Strange problems from get-go

Could you describe the strange problems ?

Thank you for your response, mazzinia. I think I messed up, thinking I had sent a reply, when I may not have. Oh, dear. I should have gotten one of those computers advertised by AARP, that are especially for people my age.

I'll try to keep this short: From the time of arrival, the computer (presumably an XPS 8930) was VERY slow to boot. I ignored that for awhile, thinking I was expecting too much from the SSD. Then, one day it wouldn't boot at all, and Dell told me to send the tower back. Come to find out, they had installed the OS to the HDD, as opposed to the SSD, where it should have been installed. When the computer came back to me, it seemed better, but not what it should have been.

I lost audio at various times; other times the monitor screen would black out, but come back on again within two or three seconds. I'm sorry that I can't remember exactly what had happened, when Dell (reluctantly) sent an on site technician. He was very nice and very good. He found that both the motherboard and the SSD were faulty. He replaced both, and all seemed well.

Considering that Dell had recently worked on the SSD (when I returned it to them), I asked for an extension on my Premium Support, in case I should have other problems. They gave me a flat NO, so I'm hoping I can solve some problems with major help from forums.

My boyfriend likes to play games, and, other than Sim City and one fishing game, these are freeware games from "myrealgames.com." Sometimes the games will come on at a size roughly one-quarter of the monitor screen, in the upper left corner, and there's no way to enlarge them. This happened this morning.

I have the resolution set to "recommended," but other settings are enlarged to 150% (so we can see what's on the screen!) I did have 125%, and that worked well for quite some time; then, this morning, I left the resolution at "recommended" and enlarged everything else to "150%" After that, the games came on at full screen size, but I doubt that I've solved the problem.

I know I've left out some things, that I can't remember right now. What might be important, though, is that I looked at my basic computer specs for the first time this morning. I was surprised to see "Dell Precision Tower 3420," and nothing about an "XPS 8930." From what little I've learned so far, it seems like these are two entirely different OS's.

So I'm more than lost. Maybe it should be trying to work on a 3420, as opposed to an 8930. I just don't know. Basically, I'm lost, and will appreciate any help you can give me.

Well, this is a bit weird since they have some big visual differences

this one is the xps, and this one down is the 3420

that has the series and model written on the front upward right area.

This said, these freeware games could be affected by an update of the operating system and/or of the video drivers

Thanks so much for responding. There's definitely a big difference in the appearance, and mine looks nothing like the 3420. Still, I'm wondering. I mean, the tower is the computer. I think it is, anyway. Is it possible for a 3420 OS to have been put into an XPS 8930 tower? Thank you again so much for your help.

The OS is the same, there's no specific version. Where did you read it saying being a 3420 ?

I went to "Settings", and down to "About", where it says "Device Specifications," and then "Precision Tower 3420."

Another thing that might be helpful to you: I went to the Dell Support website -- same site I'd used before in trying to solve problems. The only service tag number I have is the one for XPS 8930, and that support ended last month.

I dropped Dell Precision Tower 3420 into a blank space where other products could be looked for. There was a long list of updates, almost all of them saying "urgent." I think that means the updates are urgent for this particular computer, right? I mean, if I could find the same list on a theoretical site, that has no connection with my computer, it would identify the updates, but I don't think there would be any "urgent" messages, because that theoretical site wouldn't know my computer doesn't have those updates.

I hope this is making some kind of sense, because my tech language is pretty limited. Thank you again so much.

What matters is the service tag that's on the Tower itself, because that one identifies your actual computer.

https://www.dell.com/support/home/en-us/?app=products + service tag, and you get presented with the list of all drivers/updates for your specific unit.

The "Device specification" is something that can be manually edited and looks like someone ( the dell tech ) edited it wrongly when he installed the os in the replacement ssd, or used an image premade for a 3420

Thank you again. I just have to ask, though, would an image of a 3420 cause problems, when my computer is supposed to be an XPS 8930? I'm sorry for  being so slow at this, but it seems like, if there's now an image of a 3420 on the SSD, then my 8930 has become a 3420.

Actually i think i did very, very little. And you can always contact me directly with a private message if in need of help (if I can, i will try to)

I'm glad you make that offer, mazzinia. Thank you!