Quick Laptop opinions please..

[Fastra]

My Dad bought my son a laptop from Currys for Christmas and I've just noticed a dead pixel smack bang in the middle of the screen.
I'm just about to take it back for an exchange, BUT I've just noticed on their site a machine that's possibly a much better spec for the same money.

We've got this;

http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/toshiba-satellite-c66...

TOSHIBA Satellite C660 15.6" Laptop - Grey £349.99
Dual-core AMD E-450 processor
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64-bit
Memory: 6GB
Hard drive: 320GB

and I'm going to see if I can swap it for this;

http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/hp-pavilion-g6-1210sa...

HP Pavilion g6-1210sa 15.6" Laptop - Red £349.00
Intel® Core™ i3-370M processor
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64-bit
Memory: 6GB
Hard drive: 640GB


Is the spec on the HP that much better though?

[sday12]

No, it's red.

[Fastra]

Ah - good spot - thanks matey.

[joebongo]

Be interesting to see if they do allow an exchange as they have weasel worded small print where they don't class less than a certain number of dead pixels as a fault.

Edit to add you can often massage the pixel back to health by rubbing the screen at the point of the dead pixel. Worth a google.

Edited by joebongo on Monday 26th December 09:55

[Fastra]

Yeah - I thought there maybe something like that.
Most places allow up to 3 pixels before it's deemed a fault, I'll give it a go though.

Hopefully I'll collar some 17 year old part-timer who couldn't really give a toss.


EDIT - tried tapping and rubbing the screen, but with no success.

Edited by Fastra on Monday 26th December 09:57

[papercup]

Dead pixels after a while can be difficult with warranties sometimes, but this was from new; thats different. Take it back.

If Currys give you any crap whatsoever, call Toshiba themselves; their support is excellent, and I would think that with the fault being 'out of the box' they'll swap it straight for a new unit (not repair it).

[Kudos]

Once bought a 22" tv from them and had a dead pixel. Took it back and exchanged no problem, except the replacement had the exact same problem!

[Fastra]

Do we reckon that the HP I mentioned is a better machien though?
Because once (IF) I get a replacement I might bung it back at them as an unopened return and swap it for the HP.

[papercup]

You'll be unlikely to fill a 320gb hard drive before the laptops end-of-life, and £350 laptops will thrown away due to being slow before they break. So the hard drive size is irrelevant.

Not sure on the processor; the only other thing thats different. Look at some comparisons. The Intel i3 is a bit pants anyway, I'd think an equivalent price AMD will be just as good. They are both bottom end of the market.

Bottom line for me? Toshiba laptops are better than HP, end of story. I'd keep the Tosh (but get a replacement).

Thats personal opinion, based on ten years experience in the sector.

[Fastra]

Thanks Papercup.



I had a look at this:

http://compare-processors.com/amd-e-450-vs-intel-c...

...and I think the jist of it recommends the i3 over the AMD - although you're right, neither are exactly speed machines.

[DrTre]

I'd get the money back then head to JL to pick up the better specced Tosh they're selling for £50 more.

320GB will be eaten up. Hell, I'm not a teenager with a load of music/games/dvd rips/porn* and don't' own a digi camera but I annihilate HDD space so I reckon the OPs son will too..

• to be fair, the latter of those I probably do hold my own on,...so to speak...

[DrTre]

FWIW my mother has last years Satellite bought at Xmas, HDD went a month ago, Tosh sorted it no quibble (as you'd expect) but I can't say I was impressed tbh.
One sample of many thousands though.

[Matthen]

papercup said:

You'll be unlikely to fill a 320gb hard drive before the laptops end-of-life, and £350 laptops will thrown away due to being slow before they break. So the hard drive size is irrelevant.

Not sure on the processor; the only other thing thats different. Look at some comparisons. The Intel i3 is a bit pants anyway, I'd think an equivalent price AMD will be just as good. They are both bottom end of the market.

Bottom line for me? Toshiba laptops are better than HP, end of story. I'd keep the Tosh (but get a replacement).

Thats personal opinion, based on ten years experience in the sector.

You're wrong. End of.

I3-370m = 2.4 GHz with multithreading, so it is, in effect, a quad core 3mb cache
AMD Fusion 1.65GHz Duel core, 1mb cache

The HP is going to be heavier on the juice, but the Intel CPU is leaps and bounds ahead of the AMD one in this case. The HP one is also better put together, ive never seen a recent HP laptop fall apart, and yet virtually every toshiba we've got at work has had its video lead replaced multiple times, and the hinges also get week and start to cause the screen to wobble.

Change it if you can. Although, note - the HP laptop does not have discrete graphics - although i am unsure how powerful the graphics are in the Toshiba - so any computer gaming you wish to do may look worse on the HP.

[Fastra]

Thanks lads - most helpful as usual!


Took it back with no hassle at all.
During the exchange I mentioned that I'd seen the HP deal on the way in and how it seemed a good deal.
She reckoned it was a far better machine and said I could swap it with batting an eyelid.

I have to say the service was excellent and I was in and out within 10 minutes.

As far as the spec goes though, my lad (12) understands it's not a gaming machine (he's got an xbox for that) and will primarily be used for homework using Powerpoint and Word - he might use it for a bit of video editing too. He's quite computer savvy really so knows its limits.

I'm going to put Crysis on it though - for test purposes..!