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$298 Wal-Mart PC Has OO.org, No Crapware

Posted by kdawson on from the tell-me-again-why-dell-can't-do-this dept.

cristarol writes "Wal-Mart has begun selling a $298 PC (Everex IMPACT GC3502). It comes with Windows Vista Home Basic and OpenOffice.org 2.2, as well as a complete lack of crapware: 'Users accustomed to being bombarded with trialware offers and seeing their would-be pristine Windows desktops littered with shortcuts to AOL and other applications will likely be pleased at their absence from the GC3502.' The machine is targeted at the back-to-school market. The hardware is nothing to write home about: a 1.5GHz Via C7 with 1GB of RAM and integrated graphics, but as Ars points out, it should be more than capable of performing basic tasks." Dell sells a low-end PC through Wal-Mart for $200 more, and one assumes it is loaded with crapware. Anybody know for sure?

3 of 422 comments (clear)

  1. Comparison by eldavojohn · · Score: 5, Informative

    Dell sells a low-end PC through Wal-Mart for $200 more, and one assumes it is loaded with crapware. Anybody know for sure? Well, from the product page of the $500 "Dell Dimension E521 Desktop PC w/ AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual-Core Processor":

    • # Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium Edition
    • # NVIDIA GeForce 6150 integrated graphics
    • # Dell USB keyboard and USB 2-button mouse
    • # Integrated 10/100 Ethernet
    • # Integrated 7.1-channel audio
    • # 56k PCI data/fax modem
    • # Microsoft Works 8.5
    • # Adobe Acrobat Reader 7.0
    • # Roxio Creator Basic
    • # McAfee Security 30-day trial
    • # Earthlink application software
    • # Windows Vista PC-Restore
    • # 1-year limited warranty and at-home service
    Having experienced all the above software (with the exception of Earthlink application software whatever that is), I'm going to say that yes, it is loaded with crapware. Scariest one on that list would probably be the earthlink application software because that's the most generic name for a product I can ever think of.

    The other differences between these two machines is they have comparable memory, DVD burner & GPU, the Dell's hard drive & CPU are a lot better. The ArsTechnica article mentions upgrades at a price, you could probably get the IMPACT up to the Dell range and get it close which is probably pretty important for the average consumer who doesn't want to deal with the ordeal of reinstalling Windows just to get a clean slate.
    --
    My work here is dung.
  2. Minimal crapware.. by tji · · Score: 5, Informative

    It's not totally crapware free. From the Specs: Norton Internet Security(TM) 2007 (90-day subscription included)

    They could have chosen a free AV package, like they chose a free office suite (or even a free operating system). But, they went with the try-now buy-later package.

  3. Re:Don't sell the students short by LWATCDR · · Score: 5, Informative

    Okay let's take a look at the "real world"
    1. It has Vista Home Basic so no Aero. It probably will not be stressing the harware.
    2. It has a gig of Ram. I have NO problem running XP media Center and OpenSuse on a system with a Gig of ram as a duel boot. Open Office runs just fine.
    3. It is under $300.
    4. I has a DVD drive so yes you can watch DVDs on it.
    5. It has IE on it. The sad truth is some sites require IE to work correctly. This is changing but having IE to fall back on does make life easy.
    6. It has Open Office. Which gives you a lot of good tools.
    7. Did I mention it is under $300. Less than a PS/3 or 360?
    8. It only has an 80 gig drive. So it has 6 USB ports. Think Geek was selling 80 Gig external drives for under $50! Those are much better to put your music and videos on anyway. When the RIAA and Montag come knocking at your door they my not find your external drive with your MP3s or your collection of books.
    9. It uses SATA for the HD. I bet you could put in another or a Larger drive if you really wanted it.
    10. So it only has one gig of ram. It has an open memory slot. Go buy an extra gig.

    For a High school kid or even a college student this would be a good machine. Frankly a lot of businesses could work just fine off one of these. It also doesn't use a lot of power thanks to the C7 CPU.

    As to just building your own. Not everyone wants to build their own PC or even knows how. This machine with an LCD monitor would be a handy little system for many people.
    I don't know if it has any open slots but even without them you could add WiFi with USB. You could also add a TV tuner so it could be you kids TV as well.
    In other words it seems like a good deal for some people. The fact that it will not play the latest and greatest games I can only see as a plus.

    --
    See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.