Dell or E-machine?

[Antisocial Virge]

Aunt wants a computer for mainly email, surfing and word processing and such. I was gonna get a Dell but the price range I'm looking at is around $500+ for a celeron upgraded with 512 ram and such. I have seen some e-machines with an athlon 64 in that price range and what looks to be "better" quality stuff in it. Now how do these compare in terms of quality and warrenty? I know emachines used to be fairly crappy when they first came out but not sure if they changed at all.

Any suggestions and insights?

 

[Zim Hosein]

Antisocial Virge, considering that your aunt will only be doing "basic" computing tasks, I'd suggest going w/ a Dell unit IMO. I'm not knocking emachines, but there is no way that they can offer "better quality stuff in it" considering Dell's purchasing power Could you provide some links so we can compare/contrast the two systems you are looking at?

 

[bamacre]

http://www.delloutlet.com

The e-machines are horribly built. But so are the low-end Dell's. Try to snag an xps 200 or 400, or even an 8400/9100. Even the midrange 4700 and 51XX models are better designed and built than an emachine.

 

[alimoalem]

yea, give links to the 2 items you're looking at. i would go with dell personally. well i would actually build a rig but if i had to choose, go with the dell unless you know for a fact the emachines is better (with our approval hopefully lol). does the emachines come with a free monitor?

 

[hans030390]

I've always like emachines...we've had one for many years, and it hasn't let us down yet.

I'd take it since it has the AMD 64 in it.

 

[imported_Stew]

Emachines seem to give you more for your money, from what I've seen.

 

[Zelmo3]

Nothing empirical here, just my limited experience. I have an e-machines laptop. My girlfriend has a Dell. I'm jealous of her laptop.
I got my laptop from Best Buy, and luckily I got the store's service contract. In the two days following my purchase I replaced the laptop twice. Since then I've had problems with overheating to the point of the laptop shutting itself off in the middle of something (which, according to Google, happens to a LOT of e-machines laptops), pixels dying, and recently my backlight has been flickering. It's getting to be time to see how Best Buy deals with outdated stuff that's still withing the service term.
My GF's laptop, on the other hand, has had one problem: the power jack once developed a loose connection (probably from the dogs always running into the power cord). After a call to Dell, they sent us a box the next day, we sent the computer back in that box, they had it three days to replace the motherboard, and then overnighted it back to us. So a week after the phone call, the computer worked fine again, at no cost to us.
My 2¢

 

[thecoolnessrune]

Dell

 

[unfalliblekrutch]

Dell -might- (that's a MIGHT) have slightly better service and support than emachines. However, emachines will offer you more for the money, especially if you find a good deal after rebates.

It depends on if your aunt really needs the athlon64...you could go for a $250 emachines and get enough power for basic uses.

My emachines (specs below) cost me a grand total of $220, with taxes and everything included. It's good enough for basically any basic email/word processing task. It even plays HL2 at low settings @ 1280x1024 w/ 2xAA smoothly. I've kept it on 24/7 for the last 3 months, and nothing has gone wrong at all.

I doubt a similar deal can be had from dell. However, if you want dell for the service and support, go ahead, although I'm not sure how helpful those Indian tech support people are.

EDIT: forgot to talk about that quality issue. IMO, there is no issue.
My emachines came with a foxconn motherboard with intel chipset. Infineon ram (says infineon on the chips themselves, IIRC). Hitachi HDD.
These would be industry standard components...more or less. I can't imagine how dell would have "higher reliability" or quality.

 

[Green Man]

The quality of Dell is unbelievably bad. I see bad motherboards with blown caps and bad PSUs almost daily. As an added bonus, only a Dell motherboard will fit in a dell chassis.

I can't speak for emachines, but I can't imagine them being worse.

 

[n7]

eMachines FTW.

They are actually a pretty decent value for the components you get.

 

[SonicIce]

eMachines sometimes have half-decent motherboards and other standard componenets. Dells have alot of proprietary parts.

 

[Dumac]

I got an eMachine recently. Added a 7800GT to the PCI-e slot and it runs pretty well

eMachines seem to give you a good bit for your money. Of course its not top of the line stuff, but you are looking at spending only around $500 here. Also, emachine support seems pretty good. Last time I tried Dell support i couldn't even understand the person i was talking to.

 

[bamacre]

Originally posted by: Dumac
I got an eMachine recently. Added a 7800GT to the PCI-e slot and it runs pretty well

eMachines seem to give you a good bit for your money. Of course its not top of the line stuff, but you are looking at spending only around $500 here. Also, emachine support seems pretty good. Last time I tried Dell support i couldn't even understand the person i was talking to.

Was it a T6524? I added a 7800GT in one of those and the damned power supply not only did not have a PCIe power connection, but there was only one free 4pin connector, and it was too short to even reach the card without bending it. I had to buy a splitter/extension for it.

I was not impressed with the T6524 at all, and that is a higher end eMachine, maybe their top of the line, I dunno. The build quality and design of the system sucks compared to a Dell XPS 400, which is very well designed, has plenty of room, and a MUCH better power supply. Not to mention better integrated audio, better ventilation, and better cable managment as well.

 

[Zebo]

BYO -

There is no reason to get a low end crummy prebuilt. I could build decent systems all day with 17" LCD's for less than $500.

Here's an example from newegg:

NEC Black IDE/ATAPI DVD Burner Model ND-3550A -
Rosewill Value R103A Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case ATX12V 350W
NEC Black 1.44MB 3.5" Internal Floppy Drive
SAMSUNG SpinPoint P Series SP2514N 250GB 7200 RPM IDE Ultra ATA133 Hard
171B Black 17" 16ms LCD Monitor
pqi POWER Series 512MB 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200)
AMD Sempron 64 2600+ Palermo 800MHz FSB Socket 754 Processor Model
BIOSTAR TForce6100 Socket 754 NVIDIA GeForce 6100 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard

$474.54 AR

 

[thegorx]

eMachines
as long as they still using named brand motherboards
the last one I saw had a special version MSI board
but could easily be replaced with a retail motherboard if ever it had problems

I've just recently looked at someones Dell Dimension 8300
it has bulging and leaking capacitors
I called Dell and the person I talked to tried to lean me to what might have caused this
and I said what caused this was bad capacitors
I asked what the policy was for this and they said none but I could buy a replacement board for $150 with a one year warranty ... yea .. and coud have the same problem since they aren't admiting the problem in the first place. I wouldn't even care if I could replace the motherboard with any standard motherboard but you can't.

given the choice -> eMachines

emachine laptops on the other hand had a problem with their hinges
so unles they fixed that or you don't mind carrying your lappy in two pieces then you might not want one of those.

 

[abs0lut3]

I would go with Dell. BYO just bring too many implications that most novice users would be able to comprehend.

Don't get me wrong, your suggestion is great but it will ended up being too much for OP's aunt.

 

[Zebo]

Guy has 6000 posts. I'd be ashamed to be buying Dell or emachines. Not only do they come loaded with adware and loads of crap you don't need which can introduce slowness they have worse HW for more money.

But if he can find a super smoking deal like they run sometimes in hotdeals then it's worth it just to save 45 minutes of build time. But I've never really found a savings even with those. Compared lots of times - when you add dells outragous shipping and tax BYO is superior. And we havent even starting talking about making a $100 processor into a $1000 one (overclocking) but that's not for aunty so it's immaterial here.

 

[Antisocial Virge]

Originally posted by: Zebo
Guy has 6000 posts. I'd be ashamed to be buying Dell or emachines. Not only do they come loaded with adware and loads of crap you don't need which can introduce slowness they have worse HW for more money.

But if he can find a super smoking deal like they run sometimes in hotdeals then it's worth it just to save 45 minutes of build time. But I've never really found a savings even with those. Compared lots of times - when you add dells outragous shipping and tax BYO is superior. And we havent even starting talking about making a $100 processor into a $1000 one (overclocking) but that's not for aunty so it's immaterial here.

You forgot the first rule of building computers for relatives or friends. DON'T DO IT. I don't want to be tech support for the rest of my days.
Its not that I couldn't fo it either, I have the parts for a 170 opteron, 7800gt and 2 gigs of ram setup on the way for myself. I probably have all the spare parts to build her a fairly good system right here sitting around me but i have no plans to go that route.

Thanks guys for all your help. I had no real system specs in mind I just have a old memories off celerons being crap. It looks like its gonna be a toss up between the both. Dell support used to be good but I have heard horror stories about it for a while now. Emachines used to be crap but I have heard they have gotten better since then. Thanks for the help guys, some more to think about.

 

[LifeStealer]

I'd go eMachines, before Gateway bought them out they were rated highest among the big PC sellers.

http://www.emachineupgraders.info/
A good site with anything you'd want to know about an E system.

 

[dexvx]

Most people here hate Dell because they use Intel only.

 

[Ike0069]

I too would suggest E-machines. I have suggested them to several non-PC savy co-workers for basic Internet/email sytems and they all have been great.
Only problem I know of was one couln't get the on board Ehternet to work. He just plugged his modem using USB. So E-machines seem to have an outstanding track record from my view point.

 

[Viditor]

The question comes down to AMD or Intel...
Dell is 100% AMD, and eMachines is 100% AMD...

 

[terry107]

Originally posted by: Viditor
The question comes down to AMD or Intel...
Dell is 100% Intel, and eMachines is 100% AMD...

Fixed that for ya!

 

[n7]

Originally posted by: Viditor
The question comes down to AMD or Intel...
Dell is 100% AMD, and eMachines is 100% AMD...

Uh no

eMachines uses lots of Intel also.