I’ve been pleased with the eMachine that I bought Mom for XMas two years ago. Particularly just recently, when my sister trashed it. Mom has misplaced the XP install, so I had to buy a new copy. The new copy did not have the drivers for the video card and audio card. I went out to their web site, found the model, and found easy down loads for all the drivers. This was a pleasant surprise since in the past I had to scramble to find drivers.
I just got an emachines computer for my father at Best Buy – one of those rebate-happy bundles where it’s cheaper to get the monitor and printer than it is to get the computer alone. Aside from being critically short on RAM, it’s a heck of a deal for $289.
The one thing I found, though is that BB and emachines are going to do everything in their power to prevent this from being a $289 purchase. The BB cashier tried to upsell us on just about everything – home installation, antivirus software, a USB cable for the printer, extra ink cartridges. Thankfully he didn’t even start on the extended warranty. And then the machine itself has like three or four “internet security” packages installed on it that aggressively try to sell you subscriptions, plus AOL. I had to spend about 90 minutes just doing uninstalls before the machine wasn’t just a huge advertisement.
So I’d worry about somebody who didn’t know exactly what they want trying to get the cheapo computer from BB.
>And then the machine itself has like three or four “internet security” packages installed on it that aggressively try to sell you subscriptions
Don’t you love this? Does anybody remember that the point of internet security packages used to be to prevent unwanted programs from interefering with using the computer or trying to get your money?