Laptop - Which one?
Discussion
Mum wants to buy the old man a Laptop for his 60th, and I've been tasked with product selection(????!!). All I think he'll want is something he can browse the internet on and send/receive emails, without being attached to the wall. Does anyone have any suggestions? Max budget of around £750.
Cheers,
Chilli.
Cheers,
Chilli.
I'd normally recommend Toshiba for laptops. Good machines and warranties. Best prices would more than likely be www.dabs.com or www.insight.co.uk (and I don't work for either !!)
Dell deals are good, but I think their service can be a bit lacking personally.
Also, try Evesham and Mesh as they are pretty good normally (I USED to work for one of them)
Avoid PC World if at all possible
All IMHO of course
HTH
Steve
Dell deals are good, but I think their service can be a bit lacking personally.
Also, try Evesham and Mesh as they are pretty good normally (I USED to work for one of them)
Avoid PC World if at all possible
All IMHO of course
HTH
Steve
I bought an ACER 3023WLMi (no longer a current model), ex demo. Which blew up within a week of my having it.
They sent me a replacement (brand new for ex-demo price - result) and to be fair it is brilliant; fast, reliable and packed with features (including sparate graphics card - rare at the £600 range). Heartily recommended. Only downside - the bundled NTI multimedia software is poor. But you can download free software to replace it from the net, so no problem. Oh, and the onboard speakers are utterly rubbish.
Very good screen on it too - unusual for a budget widescreen laptop.
But £600 (or £450 in my case
) got me 80Mb hard drive, integrated wireless, 512Mb RAM, Radeon X700 graphics card, CrystalBrite screen (very good actually - ACER's own technology), 4xUSB ports, 1 x Firewire port, 1 S-Video out (useful as you can connect to your TV), Dual Layer DVD/CD writer. It is far better specced than my best friend's Dell, which was £100 or so more RRP.
>> Edited by Harry Flashman on Monday 7th November 13:31
They sent me a replacement (brand new for ex-demo price - result) and to be fair it is brilliant; fast, reliable and packed with features (including sparate graphics card - rare at the £600 range). Heartily recommended. Only downside - the bundled NTI multimedia software is poor. But you can download free software to replace it from the net, so no problem. Oh, and the onboard speakers are utterly rubbish.
Very good screen on it too - unusual for a budget widescreen laptop.
But £600 (or £450 in my case
) got me 80Mb hard drive, integrated wireless, 512Mb RAM, Radeon X700 graphics card, CrystalBrite screen (very good actually - ACER's own technology), 4xUSB ports, 1 x Firewire port, 1 S-Video out (useful as you can connect to your TV), Dual Layer DVD/CD writer. It is far better specced than my best friend's Dell, which was £100 or so more RRP. >> Edited by Harry Flashman on Monday 7th November 13:31
I'm posting this via a IBM T42 which is a great laptop but expensive (I didn't pay for it!)
Try the usual suspects Dell, Toshiba etc.
My mate brought a very nice Advent laptop about a year ago from PC World. Very compact widescreen, silver case. Quite an impressive bit of kit. Well worth a look IMO. It was in your price range as well.
Try the usual suspects Dell, Toshiba etc.
My mate brought a very nice Advent laptop about a year ago from PC World. Very compact widescreen, silver case. Quite an impressive bit of kit. Well worth a look IMO. It was in your price range as well.
chilli said:
Try the Dell website they're pretty good, and you should be able to get something good for £750 these days.
Yeah, looked on there...Got some nice ones, but if I want to ask questions I get routed to a person in the Indian call centre, who knows less than I do!!!
Yes but they can always tell you what the weather is like in Liverpool and what happened last week on Eastenders.
shaw-cross shark said:
I'd normally recommend Toshiba for laptops. Good machines and warranties. Best prices would more than likely be www.dabs.com or www.insight.co.uk (and I don't work for either !!)
Dell deals are good, but I think their service can be a bit lacking personally.
Also, try Evesham and Mesh as they are pretty good normally (I USED to work for one of them)
Avoid PC World if at all possible
All IMHO of course
HTH
Steve
Unless you go through the business side, which tends to be significantly better than the usual retail side(OK OK, not necessarily anything to be proud of
) >> Edited by wolves_wanderer on Monday 7th November 13:52
pmanson said:
I'm posting this via a IBM T42 which is a great laptop but expensive (I didn't pay for it!)
Try the usual suspects Dell, Toshiba etc.
My mate brought a very nice Advent laptop about a year ago from PC World. Very compact widescreen, silver case. Quite an impressive bit of kit. Well worth a look IMO. It was in your price range as well.
The T42 is probably the Best all rounder PC laptop you can buy, but by god the prices are extortinate, but then it's aimed at business users not home use. I think that would be serious overkill for an old guy who just wants to send emails and do some web browsing. You really dont need a ton of features for that, any old base spec machine will do, it comes down to price and warranty/service in this case.
I'd go for the Apple iBook. It's a Mac so you won't have any problems with spy-ware, viruses etc... also they're well built and simple to use.
They start from £699.
They start from £699.
r988 said:
The T42 is probably the Best all rounder PC laptop you can buy, but by god the prices are extortinate, but then it's aimed at business users not home use. I think that would be serious overkill for an old guy who just wants to send emails and do some web browsing. You really dont need a ton of features for that, any old base spec machine will do, it comes down to price and warranty/service in this case.
I was recommending it just stating a fact lol.
Like you say its a superb bit of kit! I wouldn't pay the money that IBM want for it but it was a leaving present from work after my uni placement. So I can't complain!
Its worth asking if this is a desktop replacement that stays at home or will it be moved around frequently. (Size and weight can be a pain if its being moved frequently).
theaxe said:
I'd go for the Apple iBook. It's a Mac so you won't have any problems with spy-ware, viruses etc... also they're well built and simple to use.
They start from £699.
jimothy said:
I'd go for the Apple iBook. It's a Mac so you won't have any problems with spy-ware, viruses etc... also they're well built and simple to use.
They start from £699.
Looked at these....They look the nuts....However, unless I've got it all wrong, your only "Wireless" up to 45 feet away from some kinda base unit..... Is there one that's wireless where-ever you are??
pmanson said:
The T42 is probably the Best all rounder PC laptop you can buy, but by god the prices are extortinate, but then it's aimed at business users not home use. I think that would be serious overkill for an old guy who just wants to send emails and do some web browsing. You really dont need a ton of features for that, any old base spec machine will do, it comes down to price and warranty/service in this case.
I was recommending it just stating a fact lol.
Like you say its a superb bit of kit! I wouldn't pay the money that IBM want for it but it was a leaving present from work after my uni placement. So I can't complain!
Its worth asking if this is a desktop replacement that stays at home or will it be moved around frequently. (Size and weight can be a pain if its being moved frequently).
We use IBM only here and they are pretty good but the docking stations are very fragile considering the reason for having them is to attach and re-attach the laptop frequently and easily
The IBM laptops do have problems with hard drive failure, we are frequently returning or rebuilding them.
My personal laptop for home use is a Toshiba Satellite, bought in Switzerland for the equivalent of £550 (£850 in the UK), still a current model and is excellent so far. It has a nice 15" TFT and is pretty fast to use, has a nice integrated mouse pad. It could do with a couple more USB ports though.
I've had Sony VAIO now for about 4 years, and I've (touching wood right now) never had a problem with it. Now the other thing to remember is that I bought on the cheaper end of the scale I think I paid £670 for it back then.
I was looking not a few days ago at upgrading, although I don;t really need to, but if you have a look at the model below, this is what I had my eye on. Seems to have everything, and with Sony, you know you are getting a good make. I always try to buy sony, and I've found over the last 5 years, I've been pleasently suprised time and again. for wuality and value for money. Again, it's not all singing and all dancing, but then how much power do you really need? and is he going to be playing hardcore 3d rendered gamining applications etc...
Anyway, thats my 2p...
Bugger just tried and cant get the website up but take a look at www.scan.co.uk
Cheers,
JC
I was looking not a few days ago at upgrading, although I don;t really need to, but if you have a look at the model below, this is what I had my eye on. Seems to have everything, and with Sony, you know you are getting a good make. I always try to buy sony, and I've found over the last 5 years, I've been pleasently suprised time and again. for wuality and value for money. Again, it's not all singing and all dancing, but then how much power do you really need? and is he going to be playing hardcore 3d rendered gamining applications etc...
Anyway, thats my 2p...
Bugger just tried and cant get the website up but take a look at www.scan.co.uk
Cheers,
JC
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