doug guy, coming in here and running and advertisement for a Dell

Carter why don't you chill out. Doug provided some VERY useful information about the Dell 2350, and also let us know that the hardware components are STANDARD components (and not re-wired proprietary components that you keep trying to scare people with). Most computer manufacturers haven't used "re-wired" components since the old Compaq days (1998 and earlier).

I'm currently looking for a new microatx motherboard for my Dell 2350. Something that supports AGP, and also has a bios that supports a 200GB hard drive.

Any suggestions Doug?

http://www.shentech.com/inbod8532dat.html

I've been looking at the Intel D845GE motherboard, any ideas if it would work? (as a direct replacement for the current Dell 2350 motherboard). Will the processor/heat sink still be in the "correct place" and work with the current Dell 2350 case?

Thank-you for all your help Doug,

Mark

I'm looking for a "direct replacement" motherboard for the Dell 2350. I was looking at the Intel D845EPT2 motherboard (with an AGP slot):

http://www.shentech.com/ind845ep845e.html

and the Intel 845GE motherboard (with an AGP slot, and gigabit LAN):

http://www.shentech.com/inbod8532dat.html

Would either of these motherboards mentioned above work as a "direct replacement" for the current Dell 2350 (Intel D845GLVA) motherboard?

Has anyone successfully upgraded their Dell 2350 with either of the boards mentioned above, and do either of these motherboards mentioned above support 200+GB hard drives?

I have some problems with the USB ports in the front part, they seem to not recognize a Lexar media JumpDrive USB memory stick, allthough they do recognize other USB memory sticks. The USB ports in the back recognize all of them, including the same Lexar JumpDrive.
Is it a 1.1 / 2.0 compatiblity problem? Any solution?

There wasn't anything wrong with his post, Carter.

Normally, the Dells are made of exceptional quality.

I have a Dell dimension 2350 to i just got it, I put in my adminstrator password just the other day,and now im having problems or i may have forgot it, it wont let me login windows, what can i do without reformatting getting a new hard grive or spending money, is there any kind of trick i can do or somthing, if anyone has any ideas please, please, please, PLEASE let me know, im counting on you guys, you are my last hope becouse i do not want to buy a nother one thanks..

Well, if you "just got it", then you may want to just "bring it back". Hopefully they can reformat it for you, and do a re-install from the Dell OEM CD.

i still think Dell is a ripoff

re-formating disk, that I did not get one of, it only had the screen, computer, speakers, mouse, and keyboard, I didn't know disks even came with the Dell set, now im very disapointed that my computer didnt come with the re-formating disk. So Dell if you see this send me a free re-formating disk,thanks you.

Eddie,

It seems odd that you "just got" your Dell Dimension 2350 (especially since Dell no longer sells Dimension 2350's, and they've been replaced by the Dell Dimension 2400). So I find it extremely hard to believe that you "just got" your Dimension 2350.

If you did in fact "just buy it", and you have proof of purchase (and your service tag hasn't been reported stolen) then simply call Dell's customer service and they should be more than happy to help you. If the computer that you "just bought" has just "fallen off the back of a truck", then I can understand it not coming with the original software, or the original Dell CD's (and you not knowing the login or password for it).

If you simply "misplaced" the CD's, then you may want to call or contact Dell Customer Service and see if you can order replacement CD's. (Again, you'll probably need a valid service tag number, and proof of purchase if the system is not registered in your name).

Same issue, flashed bios problem and need replacement motherboard. Dell willing to sell refurb board at twice the price of new board purchased elsewhere. Dell forum states if I go with new board purchased elsewhere I will have bios and software issues as well as need to purchase oem windows software from them. Board I was looking at was intel D845gvsrl (micro atx and 478) ( I've got 2.0 celeron). Do I have any reasonable alternatives??thx for any help.