I knew Packard-Bell were pieces of garbage back in the 90s and never bought one. There's no way on earth I would buy one now for retro experience. Some things should remain dead permanently.
I've got a lot of fond memories of my Packaged Smell even though I knew it was kind of junk.
I actually occasionally peruse ebay for them since I sort of wanted to build a sleeper PC and thought it would be fun if it was in a Packard-Bell case. But like most manufacturers back then the vast majority of their products used weird customer case and motherboard designs instead of standard ATX making it a tough project.
I bought a Mac in April, 1984. It was one of the first 50k Apple made and the first computer I owned. Inflation adjusted it is still the most expensive personal computer I have bought with my own money. I kept it and have it sitting on a shelf in my office.
