Dell Dimension 8400 (Pentium 4 560 3.6GHz, 512MB RAM, 80GB HDD, XP Pro)

Pros: Value! Customer service and warranty

Cons: System arrives with spyware, bloatware, you name it

Summary: First of all, I'd like to comment on CNET's change in posting customer's opinions. It isn't better! I hate it. You have to click on each person now where before you could just scroll through. And they still don't screen out the stupid ones. A better approach might be to leave it the way it was but add the ability to post comments on customer's opinions.

Onto the 8400, CNET really needs to update their review on it. But I bought this system and it was delivered 3 days later. Great? Well, no. The monitor and speakers have yet to arrive and I had to call Dell to find out about the monitor since their tracking system indicated it had been delivered with the system. That's kind of important to me since its their 24" LCD which costs more than the computer itself. But the customer service rep was on top of it.

The person below me (csmac71) brings up some good points to remember. The system (hooked up to my old monitor right now) comes with so much spyware and bloatware that it should be a crime. C'mon Dell, let's make that an option. But just like a dell laptop purchased a month ago, the first thing you should do is stick the Windows CD in and reinstall after formating the harddrive. But like csmac71 learned, go to Dell's customer support website and download the drivers as the CD doesn't have them. As an alternative, you can copy C:/drivers to a cd but the ones on dell's site are more user friendly and current. (you should always make sure you have drivers before reinstalling)

It would be easy to be mad and downgrade Dell because of this, but I have to keep in mind the value I got. The system is fast. The customer service rep was friendly and prompt in helping me. Finding another company that can do better (and provide upgrades like a 24" LCD) at this pricing would be a challenge.

I fully recommend Dell. Just keep in mind it'll take a couple of hours of reinstalling after downloading the drivers. However, I'm sure most computers are like this these days..with stuff you don't want on it like AOL, earthlink, mcafee security, and the list goes on..