Customer Reviews

eMachines E725-4520 Laptop Win7 Pentium T4400 2.2G 15.6? 3GB Ram 250GB WiFi 6-cell battery DVD-super Multi DL Drive GMA 4500M

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I bought this about two weeks ago when it was on sale for under three hundred bucks. I have been using a Macbook Pro for the last 4 years, which is great but which is also my wife's computer. With the kids and I also trying to use her computer I figured it was time to pony up for a second laptop.

Pluses:
1. Price

2. functions just fine for internet, watching DVDs, You Tube, Itunes, etc. no noticable difference in quality of images or streaming from my high end Mac.

3. Costs less than a netbook, has a dvd player/recorder.

4. Battery life is actually very good - 4+ hours so far for regular surfing. video knows it down to about 3 hours.

Fairly solid feel to it for being a hunk of plastic

Back has all sorts of access panels for people that want to change out the hard drive or add more RAM


My Age of Mythology game works just fine on it.

Minuses:

#1 gripe - no HDMI port. Bummer. HAs some cheesy aavi port but I haven't bothered to figure out if I can convert that to HDMI. Whoops on their part, but then agin, this thing cost me less than most netbooks.

Speakers are lousy. If you mess with the EQ and SRS Wow you can get it to an aceptable level, but out of the box they sound like they are tin cans. Fine with headphones.

Keyboard is okay - does not have a high quality feel to it. easier to type mistakes than on my Mac.

Windows 7 is...... nothing more than XP with a couple of the bugs fixed and an interface that makes it harder to find things if you are used to XP or 2000.

Boot of programs is a bit slow. I think this could be a WIndows issue more than a hardware issue.


Ovberall - works just fine for a cheap laptop. don't need to pay twice as much if all you do is surf the net and watch TV on it.

There was a certain retailer who was selling this eMachines laptop for just under $300, and at that price, this laptop is an excellent deal. Much above that price and you should probably look elsewhere.

As others have said, the display is excellent - very bright. The keyboard is OK - not great, a bit "spongy" but not bad. The speakers are awful, perhaps the worst I've ever heard; attaching a pair of cheap USB-powered speakers makes a big difference when you use it at home.

The CPU is a standard 2.2GHZ Pentium (Dual Core) T4400, which is a sweet budget CPU (a budget version of the now-being-phased-out Core 2 Duo CPU). It's actually quite a fast CPU for basic stuff. The thing DOES NOT get hot (compare that to the AMD-based laptops) beyond a little warm on the bottom.

The two biggest downsides (beyond the speakers): only two USB ports and no webcam (even the Acer version of this laptop that has a webcam curiously has no built-in microphone). So as I said, for the price I paid, I can put up with it.

One little annoyance I've noticed lately: The touchpad is a bit wider than I'm used to, and I seem to rub the left side of the touchpad with my left hand too often, causing the mouse pointer to jump. This seems like a curious design feature of this particular model; when typing on other 15.6" laptops of this same era, I don't have this problem.

RAM is DDR3 despite what official specs say. Easy to upgrade. The wireless card is easy to upgrade as well - you can upgrade it to an Intel 5100 "Draft-N" card that is an excellent wireless card for $10-$15 on ebay, very worth doing. You can use either a half-height or full-height mini-PCI wireless card in the slot, I've used both. SATA hard drive is easy to swap as well - I've already done that.

You can run XP on this thing too if you really want to - but you must first upgrade the BIOS to at least 3.06 (so you have to boot up Windows 7 for that most likely). Then you have to set the BIOS SATA option to "IDE" not "AHCI" and then XP can boot easily (you'll need drivers from Acer on the Emachines support page for this laptop). I did have trouble with Acer's supplied XP driver for the included Broadcom wireless card - it froze the laptop every time I enabled the card, but as I have since replaced the Broadcom card with an Intel card, I have no problems with wireless in either Windows 7 or XP.

inexpensive for its power and speed. good looking. large brilliant screen with wonderful colors.
key board and internal speakers are an issue. poor speakers and a poor keyboard.
buyers may wish to experiment with external speakers and external keyboard if you are going to be using the keyboard a lot for text entry.
the computer itself is quite powerful for its cost, no heat, no noise, no processor or fan noise or vibration.
looks to be solid build. not the lightest laptop, but solidly built.also WIN 7 does have some glitches related to compatibility and proprietary issues with other Microsoft software,
Microsoft and WIN 7 does not like Google Chrome, for example, some issues with MS software downloads with Chrome, with Win 7. however,
XP computers are hard to get now unfortunately.
if you need to do serious text entry and require a really good keyboard, I would suggest that you spend some time with this keyboard before buying this computer. make sure it will work for you.
do not buy it sight unseen and untested. if the keyboard and internal speakers are not important to you, this laptop might work for you.
despite this laptops high processor power for the price, and other good points, IF you require an excellent keyboard and/or speakers with normal volume, I would not recommend this laptop.

I like the computer but when it comes to warranty be prepared to get screwed they want you to buy a box bubble wrap ship it fed ex or ups cant use orignal box because you will lose it. I am now in the process of having the computer replaced with a new one under louisiana lemon law. emachines was gateway now is owned by acer i hate companies that dont want honor warrantys and screw over consumers

I picked this up for under $300, without even testing it out! I've been using it for two weeks and have no real complaints, except that the speakers sound really tinny. Not a problem for me, since this laptop is used mainly for email and websurfing. It seems like a sturdily built, if kind of heavy and cumbersome laptop. Unlike the other reviewers, I found the keyboard comfortable. I have burned some DVDs and had no issues. Windows 7 is a plus, way better than Windows Vista. The touchpad seems more responsive than some others on more expensive laptops. Monitor is okay, a little fuzzier than the expensive machines, but not bad at all. This would be a great first laptop for anyone. I hope it turns out to be as durable as it feels. I recommend this.

I needed a back up laptop and came across the eMachine for $399.99. My girlfriend had one, so I had used it before and she is very happy with it. I read other customer reviews and 2 things kept coming up: the keyboard and the speakers. Well, using my girlfriend's the key board was fine but the speakers were of a low quality. Mine has a sound quality that's not too bad but the key board is, well, not of a high quality. Besides those things the computer is great for this price. It is fast and high functioning. I have 4 computers, 2 acers, 1 dell, and this emachine and it is just as good as any of the others. Besides the quality of the keyboard, I have no complaints. Also, when I use headphones, the sound quality is great, and the computer speakers are irrelevant.

I've been using this for about six months and I haven't had any major problems. The only issues I've found have been with older apps not working in a 64-bit Windows 7 environment (which is hardly the fault of the machine). After downloading new 64 bit drivers for my Epson printer/scanner, all my devices work fine. Hardware I'm using includes a graphics tablet and a variety of wireless USB and wired mice. All of these worked without any modification. Many of my favourite old games (such as Civilization) would not load on 64-bit Windows 7. You might want to take this in consideration if you are choosing between Win 7 and XP. Again, you can't blame the system for this. The speed is excellent, and has about a 3.5 hour battery life with a slightly dimmed screen. The wifi works great. As others have already said, there are only two usb ports which is easily addressed by getting a USB hub. I mainly use a 19" external monitor, but the wide aspect ratio screen is great (very bright, which is good if you are working in an area with a lot of windows). Windows 7 automatically supports multiple monitors, so you can have a very wide desktop and have apps running on two screens. You can drag items from one screen to the other. The main uses I have, other than running several programming environments, is browsing the Internet, and viewing Netflix and Hulu (using 64-bit Google Chrome). The keyboard is average (a little mushy), but I do like the fact that it is a full-sized keyboard with a numeric keypad (very important for me since I spend a lot of time using the numpad). One oddity of the numpad is that the decimal point is above the "7". That took a little getting used to. If travelling is important to you, note that a replacement battery is less than $50 (including shipping), which will also come in handy when the main battery dies (as they all do within a few years, depending on usage).

All in all, a good buy at $400.

I recieved this laptop in Feburary 2010 as a gift. I use it everyday for several hours and have never had a single problem with it. Great price for 3gb Memory and 250gb Hard drive! Perfect for internet, doing homework, storing media, all the basic ammentities a computer should posess but cheaper and better than a Netbook! Definitely recommend this.

This is a solid laptop, that works well for a good price! Love the Carbon pattern on the lid! Overall form and function seems solid and reliable. Bought a second one for my 6th grade son to use for school. Surprised at the seemingly high quality for such a reasonable price. Love this machine, I am an advanced user.

I bought this laptop at walmart when it was on sale for under 400 dollars and i am so pleased
with its performance. I have built and work on computers for about 12 yrs now and this is the
best running computer i have ever had. its perpect for gaming, sufing the web, multi tasking
you name it can do it with no problems. nothing but pure power!!!!!!.
In yrs to come when it is time to retire this on. I plan on purchasing another one just like it.