Last year, my husband and I both needed to replace our computers.  His died completely and mine was on its way out, but we didn’t exactly have the budget to get fancy machines.  So we opted for some low budget Acer laptops from Walmart.  I remember Acer having quality components back when I knew anything about building a computer, so I was looking forward to using my new laptop.  While I’m still writing on it, I wish I had waited until I had the money for a nice laptop.

From day one, my Aspire 7741Z has been threatening me with a hard drive failure, but I couldn’t afford the time it would take to replace it.  A couple months in, one of my keys just popped off and won’t go back in, so it sits at a jaunty angle and threatens to run away completely.  The mouse is quite possibly the worst mouse I have ever encountered, jumping all over the screen and clicking when no hands appear to be near.  I shut it off and even in the car, use my wireless mouse.

My husband’s similar Aspire hasn’t had much luck, either.  Right out of the gate, he started having trouble with a couple keys.  Fortunately, he is a surfer and not a typist, because there is no way a sane person could handle that keyboard.  A few months after he got it, the battery fried on it.  We were under warranty and got a new one, but now the power key sticks intermittently, so it goes all wonky and beeps about as loud as a smoke alarm when he turns it on.

Overall, I have been extremely disappointed in these computers.  I guess it’s true, you do get what you pay for.  I’m just holding my breath waiting for them to die so we can replace them.  We even have a fund set aside for it now.  I imagine, like in all other ways, they will disappoint me in this as well.