DailyTech - NEC Sells Packard Bell Division to eMachines Co-Founder

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IT NEC Sells Packard Bell Division to eMachines Co-Founder
Tuan Nguyen (Blog) - October 16, 2006 5:40 PM

13 comment(s) - last by Lazarus Dark.. on Oct 17 at 11:19 AM

The Packard Bell brand continues to live on

Today NEC announced that it finalized a deal to sell its Packard Bell PC division to Lap Shun Hui, co-founder of eMachines. NEC and Shun Hui had been talking as earlier as April of this year, and in June, news broke that NEC would sell Packard Bell for as much as 10 billion Yen, or roughly $87 million USD.

Although no financial numbers were released, analysts indicated that NEC's Packard Bell division was in a poor state for several years. The brand was well known in North America nearly a decade ago, but since then retreated to Europe where it did better. Shun Hui's eMachines also did well in the US at first but the company stopped producing computers later on and the company was eventually sold to Gateway.

According to reports, NEC is currently a top tier producer of computers in Japan, but is not doing very well in other countries. Research firm Gartner indicated that NEC had a 2.8 percent market share globally for PCs.

No indications on the future of the Packard Bell brand were given. Shun Hui has not made a public statement about the transaction, but analysts think that under Shun Hui, Packard Bell could bring in new business in the entry level segment.

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Woohoo!

By therealnickdanger on 10/16/2006 5:44:26 PM , Rating: 1

Let's here it for mediocrity! It's so funny, I remember even back in the day how poorly PB was looked down upon. Poor guys just can't get a break.

RE: Woohoo!

By Oscarine on 10/16/2006 5:59:49 PM , Rating: 2

They were pretty bad... I remember a really notorious Pentium 75 that managed to integrate some of the worst features I've ever seen. Included a barely workable Sound/Modem card, integrated video, and SIMM memory that made it slow as molasses.

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RE: Woohoo!

By sadffffff on 10/16/2006 6:49:20 PM , Rating: 2

heh, i had one of those. came with a whopping 8mb of ram, which we had upgraded... the souncard/modem card was sooo awfull. it was sound blaster compatible...KINDA.. when i wanted to play doom i had to start setup, select the card, test it, the sound would NOT work, save, exit, start setup again and then it would work, then save and launch doom. EVERY TIME. the IDE controler was really quirky as well if i remember... but to their credit, that machine was an iron horse. never quit running. not even the cd drive. i have it to this day with NT4 running

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RE: Woohoo!

By Merry on 10/16/2006 7:50:31 PM , Rating: 2

I have the same machine. The thing still keeps running to this day. It just wont die!

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RE: Woohoo!

By Randalllind on 10/17/2006 8:10:45 AM , Rating: 2

My frist Microsoft base machine was a PackardBell 486 dx2-33. It sucked couldn't even play the games that came with it without crashing.

The restore cd was easy. Back then I hardly knew much about computers. I wouldn't buy a PackardBell but I bet some people will.

By the way I went in to a Rent-a-Center (rent to own place) a year ago and they were renting to own old packardbells. I couldn't stop laughing.

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RE: Woohoo!

By Randalllind on 10/17/2006 8:12:12 AM , Rating: 2

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Packard Bell Mice

By Tamale on 10/16/2006 7:27:46 PM , Rating: 2

Let's hear it for ribbed mouse buttons!

http://www.computerdeskinfo.com/packard-bell-ergon...

RE: Packard Bell Mice

By Samus on 10/16/2006 10:26:43 PM , Rating: 2

they xbox controller of a mouse, so big, it wont fit anyones hand!

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RE: Packard Bell Mice

By Randalllind on 10/17/2006 8:15:11 AM , Rating: 2

My packardbell the mouse hurt the palm of my hand. It was the wrost mouse I have even seen or used.

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Damn Packard Bell Brand....just die already!!

By rushfan2006 on 10/17/2006 11:09:15 AM , Rating: 2

;)

Like most of you I have memories of "back in the day" as the story always goes...of the ol' PBs... I specifically recall the era when it was uber to have a 486 pc, as the 80486 processor had recently replaced the 386. Must of been about 15 years ago by now...my then buddy (lost contact with him about 10 years ago) was all excited his parents bought their first PC....a PB 486 dx2/33 - at the time it was a very good machine --- on paper anyway. Knowing his parents well they asked me to come help them set it up....

Everything was good and then we turned it on.....UGH.....

Even then...it sucked....but like everyone says they are like tanks...they just don't die.

Anyway....can someone please just kill off Packard Bell already...for the love of god..DIE DAMN IT DIE!!!! ;)

RE: Damn Packard Bell Brand....just die already!!

By Lazarus Dark on 10/17/2006 11:19:00 AM , Rating: 2

I thought it WAS dead. Who in thier right mind would buy a packard hell since '95. Worst computer I ever owned. The bloatware was rediculous. I can't beleive they still exist.

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