Laptop Decision Help

Phantom Steelworks

Phantom Steelworks

Joined
May 28, 2008
Messages
2,093
Hello my brothers and sisters:)

I am trying to decide on a new laptop/good used laptop.

The laptop will be used as a secondary computer for the mancave, road trips and when I am just too lazy late at night to go check email:D

Wanting something with a dual core, RAM expandable to 4 gig etc. Big hard drive, CD/DVD burner.

Looking to spend under $500. Most likely be trading a blade for it, or buy out right...not sure yet.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I just need something that will last and not crap out on me after a couple months use. I have had several laptops...all took a shit....one had an overheating problem.:thumbdn:

Thanks for any help guys/gals:thumbup::D

45
 
"I just need something that will last and not crap out on me after a couple months use"

Macbook or Thinkpad, but neither are under $500.

I have had bad experiences with Dell, pretty good experiences with Fujitsu, and the rest of my laptops have been Apple or IBM.
 
I like my moms Toshiba Satellite but just a little pricey for me right now. The HP's seem to be decent for the money...but I am a total newb at the laptop's...just bought them in the past and had bad luck I guess?

I will look into the ones you mentioned.

Thanks

45

carrot said:
"I just need something that will last and not crap out on me after a couple months use"

Macbook or Thinkpad, but neither are under $500.

I have had bad experiences with Dell, pretty good experiences with Fujitsu, and the rest of my laptops have been Apple or IBM.
Click to expand...
 
Skip the Mac. I've had 2 crap out and they never left the house.
My buddies just killed a monitor and another neighbors just lost a motherboard.
The clowns wanted $600 to replace the MB since it isnt " a user installable item".
I like Mac's OS and my iMac has been fine but skip the Macbook movie. Junk.

Dell laptops are pretty popular down here. The price is pretty good too.
 
I have had good luck with the Dells and just bought an Inspiron 1545 for 499.00 Check them out. Good value for the buck.
 
Thanks guys,

I know this might be a stupid question....but what about the new Acer's? Compact little guys and have decent RAM/HD and battery life.

I have read mixed reviews on them though.

But, might be a decent little laptop and save me a couple hundred bucks??? I know..you get what ya pay for:cool:
 
Stay away from Dell. My company has nothing but issues from them. I bought one on a whim a couple of years ago. Bad idea. They have applications in the background that really whack up the BIOS. I would say 6 out of 10 Dells are crap.

I have been impressed with HP laptops. So far they are working good and at a good price point, I think you could find some used HPs or refurbished ones for a good deal , right around 500 dollars.

IBM/Lenova's are awesome.. but super expensive..but if you can find an older one refurbished... snag it up. I had an IBM/Lenova 720 that was a tank. It was knocked over by one of my yingyang employee's...it hit the floor hard and some goofball in sales spilled his coffee on the keyboard too. I wish i still had it...but it was leased, so I had to put it back in the company stockpile.

Acers are ...meh.. its a grabbag. Some are good , some are problems childs...but for what you are doing.. it will work. email and such... Throw Linux on the bad boy and emulate windows in the background.. thats what I'm talking about.
 
Thank you for the info sir. Funny how a lot of you guys say stay away from Dell...My mom bought a brand new syatem a few months ago....dead out of the box.....took her a god damn month to get her money back after fighting with them.

I think I will try my luck with HP or Toshiba.....I like the Dell XPS...but...Its a Dell....lol

So you think a refurbed model would be ok? I see tons of them on flea bay, new/re furbished for almost half the cost of a new one...some only have 90 warranty though....some offer a year factory warranty:thumbup:

I might try a refurbed model if I can find a good warranty on one!

Thanks again pardner, good info here.

45

Stavrou0 said:
Stay away from Dell. My company has nothing but issues from them. I bought one on a whim a couple of years ago. Bad idea. They have applications in the background that really whack up the BIOS. I would say 6 out of 10 Dells are crap.

I have been impressed with HP laptops. So far they are working good and at a good price point, I think you could find some used HPs or refurbished ones for a good deal , right around 500 dollars.

IBM/Lenova's are awesome.. but super expensive..but if you can find an older one refurbished... snag it up. I had an IBM/Lenova 720 that was a tank. It was knocked over by one of my yingyang employee's...it hit the floor hard and some goofball in sales spilled his coffee on the keyboard too. I wish i still had it...but it was leased, so I had to put it back in the company stockpile.

Acers are ...meh.. its a grabbag. Some are good , some are problems childs...but for what you are doing.. it will work. email and such... Throw Linux on the bad boy and emulate windows in the background.. thats what I'm talking about.
Click to expand...
 
I have had nothing but problems with Dell and avoid them at all costs. Nearly everyone that I know has an HP these days and they all speak highly of the brand.
 
It's a crapshoot. My office used to have nothing but Dells and had no problem. My own issue work PC is a Dell laptop that I've had for 2 trouble-free years, and it sees heavy use. We're now starting to transition to HP laptops, but I have no data yet. I'll get one next year sometime, a few others already have them.

At my old company I had Thinkpads (T42 and T43, over 4 years or so) and loved them to pieces. Oh yes I love me some T series Thinkpads.
 
Asking for laptop opinions is like asking for car opinions. There's no conclusive answer, a brand that's been reliable for one person could be the exact opposite for another. The build quality and reliability differs practically from unit to unit, though there are some models that are more susceptible to problems. It also greatly depends on the user. Some people just don't take care of stuff and freak out when it craps out at the worst time.

I worked retail for a couple years selling/repairing desktops/laptops. It still makes me laugh whenever I hear someone(from individuals to IT to executives) say "I've had nothing but problems with brand X, go with brand Y". As if their minimal experience with different models and brands of computers actually reflect anything.

My opinion on most reliable brand? None. I pretty much saw every brand equally(brought in for repair), with equal number of people claiming they'll never buy that certain brand again. Of course the problems varied from user-error to a parts randomly dying, or sometimes it'd be a Windows problem not related to hardware at all.

My advice is to go with the features you're looking for, trying to get the best value at the price that you want. Brand is the last thing I would be concerned about(when the issue of cost is involved).

If price isn't a concern, you do normally get what you pay for. Lenovo(the Chinese company that bought IBM's ThinkPad division) and Apple are pricey, but definitely more reliable.
 
Yup these co use parts made from other areas. All you are buying is the pieces they put together. Processor, memory,video card, sound card ect.. they don't make anything. They may have vendors make them and put ther name on it.
 
Get a used Mac. Yeah i know...Ill probably get flamed but u can get one for your price range... hardware is very solid and you can run windows on it. Best of everything.
 
I use my laptop 14 to 16 hours a day. So far I've owned Toshiba, HP and ASUS laptops and I have had the best luck out of the ASUS. I also find that I get a faster processor and better video card for less money than other manufacturers. Not to mention they offer a 2 year warranty at no additional cost. YMMV
 
Wait!

Wait just a couple of months, if you can, for the new Windows 7 Operating System.
If you buy a PC now - from any manufacturer - you'll be buying a Vista OS computer, and Vista has never received great reviews.
Copies of Windows 7 which have been "leaked" show it to be a far better system than Vista.

I use PC's and Mac's, and prefer PC's.
But that's a whole 'nother discussion.
 
100eyes said:
Asking for laptop opinions is like asking for car opinions. There's no conclusive answer, a brand that's been reliable for one person could be the exact opposite for another. The build quality and reliability differs practically from unit to unit, though there are some models that are more susceptible to problems. It also greatly depends on the user. Some people just don't take care of stuff and freak out when it craps out at the worst time.

I worked retail for a couple years selling/repairing desktops/laptops. It still makes me laugh whenever I hear someone(from individuals to IT to executives) say "I've had nothing but problems with brand X, go with brand Y". As if their minimal experience with different models and brands of computers actually reflect anything.

My opinion on most reliable brand? None. I pretty much saw every brand equally(brought in for repair), with equal number of people claiming they'll never buy that certain brand again. Of course the problems varied from user-error to a parts randomly dying, or sometimes it'd be a Windows problem not related to hardware at all.

My advice is to go with the features you're looking for, trying to get the best value at the price that you want. Brand is the last thing I would be concerned about(when the issue of cost is involved).

If price isn't a concern, you do normally get what you pay for. Lenovo(the Chinese company that bought IBM's ThinkPad division) and Apple are pricey, but definitely more reliable.
Click to expand...

It is true.. asking for opinions are just that. I have used Dells and seen Dells work fine right out of the box. But I have seen more than enough to not trust them. I have a Dell 800 Inspiron Laptop. It sucks. I use it as a print server for my home network.

I work for a very, very, large tele-communications company, as a network engineer, I have deployed more computers and network equipment than I care to talk about. Been their for over 15 years. I know what works. And Dells are just more prone to application/software bugs, screens losing power, drives breaking, faulty ethernet ports, etc.. That's why we no longer use them as our vendor. We swtiched to HP and back to IBM/Lenova.

If you can, find a good 1 year warranty on a refurbished HP or Toshiba. It will work. At least if it has software problems and you wipe it clean, you can start over without dealing with bios issues and other crappy problems.

Try to find a used IBM T42 as well. They are AWESOME . My Director of Global networking had one. One Bada$$ laptop. :D
 
At my university, we've never (to my knowledge) had problems with Dells, just a tad small for my taste. I prefer big screens so I can see what I'm doing. I have/had a HP laptop for 5 years before it had some error which forced it to shutdown.

Great laptops from HP, and printers too :thumbup:

As far as dell, I suppose it's a 50/50, but all my experiences were positive. That could be because the school does it's own routine checks on everything :o

Right now I'm typing on a COMPAQ Presario (my fiance's) and it's lasted since before I knew her (5 years +). Great little laptop and we use it as our "base" computer since we don't have a desktop.

Get what yer money can buy and I would recommend either brand spanking new (you don't want to buy a problem) or even checking out a local computer repair shop as they buy used laptops and fix them up real good since they know everything there is about computers (and typically have some sort of warranty, bring back period, or will repair for free).

I hope this helps, J.
 
45warrior said:
RAM expandable to 4 gig
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If you are going to buy a Windows laptop you need to get the 64-bit OS to utilize all 4 gig of ram.


I am currently using a Dell XPS and it is great. Our house also has 3 Dells that have been fine.

That said, I would look at the laptop deals that are at Bestbuy. I think that they have a very nice HP for about $800. I know you said $500 but that is a hard price point for a new laptop.
 
Thanks again guys!!!

So far I am torn between the Dell XPS, Toshiba Satellit and HP models.

See some good deals on new ones on GayBay and my local Craigslist. Just waiting to hear back from a few people first.

I appreciate all the help everyone. Have narrowed it down a lot since deciding to buy another:thumbup:

Best to you guys,

45

J's Knives-N-More said:
At my university, we've never (to my knowledge) had problems with Dells, just a tad small for my taste. I prefer big screens so I can see what I'm doing. I have/had a HP laptop for 5 years before it had some error which forced it to shutdown.

Great laptops from HP, and printers too :thumbup:

As far as dell, I suppose it's a 50/50, but all my experiences were positive. That could be because the school does it's own routine checks on everything :o

Right now I'm typing on a COMPAQ Presario (my fiance's) and it's lasted since before I knew her (5 years +). Great little laptop and we use it as our "base" computer since we don't have a desktop.

Get what yer money can buy and I would recommend either brand spanking new (you don't want to buy a problem) or even checking out a local computer repair shop as they buy used laptops and fix them up real good since they know everything there is about computers (and typically have some sort of warranty, bring back period, or will repair for free).

I hope this helps, J.
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