Consumers rush to secure free PC

The US company which offered free PCs to Internet users on Monday has been inundated with over 300,000 responses via email and the phone.

Free-PC.com offered 10,000 machines to customers in exchange completing a questionnaire about themselves for marketing purposes.

The Compaq machines - normally worth $500 - come complete with free Web access. The borders of the screen are filed with adverts, stored on the hard drive, which update automatically when the user goes online.

Jamie Snowdon, principle analyst at Input, warned it was probably a gimmick but said other companies could follow suit. "I can see something similar happening with the PC given away free alongside another service - such as Web access. You could get the customer to commit for a couple of years and make the money that way," he said.

Graham Morgan, director at software developer AdScience, thought the idea was "absolutely awesome". "Target marketing is a very well proven," he said.

Dion Weisler, UK MD at PC manufacturer Acer, said: "If this became a successful marketing plan I see no reason why we couldn't do something similar."