[Disgruntled Head of C-3PO]

"For Apple, the entry-level eMac really does represent Think Different. That's because for a company that prides itself on quality, this computer is different. As in bad. On the plus side, it's stylish. On the downside, it's slow, underpowered, and pathetic. The 40GB hard drive will fill up quickly, the lack of a DVD burner makes offloading files impossible, and the Radeon 9200 graphics card won't even run this fall's hot Mac games. And at around $800, this eMac ain't cheap. If you're considering a home Apple, think different. Buy a Dell. Or be prepared to spend a lot more for an acceptable Apple computer. Our Desktop Product Guide can lead you to the best Apples, along with the best of the rest."

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1735287,00.asp

[DarwinX]

I just saw that article. Holy harshness Batman! Though it has some valid points.

[Disgruntled Head of C-3PO]

All the crap PC's out there and he considers the eMac to be the worst?

[lavar78]

the lack of a DVD burner makes offloading files impossible

This part is laughable. He might want to tone down the hyperbole. Jim seems like a smart guy; perhaps he's heard of CD-R/W, Firewire, and/or ethernet?

[mikellanes]

I don't agree with it being WORST... some of the points have merit, but it is not a gaming machine, It was designed for the education market and has just been selling well because of the low price point, thus now a mainstream product.

Although I will say, even the basic eMac at $799 had a CD-R drive so its not impossible to offload files..

[DarwinX]

Originally posted by Disgruntled Head of C-3PO:
All the crap PC's out there and he considers the eMac to be the worst?

Point taken. At least with an eMac you can spend your time being productive and accomplish things instead of fighting virii, worms, spyware and the like. They failed to mention that though :gasP: who woulda thunk that

[Disgruntled Head of C-3PO]

Obviously he knows his top 10 list was a little boring so the best way to get hits, links and feedback is by making some outlandish claim against Mac users.

[Eug Wanker]

I agree. The current eMac sucks.

[effgee]

Aside from the fact that I would recommend a hammer and a chisel before I'd tell someone to buy a Dell, that assessment is spot on. It's certainly not the worst but even as a non-gaming machine it is one pathetic hunk of plastic.

And stylish? Maybe if you're used to looking at the shit that Dell & Co. push off their assembly lines all day.

[Disgruntled Head of C-3PO]

Originally posted by effgee:
Aside from the fact that I would recommend a hammer and a chisel before I'd tell someone to buy a Dell, that assessment is spot on. It's certainly not the worst but even as a non-gaming machine it is one pathetic hunk of plastic.

And stylish? Maybe if you're used to looking at the shit that Dell & Co. push off their assembly lines all day.

I dunno, I know a few people that want a computer NOT a PC but only have $1000 to spend. They LOVE their iMac as it has a DVD burner a good processor and they can do all the iMovie and DVD editing that they need on it.

For the price I think it is a good deal.

[hayesk]

The eMac is the worst Mac, but it's more than fast enough and is plenty capable for the average home user. My inlaws have one and couldn't be happier.

And it's faster than the G4 tower and my PowerBook G4 which I use every day.

[Disgruntled Head of C-3PO]

I guess the nerds that read the specs and count the framerates with the "I am not getting it till they add...." attitude hate it but anyone I know on a budget loves it.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally posted by Disgruntled Head of C-3PO:
I guess the nerds that read the specs and count the framerates with the "I am not getting it till they add...." attitude hate it but anyone I know on a budget loves it.

The monitor is what I hate the most about it. It's average, for a CRT. ie. It sucks.

[Disgruntled Head of C-3PO]

Originally posted by Eug Wanker:
The monitor is what I hate the most about it.

Oh so you want it to look like an iMac for the same price.

Gotcha

[Eug Wanker]

Originally posted by Disgruntled Head of C-3PO:
Oh so you want it to look like an iMac for the same price.

Gotcha

Nope. I want it to have reasonable text quality. It doesn't.

Hell, I betcha they'd sell more of them to non-educational customers if they got rid of the CRT and sold it headless AT THE SAME PRICE.

Its CRT really is a liability. It'd be less of a liability if the CRT quality were better.

[ambush]

wut about the OQO

[effgee]

Originally posted by Disgruntled Head of C-3PO:
I dunno, I know a few people that want a computer NOT a PC but only have $1000 to spend. They LOVE their iMac as it has a DVD burner a good processor and they can do all the iMovie and DVD editing that they need on it. For the price I think it is a good deal.

I guess it very much depends on what the user needs. If they know for sure that they don't necessarily need their computer to be able to "grow" with them, an eMac could do just fine. Personally I'd probably recommend waiting for a couple of months until they could save up a couple more $$$ and get a refurbished/low-end G5 or a new iMac. Dunno why - I never liked the eMac. Maybe because it reminds me of my old Performa 5400 - worst Mac I ever owned.

[TheBadgerHunter]

Thats bull. I can run almost any mac game including the "hot" ones with no trouble at all, an I have the radeon 7500 one. Problem is he's judging it as a mid-range computer and it isn't at all.

[Oneota]

We have many, many eMacs at our school district (we just bought around 350 of 'em last summer). The reliability of them is definitely questionable, though Apple's been pretty good about fixing them. The shielding on the CRT could certainly use improvement, since if you crank the speakers all the way up, they cause interference on the monitor. And if you have 6 of them clustered together, the monitors tend to interfere with one another.

Other than that, though, they're great for labs and faculty desktops.

[mitchell_pgh]

Desktop PC: For Apple, the entry-level eMac really does represent Think Different. That's because for a company that prides itself on quality, this computer is different. As in bad.

Very descriptive for a writer. "it's bad". Why is it bad?

On the plus side, it's stylish. On the downside, it's slow, underpowered, and pathetic.

Pathetic? Very quantitative...

The 40GB hard drive will fill up quickly, the lack of a DVD burner makes offloading files impossible, and the Radeon 9200 graphics card won't even run this fall's hot Mac games. And at around $800, this eMac ain't cheap. If you're considering a home Apple, think different. Buy a Dell.

OMG OMG OMG... my eyes are glazed over with FUD.

1) A 40GB hard drive IS small, but so are the 40GB hard drives that grace the low end Dells in that price range (granted Dell offers cheaper computers). FYI, why not pay the extra $50 and get an 80GB drive?

2) Lack of a DVD burner? The eMac has a Superdrive option [Granted it's $200 more]. I guess you could say it shouldn't... but the low end Dells also don't have DVR+rw as standard equipment.

3) DVD for backup? I guess he hasn't heard of the other million backup options out there.

[quote] Or be prepared to spend a lot more for an acceptable Apple computer. Our Desktop Product Guide can lead you to the best Apples, along with the best of the rest.[quote]

The eMac is more then acceptable. It's a great home computer. Granted, it's not built for gaming, but it does so many other things well. Authoring DVDs, movies, etc, etc. etc.

Oh well

[koogz]

Edited

[Luca Rescigno]

Originally posted by Disgruntled Head of C-3PO:
Oh so you want it to look like an iMac for the same price.

Gotcha

Wow you've been a complete tool recently.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally posted by Oneota:
The shielding on the CRT could certainly use improvement, since if you crank the speakers all the way up, they cause interference on the monitor.

Yeah, I've noticed that. That's another reason I think their CRT (or something to do with the CRT) sucks. Some of the recent eMacs I've seen in the store have had distortion issues. I don't see the same issues in the standalone CRTs the same stores have.

I'd have a hard time recommending an eMac to anyone, considering the pricetag.

[Spliff]

Originally posted by Eug Wanker:
The monitor is what I hate the most about it. It's average, for a CRT. ie. It sucks.

It really does. The eMac monitor suffers from sever moire lines. And when you play music through the built-in speakers, the screen flickers and shakes severely at certain music frequencies. I went to several Mac stores in town and every eMac I looked at (7) exhibited these flaws.

Don't the f**king hardware engineers at Apple test these things? How many revisions has the eMac been through and it still has this problem? It's pathetic.

[Kenneth]

Ironicly, Macintouch.com gave it a postive mark.
Performance Comparison: eMac G4, iBook G4 and iMac G5

We all know it's the cheapest Mac, but heck it still runs Mac OS X.

[euchomai]

I have a 17" iMac and an eMac side by side at work. I find I've been using the eMac more often because of the bright great CRT screen. As a matter of fact, I think I'm going to get the eMac for our home computer based on bang for the buck, design and overall less expense than the iMac.

I'm still going to use my 17" powerbook most of the time though.

[Oneota]

Originally posted by Spliff:
Don't the f**king hardware engineers at Apple test these things? How many revisions has the eMac been through and it still has this problem? It's pathetic.

It's actually gotten worse as time has progressed; the first generation monitors were relatively-well shielded (not as well as the iMacs were, but not as bad as the current generation).

[Superchicken]

I think the eMac could use some work, though really they should look at the Profile 4

Anyway, yah the eMac isn't that bad, but they need to update it with a super slim CRT, and make it look a bit more sexy, they can pull it off so why not?

[undotwa]

I have an eMac w/512 MB of RAM. It runs the included games pretty well, and the 40 gigs will never be filled up. I don't understand how people can fill 40 gigs, unless they stuff their computer with iMovies and music.

[Eug Wanker]

Originally posted by undotwa:
I have an eMac w/512 MB of RAM. It runs the included games pretty well, and the 40 gigs will never be filled up. I don't understand how people can fill 40 gigs, unless they stuff their computer with iMovies and music.

I have filled up 80 of my 111 GBs in my Cube. I'm starting to get worried now, since it leaves little room for iMovie editing, and I'd prefer to not have to use external drives too often.

[storer]

Originally posted by Eug Wanker:
I agree. The current eMac sucks.

I agree too, it's extremely slow and in general a pain to use.

[Xeo]

Originally posted by undotwa:
I have an eMac w/512 MB of RAM. It runs the included games pretty well, and the 40 gigs will never be filled up. I don't understand how people can fill 40 gigs, unless they stuff their computer with iMovies and music.

Apple likes to advertise movie editing on the Mac and 40GB doesn't cut it. For most, this isn't a problem.

[hayesk]

Originally posted by Xeo:
Apple likes to advertise movie editing on the Mac and 40GB doesn't cut it. For most, this isn't a problem.

Apple advertised movie editing on the iMac DV - that came with a 10G hard drive. 40G is fine for editing home movies.

[Zimphire]

Originally posted by Luca Rescigno:
Wow you've been a complete tool recently.

recently?

[Disgruntled Head of C-3PO]

Originally posted by Eug Wanker:
I have filled up 80 of my 111 GBs in my Cube. I'm starting to get worried now, since it leaves little room for iMovie editing, and I'd prefer to not have to use external drives too often.

I thought this was your work computer? Is this 80 gigs every MP3 you own? Why do video editing on the cube and not your Powerbook?

[Kilbey]

I went from a Pismo PowerBook to my current eMac.

I love it.

Nice bright, solid CRT at the highest refresh rate. The image does shimmer a little bit when the volume is set to it's highest setting, but then, anyone who listens to anything at the highest volume setting is an idiot. I currently use some Altec Lansing sattellite speakers anyway so this is a moot point.

I edit and burn a DVD every month. It's so easy. I have the 80 GB drive with Superdrive and it has worked flawlessly. Not a single coaster.

I have yet to tax this computer in the year I have owned it. But then, I don't play games and don't plan to. I would buy a console for that if I did.

Oh yeah, it hasn't crashed or locked up a single time. Safari used to quit on me, but that hasn't happened in a few months. Other than that, not a single app has quit.

[nredman]

Originally posted by Zimphire:
recently?

that's what i was thinking

[Mafia]

i don't think the article mentioned that the emac is marketed as an "education machine". my high school uses them in our photoshop lab. In my opinion schools don't need a massive hard drive or a superdrive. this guy is basically saying if dell makes a machine for purely music listening, that the computer sucks cause it only comes with a 32 mb video card. its stupid.

[ManOfSteal]

[olePigeon]

I manage two labs of about 60 eMacs. They work great. We've had only 2 eMacs sent in for repair. So 58 out of 60 ain't bad. Of course, we got a huge deal. We payed only $599 for 1.2GHz eMac with 1GB of RAM, Super Drive, and Tilt & Swivel stand. But I think Apple has a big promotion if you buy eMacs 20 at a time.