ASUS CM1831-US-3AD Desktop PC AMD FX-Series FX-8120(3.1GHz) 8GB DDR3 2TB HDD Capacity ATI Radeon 3000 IGP Windows 7 Home Premium 64-Bit

Pros: 1. This was purchased on a special sale. I bought the last one. . . At $467 with free shipping and no sales tax, it was a steal. These would have required an additional $76 in expenses. In theory, I bought the computer at $391.
2. It was a great value: 8 core CPU, Asus brand motherboard, 2TB hard drive, and 8gb of memory. It would cost me $200-$300 more to buy the components at retail and assemble them myself.
3. I ordered it on Thursday. It arrived on Monday at 4:15 PM.
4. Newegg warranties the unit for 30 days. If anything go wrong, it is shipped back at company expense for a refund.

Cons: 1. If anything go wrong during the first year warranty, you need to ship the computer to Asus at your expense.
2. Asus will not permit you to open the case and upgrade the unit with more memory, another hard drive, or board. If you do, the warranty is "null and void."
3. The computer came without a device disk or user manual. All had to be downloaded from the Asus website.
4. The updated drivers from the Asus website were dated. The latest ones were found by using DRIVER GENIUS.

Other Thoughts: At $467 - $391 if free shipping and sales tax were factored in, I have no complaint. It was a steal. . . . My only regret was that I was too late for the special sale. I would have bought two more.

Pros: follow up on review,,,, about power button.

Cons: I don't like the power button protruding out from the case,,, and on the corner/ edge. It was turning on and off while I had it open on its side while upgrading and configuring.

Other Thoughts: Power button should be slightly more difficult to push. just a brush against the case while setup and the things on and off. annoying.

Pros: Quiet, except for Mechanical HD, scratch, scrape scratch....Nice processor and memory combo,, Motherboard seems OK...., card readers and USB on front nice and convenient. Runs 80 - 110 watt load out of the box.
Good PC for aging father who complains internet, mail, apps, and funny videos are slow.

Cons: Needs intake fan, in my opinion. but air flow is sufficient due to side panel full of "hole pattern"..... PSU leaves a little to be desired... upgraded that. on-board graphics are weak, added a card to fix that. Really wish this was Sata6GBs, but will make do.

Other Thoughts: Highly recommend SSD for Operating System and use the 2 TB drive for storage. (upgraded that) Flies and now is about par. 4 Extra Sata plugs on Mobo is a bonus.

Would recommend to a friend, but also would recommend these upgrades once it arrives.

Pros: Bought this one for one of my customers and so far he is happy with this PC. Asus did a good job on case, it looks as a quality case, all common ports are on top which can be handy. I made some research before purchasing and so far it's best configuration for the price you pay. NewEgg rocks once again. 8 core, 8 GBs, 2 TBs, wireless card, Win 7 64-bits (it was important for me, cause nowdays almost everything comes with Win 8 which I hate).

Cons: The only con I have so far is flimsy CD/DVD eject button on case. Like others have said, by pressing this button you never know if you pressed it or not.

Other Thoughts: Specs are great, but this built has two weak spots: internal graphic card and power supply. If you are gamer, think to spend couple extra bucks on purchasing these two things. Windows gave us for internal video card 4.3 rating. For business use is fine, but for game... better to upgrade.

Pros: Was only 499.99 with free shipping when I got it. 8 gb 1600 ram, AMD 8 Cores, 2 TB 7200 HDD, Windows 7

Cons: Wireless Card is weaker than my laptop.

Other Thoughts: Planning on upgrading graphics, power source, and SSD.

Pros: Good for video editing, music editing, mild gaming (no Crysis 3 on max render), and a steal for the price.

Cons: Poor wireless card.

Other Thoughts: Amazing deal for the price. Cannot compete with these specs on any other $550 computer!

Pros: 8 core, 2T harddisk, 8G memory, with good price.

Cons: Button for optical drive and power button identical and Power button is very sensitive while optical drive does not work well. I can not feel if I push the optical button down or not, and it takes a a second to open after you press the button - I'm never sure if I pressed it hard enough or if it is just slow to respond.

Pros: So far seems to be a great desktop. Great build and I love the 4 USP ports.

Cons: Wireless: As one user mentioned above, the wireless card is horrendous. I'm actually shocked that ASUS would put a card in a modern computer that barely works. I had read the previous review going in, but had no idea it would be this bad. I've tried updating the drivers with no success. I have one bar of signal strength when all other devices are getting 5.

This may seem like a minor thing and I know I can replace the card, it just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Wireless communication is so common now, and there are so many good wireless cards, why should this even happen?

Other Thoughts: All in all, it seems like I'll be happy with this computer once I fix and forget the wireless issue. It's just frustrating to have to deal with something like this on a brand new computer.

Pros: Good value. This is a good unit with strong base components for someone wanting to do basic computing with the intention of expanding to the next level of machine.

Cons: Only a 300W power supply. Onboard graphics card is very basic. Hard disk data transfer rate could be better.

Other Thoughts: I bought this computer because the higher level computer was out of stock when I needed it.

My wife wanted to be able to edit HD family movies.

I swapped the power supply with an Antec NEO ECO 620C, and installed an XFX Radeon 7850 graphics card.

In the new configuration my Windows Experience Index subscores are as follows:
(Max achievable is 7.9)
Processor - 7.5
Memory (RAM) - 7.6
Graphics - 7.9
Gaming graphics - 7.9
Primary Hard Disk - 5.9

To make this a truly outstanding machine, the Hard drive needs to have a better transfer rate.

Honestly, the computer, as I have configured it, is capable of far more than I am asking of it doing video editing. It is a very capable machine for an average (non-gaming) user.

Pros: Great price, handles all my needs

Cons: Button for optical drive and power button identical and placed close together. Also the optical drive takes a a second to open after you press the button - I'm never sure if I pressed it hard enough or if it is just slow to respond.

Other Thoughts: No support for Windows 8 as of mid December 2012

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Valued Customer,

Unfortunately, it does not look like we will have drivers to support upgrade to windows 8. However what you can do if you do decide to upgrade to windows 8, when it ask you what you want to keep select the first bullet so all your drivers will still compatible with windows 8.

Here is a link below of what you are watching out for while doing the setup.
http://cdn.ghacks.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/windows-8-upgrade-setup.png

If you have any questions or comments you can email me at cl-jeffrey@asus.com which I reside in the U.S

ASUS strives to meet and exceeds our customer expectations within our warranty policy.

Regards,

Jeffrey
ASUS Customer Loyalty