I’ve had several of them, never had any problems.
e-machine is gateways “value” line. You get what you pay for.
Your monitor should work with any new computer should you want to keep it.
I suggest Microcenter or newegg.. Stick with the name brands. Staples, officemax, office depot all have huge sales going on. Some are even giving a trade in for your old working (well enough for them anyways) PC.
Do you know what’s causing the crashes? Have you scanned for viruses? Has the registry been cleaned lately? You might be able to get by for a while longer. My computer is older than yours.
You may not be able to use your old mouse and keyboard and maybe not your old monitor as the new PC may not have the right ports (connectors) for them.
Have you ever cleaned the inside of your PC? Dust drawn by the fans can cause overheating and will shut you down.
I have one since 2009, no problems yet. Runs Windows Vista. It is a 1.6 GHz Atlon with 2 gigs of RAM and 160 GB HD. It was the low “Wal*Mart” special. The early ones like from 1999 had power supply problems but that was long ago, but I do remember replacing power supplies in them. I think they are fine now.
Originally I wanted to get another Dell, so as to use my monitor, mouse... But they are not cheap.
You'll be able to use your monitor, keyboard and mouse with any other computer.
So, here is the question: do you own (or know some one who owns) an emachine? Can you give me any feedback?
Cheap hardware.
But more than one person has told me that Windows 7 is very similar to Windows XP. And no, I am not interested in changing to a different OS, at my age I have enough trouble just changing from one Windows version to another.
Windows 7 is more similar to Vista than XP. Windows 7 is Vista, fixed. It works pretty well.
Have it dusted.
1) Buy cans of compressed air.
2) take it outside
3) open it up
4) blast it with compressed air
My laptop was acting up until I did this. I’ve done this with many machines. No need for a new machine. Just dust it every few years, and you won’t need a new machine.
Clean it, as the feller upside suggests, otherwise get a refurbished HP desktop (if we’re talking desktop) AMD CPU (less costly), I’ve got one with no problems. For a laptop, I recommend less popular brands such as Toshiba or ASUS.
Stay away from cheap brands, or buy a no-brand assembled computer from a small local dealer with good reputation.
I had one before my Mac (which I have now). I had it for 4 years before it died (but I think a virus killed it). I was happy enough with it.
Get a Mac Mini to use with existing monitor and you will be at peace.
A four-year-old dell should have a USB keyboard and mouse (the connector looks flat and thin). These will work on any computer. Your monitor is likely VGA (plug has a blue face), and is the only common monitor connector; every computer you are likely to buy will be able to use it. Therefore, don’t worry about replacing those. Just replace the main part, the box. The new one will likely come with a new mouse and keyboard anyway, but if you like yours better, you can still use them.
It sounds like you’re not a heavy power user, so don’t bother looking for the latest and greatest. It is very likely that with the new year coming up, right after Christmas you can probably score a deal on a last-year’s model low end machine for not much money.
Look for a computer that has the i3 processor from Intel, and at least 4GB of memory (RAM). Also, it should have Windows 7, but not the “Starter” edition; don’t bother with the “Ultimate” edition though unless it isn’t going to add to the cost, because you won’t use most of what the “Ultimate” version can do.
Brand is pretty superfluous for the level of computer you want, but try to get one with a recognizable name. HP, Dell, Gateway, Acer, Asus, all these are good, reliable machines that will (probably) use fairly standard hardware and a decent hard drive.
Look at Buy.com before you buy anything, they have re-manufactured Dell’s for cheap.
I am using one to type this.
I won't buy Dell for blacklisted vendor reasons....
They make crap.
But no-one else is doing much better. Forget the keyboard and mouse. Those are fractional costs. Worrying about that is being cheap at the expense of the meat.
And new stuff should have a cordless mouse and keyboard. Bluetooth has grown up. Finally. Sheesh.
I HAD to buy one this year and I wound up with an HP. I HATE HP for what Carlie did to it. And HP/Compaq mix is poison.
But their hardware was working. Only problem I have is the A4 doesn't have a linux driver for sound.
We'll get that reverse engineered. RSN.
/johnny
Try the following before you give up on the old box.
Download, install and run:
- AVG free antivirus
- Spybot search and Destroy
- Eusing free registry cleaner
- Auslogics disk defrag
Run, don’t walk, away from e-machines.
Ditto posts #4 and 19.
My computer is also older than yours. You may not need a new machine, just some maintenance.
I would add Malwarebytes (free download) to the list.
Also, if you haven’t, click Start in the bottom left of your screen), then All Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Disk Cleanup and follow the prompts to clear your cache and speed up the computer.
I am a technophobe, but there’s simple housecleaning on the machine that even a novice like me can do to keep it going.
I really think for $400 or not much more, you can get something decent new or refurbished nowadays. Try some of the small computer stores you see, sometimes they have a distribution deal with Dell. They also make up computers or can refurb yours for a few hundred.
If you transfer all your content to an external drive, you might also try a full system restore of your machine back to factory specs. You’ll lose all data it’s like your machne just came out of the box again. I’ve done it when machines picked up a pernicious virus and there was no other way.
Also, when I bought the cheap machine locally, they were able to transfer over Microsoft Office, and that saved a couple hundred bucks.
I use to have a e-machine, it worked well enough but it was cheap. I usually keep my computer for seven or eight years doing upgrades as needed until the motherboard gives out but I sold the e-machine after having it about 18 months. It was already beginning to have little things go wrong with it, CD drive not opening, fan going out and I wasn't confident enough in the main components to just fix and upgrade as I usually do.