I grew up in Carson and knew of the Gold Dust Plaza aka Pinon Plaza and insisted my family and I stay when we travel to Carson for my daughters high school graduation. We reserved a room for 7 days. Check in was horrible. I was given attitude from the lady at the desk because she didn't understand why we were given the discount rate of our room. My husband is active military and was given a reduced rate for the room. We printed out a free upgrade from home and presented it to the front desk, without even looking in the computer, the lady said they had no upgrades. The lady asked me if I wanted a room far from the lobby and I said yes. She gave us a room on the second floor just above the lobby 4 doors down. My husband made 5 trips to our car retrieving our things and the staff that watched him do this, didn't once offer him a luggage dolley. The next night, my sister walks in and is given a suite upgrade due to an error in her reservation. The lady told me she would "help me out", but never did. She actually did a good job of avoiding me for the rest of my stay. We were kept awake for half the night every night due to loud and obnoxious people walking up and down the hall. The door to our room isn't sealed well so we heard everything. The walls are thin. The t.v went out 2 hours after check in. The maintenance guys mocked us saying it wasnt the t.v. but eventually replaced the t.v. The new t.v. loses color every now and then. The bathroom sink keeps clogging, the toilet is lop-sided. When our room was serviced, the maid service just gave us new towels but didn't replenish coffee items, we had to keep going to the front desk to get more coffee. The light socket next to the t.v. and the light next to the window is broken. The pool doesn't look clean. The cigarette smell "knocks" you out when you leave your room. Last but not least, as if there is more, our room has 2 queen beds and we figured out the last day before our departure that the sheets they used are for double beds, so we slept horribly due to the sheets coming undone and balling up. We took the liberty to make the beds ourselves and noticed that there are black "things" on the matresses. Looks like coffee grounds but have no clue as to what they are. Thank God we don't have to stay in Carson City again!

Long-time travelers will remember this place as the former "Pinion Plaza," but retains its Southwest motif. Showing up with no reservations, my friend and I waited for a room to open up just around normal check-in time (4PM). For just a little more, we got ourselves a suite with a separate bedroom/living room area, large bathroom with two sinks, two TVs, and wet bar/fridge area, which were really nice and well-maintained--there's a regiment of maids in the wings. Carpet cleaners were working on several other suites down this hallway that afternoon, and obviously (or hopefully), ours would be next on the list as there was a prominent stain on the carpet. Also, it was a smoking suite, so the room smelled like it. Still, this is a casino and that was the room available to us so that was acceptable. An "energy-saving" device that employs plugging the entry keycard into a slot once inside the room took a few minutes to figure out as it regulates the AC to a default setting and the overhead light by the doorway.
Deciding to eat in the restaurant there, we noticed a considerable lack of personnel to wait on people. Still, the wait wasn't too long. Our server, who stayed cool, got to us in a reasonable time. The food was fine and we didn't have to wait for the check. The place was "under construction," as what looked like used to be the salad bar area was going through a major makeover.
An isolated internet access area in the lobby that requires your keycard is available. If I have a couple of quibbles, it's that the jacuzzi jets are weak and the coupon book was pretty worthless unless you become a "member." Otherwise, for a place that gets a lot of traffic going through, it's clean from the parking lot to the interior and accessible.

Needing a room in Carson City for a family event, I found a great rate at Gold Dust West that included $10 free slot play and $15 food credit. My fiance and I both found the room we were given to be very nice. The king sized bed was comfortable and the bathroom was clean and well maintained. That's where my praise of this property ends.
The hotel has a bowling alley with no posted hours of operation. My fiance and I went in to check it out at 10:15 pm and were told we couldn't bowl because they close at 10:30. I understand that we couldn't have finished in 15 minutes, but the employee was very terse when she gave us the information. In the bowling alley is a gift shop with the hours posted on the glass door: Open Daily 8am-11pm. When my fiance pulled open the gift shop door, the same employee yelled at him, "We're closed! It's closed." Did we lose 45 minutes somewhere?
But the real trouble involved redeeming our food credit.
The coffee shop was was nearly empty. We placed our orders of eggs, toast and potatoes a little after 10 and didn't receive our food until well after 11. Our waitress disappeared for that entire time and only appeared, food in hand, as we prepared to leave. She told us there had been a shift change and our order had been overlooked. The food was hot, we were hungry, and we had the credit, so we ate it. I spent the next 24 hours in misery. It started with a simple stomach ache, then nausea came, and I finally ended up laying on the bathroom floor, too dizzy to stand or sit upright, freezing and aching and vomiting, with stabbing pains in my stomach that wouldn't go away. When my fiance (who was also ill, but not as bad) called the front desk for an extra blanket, he was told housekeeping had left for the day, no one had a key to get blankets and, in the snidest tone possible, "Just turn down the air conditioning and you'll be fine."
Then, upon check out, the $15 credit had not been applied to our coffee shop bill, which we'd charged to the room, following the directions given to us at check in, and the front desk clerk rolled her eyes at me and sighed when I asked for the credit. "I'll have to refund the entire charge for the room and everything to your credit card to take that off." ...so?
The nice rooms of this hotel can in no way make up for the unpleasantness of the staff.

Only a couple of miles from the main hwy thru Carson City, between Tahoe and Reno, Gold Dust is great value, about half other motels nearby and much less than staying up the mountain. We found a coupon and got an ever better deal!
It's connected on other end to casino and bowling alley. Coffee shop has decent food at good prices (best BLT I ever ate) although service is a little slow, but friendly people and clean.
Our suite had plumbing problem, so they promptly moved us to deluxe jacuzzi spa room/suite for same good price. Comfy bed, 2 TV's, bar, frig, coffee pot, pull-out couch, large towels, iron and board, big rooms!
I'll stay there again next trip!