I purchased an E Series Desktop machine from Wal-Mart on January 7, 2010. This computer was purchased solely for the use of my two young daughters (3 & 4 years old at the time). They used it on average of 5 to 8 hours per week to play games on websites such as PBS kids and Nick Jr. In addition, they downloaded pictures from their toy cameras and my older daughter occasionally typed on the word processor. The only other use was if we had a guest in our home that needed to check e-mail or use the internet, which probably happened less than 10 times in the year. Last week, the computer refused to boot up. My husband and I tried to fix it; including trying to reformat the hard drive, but nothing seemed to work.
This morning I contacted e-Machines support and was told that the hard drive of my system had gone bad and that I could send it to the depot and they would replace the hard drive for $199 plus shipping. I then called the warranty department to see if they could help me, since the computer was approximately 1 year and 1 month old. I was not expecting it to be repaired for free, but I was hoping that they could work with me on the repair costs. I was told that my only option was to mail it in for $199 plus shipping. I purchased the computer for $398 and after one year I would have to pay 50% of the original cost to fix it. Needless to say, I am quite frustrated and I will never purchase an emachine or Gateway computer again.