Help needed on Laptop choice - please!

[chrisk]

I don't need it for anything fancy, just cheap and cheerful, powerpoint, photos and internet.

I've narrowed it down to these two but I'm not knowledgable to be able to distinguish a winner out of the two, is the HP worth £40 more (bigger screen and DVD writer - will be nice) than the Dell? Is it true dell laptops are cack??

Someone please educate this fool so he doesn't make a wrong decision!!

My two choices:

http://www1.euro.dell.com/content/pro The £329 one, only 90 day return to base warranty.

or

www.microdirect.co.uk/(16350)HP-510-Notebook-CM360-140-GHz-512MB-60GB.aspx

Which is the better buy??!

Any help is appreciated, your opinions are appreciated!

[chrisk]

Just to say if anyone knows any better laptop for the money I'd be please to hear from you!!

[.Mark]

I don't have any real answers for you but have come across both Dell and HP laptops before and to me they feel a bit Flimsy.
I can recommend however the Lenovo/IBM range. Top machines, very robust and through Dabs.com very reasonably priced.

[ThePassenger]

I guess from looking at the two machines mentioned you're looking at the extreme budget end of new?

Semperon = Celeron, they're from different manufacturers but both are the budget chips (Athlon and Core 2 being the upmarket brethren). Personally I'd say those two units are pretty much identical in terms of power and capabilities. Although Dell offering a 90day collect/return in addition to the 1 year RTB is nice.

Take a look around some of the white box vendors like novatech before plunking down the readies though, you might find something a little more grunty and well built.

[plasticpig]

I would go for the HP one. There again I am an HP reseller so I would say that! I doubt they are making more than £40 profit on it and probably only £30. The HP retail price is £470.

[chrisk]

How about this, looks favourite so far.....

www.dabs.com/productview.aspx?Quicklinx=49VS&CategorySelectedId=11105&PageMode=1&NavigationKey=11105%2c50600

Has a few more features, firewire would be used too....