[hobbs07]

I have a friend's Gateway Model#GT4015E computer. It no longer has any display and I have determined the reason to be a bad motherboard. I have tried finding a compatible replacement but have not had any luck. The design of this MB is backwards from all I have ever seen. First, the MB attaches to the left side of the case and if you look at the MB straight on, the ports are all on the left and the pci slots on the right -- backwards from standard MB's.

What is up with this? Does Gateway do this on purpose so you cannot service them yourself? I know a decent bit about computers and work on them fairly regularly but I have never worked on a gateway.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

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You are looking at a BTX motherboard. You have not stated what kind of CPu it has, but heres one you can get for a Intel CPU.

http://www.adc-ast.c...em_num=D915GSE2

Heres the foxconn motherboard you probably have. You may be able to buy a replacement from Gateway, but i doubt it.

http://support.gatew.../105552nv.shtml

You will have to decide whether you want to pay the price to fix this computer.

SRX660

[SRX660]

You are looking at a BTX motherboard. You have not stated what kind of CPu it has, but heres one you can get for a Intel CPU.

http://www.adc-ast.c...em_num=D915GSE2

Heres the foxconn motherboard you probably have. You may be able to buy a replacement from Gateway, but i doubt it.

http://support.gatew.../105552nv.shtml

You will have to decide whether you want to pay the price to fix this computer.

SRX660

[Samm]

Hi there


Strangely enough, I've just be helping someone else who needs the same motherboard replacement. You may find this info I gave them helpful :

http://www.geekstogo...34-t183114.html

[hobbs07]

Thanks for the info. I have decided to just start anew and used to working components from this system. I really do not like gateway anymore.....not that i did in the first place --- seems like they try to create a monopoly

[weasel_pup]

Hi Hobbs,
I'm sorry to hear about your situation, but I wouldn't say that Gateway went out of the way to make your life miserable.

I have a similar computer and have researched into upgrading the motherboard to one that could fit a more powerful graphics card (nVidia 8800GT). In researching the BTX form factor from many informative websites, it seems that it was popular at the time the computer was being made. It was developed by Intel, to better handle airflow for their very hot CPUs, but oddly, some mobos were created with AMD sockets.

I think that Gateway created these machines at the time that AMD chips were more popular (cheaper, faster, more energy efficient) and the BTX form factor seemed to be the next evolutionary standard. Unfortunately the 3rd party component manufacturers did not jump on the train and the BTX seems to be phasing out, although IMO it is a superior form factor. This really limits ones ability to upgrade the computer by components. Unfortunately, there aren't any third party manufacturers that are making these motherboards other than Intel, and the websites that purport to carry the BTX mobos almost always have them on back order.

If anyone has sway on mobo manufacturers, I for one would be interested in a BTX mobo...

[mrbreeeeze]

I have the exact same situation here. My friends Gateway that he purchased a year and 2 weeks ago (1 year warranty), from Best Buy, has the exact same motherboard with the exact same problem. No display, POST, beeps, nothing. At first I thought it might be a faulty BIOS but Gateway support thinks it's the motherboard. They gave me the phone number for eMachines parts and they quoted me $150.00 U.S plus $60.00!!! shipping to Canada. I've have scoured the internet to its end and cannot find a thing. The funny thing is that when he was shopping for a PC last year he asked me to build him one but every configuration I came up with, without going to Semprons and cheaper RAM, was about 2 to $300 dollars more than his budget, so I found this on sale and suggested be buy it. I'll never do that again. Now he's faced with replacing the board with and ATX (939 even) which will also need a new case, fan and video card, not to mention how funny his DVD/CD drives will look coming out of that tailored Gateway case.

I guess the question is, would you order the same low quality board for $210.00 and possible duty charges or, would you salvage what you can from the Gateway (processor, RAM, drives) and rebuild using a good quality brand MOBO; add case, CPU fan, power supply and video card, for around $300.00 or better? If it was my chioce, I would go with the salvage/rebuild.

By the way, his loss is my gain because without it I may have not stumbled across this site. Glad to be a new member and look forward to chatting with more of you.

Edited by mrbreeeeze, 14 January 2008 - 04:07 PM.

[hobbs07]

I am not glad you are in the same predicament as me, but it is good to know that I am not completely crazy. I know a decent bit about computers but this one had me baffled. I did choose the salvage/rebuild option and am waiting on the heat sink to come in so I can test it out. Best of luck in your venture as well!!

[mrbreeeeze]

LOL, thanks. My friend did opt for the rebuild. I'm getting pretty lucky finding part for him too, the lucky bugger. I found a friend at work who wants to build a new PC and will sell me his practically new board, an ASUS A8N premium, for 50 bucks and an new Ultra case that he won, also for 50 bucks. So I already saved him a bundle. I'm tempted to keep it for myself actually.

[SMWVC]

Hello People,
Great board. I'm another "unhappy camper" with a Gateway GT5032/Foxconn C51GU01 Motherboard. I also have the same problem of blank screen when using a card(s) in the PCI-e slot. But when I went back to the integrated 6100 chip, all was fine. Used it for a couple of months and now this morning I have no red on my LCD display. Hooked up a seperate Monitor and cable and same problem, so it gotta be the board. Just wondering if you agree with that determination? Any help appreciated. Thanks!

[btoflinski]

right now i'm in the process of helping my mom fix her computer. she decided to buy this computer and its been just over a year and the screen went blue. well i put a new psu and video card in it and a month later the pci express slot went out. now she's not sure if they bought the extended warranty and with 939 board quickly dissappearing looks like i'm on a hunt for a board to replace hers.

[ZR2 MIKE]

GT5034 here with same problem. Black screen, no beeps, etc.
This was a great machine for the two years I have owned it. Bummer as it was still a well performing computer and still comparable to new $450 - $500 systems at Best Buy for being 2yrs old. I am seeing a pattern of life here of two (2) years over and over with these motherboards. Hmm. Dang, I with I could just replace the mobo. I priced ATX mobo's and cases but most of them require newer RAM too. Starting to make it sound a little more expensive of a fix. I really did not want to spend more than $200 getting this machine back running.

What mobo's / cases are you buying for your rebuilds and where you getting from?

[spinkston]

Ok like all the others here I had the FoxxConn MB take a drive down the highway of death. I have decided to part it out into a new case. I got a new MSI MB. but when I go to rip out the CPU the heatsink is attached to the CPU. What is up with that? How do I seperate it. THe MSI has a different heatsink attachment. HELP

[Javeloon]

I also have this board in the Gateway GM5067H. I have had it for almost two years and, so far, no issues. For those of you having problems, keep in mind that the power supplies that come with these rigs are usually 250-300 watt and that is not much for running new video cards (even lower end ones). I have a mid-low end NVIDIA 8800GS and, if I remeber correctly, it requires at least 450W. Therefore I upgraded to a 600W, which is barely enough these days, especially if you are looking to eventually have SLI/Crossfire. My computer happened to be a refurb off of Best Buy.

I was thinking of upgrading the RAM. It came with Samsung 512x2 in Dual Channel. I am hoping to add another 2 gig in Dual Channel thereby having a total of 3 gig (I have 4 slots). Anyone have any luck doing this ? If so, what kind of RAM did you use and where did you get it? Thanks.

[Javeloon]

FYI-I went ahead and ordered Buffalo Select RAM. I bought two 1 giggers and put them in the two slots. Everything is working perfect so far and I have 512x2 (in Dual Channel) and 1024x2 (in Dual Channel). It made a HUGE difference to the speed of my machine. For example, of I was gaming and pushed Alt-Tab to check the internet for something, I'd guess it took about 40-45 seconds before I could type select a link on one of my bookmarked pages. Now it takes about 4 seconds (there is almost no wait at all). I guess I found where the bottleneck in my system was.

My rig:
Gateway 5067H
Althon 64 X2 4200+
XFX Geforce 8800GS (Alpha Dog)
3 gig RAM (see above)
Windows Vista Ultimate (64 bit)
Thermaltake 600W

P.S. I got the ram from www.ncix.com for $24.99 for each 1 gig.

[muckymuck]

Add one more to the list of Gateway owners with this same problem. I recently purchased a GT5034 for $100 from a friend who was tired of trying to get a straight answer on how to fix the problems she was having, with the major one being no output from the video card. After two years with a GeForce 7600GS card in it, it stopped recognizing it. She then took it to BestBuy (BIG mistake) who proceeded to "fix" it so that it would only run in safe mode. Nice. They then sold her a new computer. She pulled the video card and sold it, and was planning on parting out the Gateway when I came along.

I've tried other cards, and the PCIe slot is just plain dead. A reformat and recovery run from the recovery partition got it back up and running with the 6100 integrated graphics, but for some reason, that only lasted about a week. Now when I try to start it, the fans run full speed and there is no signal to the monitor from the mobo integrated graphics. Seemed strange, since it was working fine, but now that I see how many people are having these problems with the Foxconn/Gateway board, I'm not surprised. Other than this Foxconn, I can see no other boards available that would fit the Gateway BTX case and support the AMD cpu, and all the used C51GU01's for sale are broken. There are a few Intel BTX boards around at reasonable prices, if you're willing to replace the cpu as well.

I've already obtained an ATX-form MSI socket 939 board on eBay for $35, and plan to transplant everything to that board and then into my son's homebuilt ATX computer that's currently running a single core Athlon XP. It should be a nice upgrade for him.

In Gateway's defense - I've had 4 Gateway desktops and 2 laptops, and this is the first time I've seen this level of problem with one of their machines. I've always had good luck with Gateway, and have always been able to do any upgrades or additions to their computers without hassle. As for BTX, my current "main PC" is a BTX form-factor Gateway with an Intel board and cpu, and it's been just fine. As one of the other posts above mentioned, BTX looked like the wave of the future back in 2005, and Gateway, Dell, and several others no doubt thought they were leading the pack by adopting it. With a lack of BTX support from the aftermarket, Intel ceased development of the design in late 2006, and OEMs like Gateway and Dell have gone back to using std. ATX boards.