Outdated eMac Swindle?

S

Sparrowhawk

Registered
Greetings All,
I purchased my first Mac, an eMac, this past April, literally about a week before Tiger was released. (I got the Tiger upgrade shortly after for a reduced price since my purchase was on the heels of the upgrade.) However, the eMac performed sluggishly, and after I looked at a recent Macworld article, discovered that my "new" eMac had last year's chip, running at 1.25 GHz (it's supposed to be 1.45) and 256 MB: it's supposed to be twice that. So what gives? When did the newer, faster eMac make its appearance? And can my slower eMac get the new, faster chip it was supposed to have in the first place, as well as the increased memory? Btw, this is a SuperDrive equipped eMac. Did the Apple Store vendor try to pull a fast one? Comments anyone?
 
The faster chip will make barely any difference at all. What will help the most is to upgrade the RAM. 256 MB is far too little to run OS X comfortably. 512 MB will make most things bearable, but I find that I need 1GB at least to run all my apps smoothly. Note I am a developer, and have loads of memory hungry apps open at one time (curse you Java....).

The current revision was introduced on the 3rd of May 2005. This was after Tiger was released. Thus I don't think you were swindled, or short changed.
 
Whom did you purchase the eMac from? If it wasn't directly from Apple, then you got what you paid for.

New computers come out all the time, and old models are constantly being updated. If what you paid for was a 1.25GHz eMac with 256MB of RAM, then you got what you ordered. If you ordered a 1.42GHz eMac with 512MB of RAM, then you got swindled and a simple phone call can remedy the situation.

When you purchased the eMac, did the specifications say 1.25GHz or 1.42GHz? Likewise with 256MB of RAM or 512MB of RAM?
 
The purchase was made from an Apple Store inside a CompUSA. I'm not sure what is meant by "directly from Apple" since an Apple Store seems rather direct to me, anyway.
My problem is one of sales ethics: the Apple representative could have advised me that an update was due within a couple of weeks. He has since offered to add extra RAM, but I don't know if it will be possible to update the chip, or if the eMac can take a full 1G.
 
A salesman is not going to know when new products will be released prior to their release (other than rumors), Apple has a reputation for being very close with new product information, and certainly would not allow sales people to provide that information, even if they were sure of their facts. Apple employees have been terminated in the past for releasing new-product information.

Those who choose to delay a purchase 'because a new model will be released tomorrow' - or 'next week' - are often disappointed.
'Direct from Apple' means just that - Ordered from Apple's on-line store.

All eMacs can be upgraded to 1 GB
The newest eMac (which you don't have) can be upgraded to 2 GB total.
 
I appreciate the info. At least I should be able to get a little more speed out of the current (read outdated) eMac. But it is still unfortunate that an eMac purchased so recently is underpowered. Perhaps Tiger slows it down?
 
I believe that the inclusion of Spotlight and Dashboard into Tiger does slow things down a bit. The indexing service that runs in the background is bound to suck some processing power. That said, 256 MB is far too little RAM to run OS X in. You'd be happier with 512, and if possible 1 GB. Tiger seems to be happier with loads of RAM.
 
Don't stop at 512. Get 1024 MB directly. Simply: Max it out.

About them selling you 'old' hardware: Although it's certainly not much help now, you should've informed yourself prior to making the purchase. The salesperson has one thing in mind: A sale. However a Mac-forum like this one would've helped you make a good decision, because we want happy Mac users.

About Tiger maybe slowing down your computer: You could install Panther, set things up and see for yourself whether you like that system's performance better. Of course, by doing so, you give up some niceties about Tiger that I, personally, wouldn't want to give up anymore, having used Tiger for a long time now.
 
I thought someone might bring up the issue that I should have informed myself better before making a purchase. You are probably right. I could have also asked for schemantics and blueprints too, but I'm not a computer geek, but someone who sees a computer as a tool, not something to revolve my life around. I came to the Apple Store with a some hope of a social contract which people sadly do not abide by anymore, that is, that seller and purchaser are honest with each other, especially when the purchaser is assuming (yes, I know what they say about that word) that he/she, particularly when new to the Mac, will be dealt with fairly in dealings with Apple. One doesn't trust used car salesmen; however, I would have thought this wouldn't be a problem with Apple.
 
A couple of points that people have made that you seem to have missed:
a) Apple announces the release of products on the day itself. Usually during a Keynote at some important Mac convention.
b) Sales staff in stores are _always_ kept in the dark about upcoming releases. Apple Stores are treated as a separate entity from Apple (someone correct me if I'm wrong, but the reason for this is to not upset the other Apple retailers).
c) Lastly, there are rumors about product launches at every large Mac convention. Sifting through the cr... I mean junk is a difficult thing to do. But if you want to be informed about your purchases, well, it's something unavoidable.

But as you say, the computer is just a tool to you, so why bother if you have a 1.25 GHz compared to a 1.42 GHz processor? The difference in performance is marginal. Sorry if this sounds harsh, but you asked to be dealt with fairly, and you were. No point complaining about it as there was nothing the sales staff could have done.
 
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