What work laptop?

[Merlot]

Due to a change in my role, I now have two offices in the same building. Rather than have a clunky desktop in each office, I have been told I can get a laptop. It doesn't have to be ultra portable nor a traditional 'tough' business laptop, but I'd like something with a bit of punch.

There is no budget as such, but as I work for local Government and it is being purchased from public funds, I would prefer to keep it around £500 (ex VAT).

I've been looking at the lowest spec Samsung R580 which comes in about £460 (we currently have an evaluation example that I've played with and I like it, but it feels a bit cheap compared to my Dell XPS home notebook).

http://www.samsung.com/uk/consumer/pc-peripherals/...

Thoughts? Alternatives?

[V]

I bought, and subsqeuently returned, a samsung r580. Its a nice laptop, I thought its very well built with a cool paint effect and good keyboard. Its also fairly light for a 15.6" laptop. Performance is excellent with the intel i3 CPU and Nvidia dedicated graphics. Connectivity is very good too, you have 802.11N, Gigabit and Bluetooth all standard. My main issue though was the screen, its resolution is low at 1366 x 768 (same as my 10" VAIO netbook) and it feels fairly cramped after a while. I also found the viewing angles to be poor, and colours below par. Shame really as in all other repsects its a sound buy. Now back to using my MacBook...

Edited by V on Thursday 1st April 23:29

[Merlot]

V said:

I bought, and subsqeuently returned, a samsung r580. Its a nice laptop, I thought its very well built with a cool paint effect and good keyboard. Its also fairly light for a 15.6" laptop. Performance is excellent with the intel i3 CPU and Nvidia dedicated graphics. Connectivity is very good too, you have 802.11N, Gigabit and Bluetooth all standard. My main issue though was the screen, its resolution is low at 1366 x 768 (same as my 10" VAIO netbook) and it feels fairly cramped after a while. I also found the viewing angles to be poor, and colours below par. Shame really as in all other repsects its a sound buy. Now back to using my MacBook...

Edited by V on Thursday 1st April 23:29

Thanks for the info. I do a fair amount of spreadsheet work so prefer wider screens - I sometimes use my own Dell XPS which has the hi-res 1440x900 and that is fine, I was thinking 1366x768 would be acceptable. My current work desktop is 1280x1024. Perhaps I'll need to buy an additional screen as I don't really want a bigger 17" laptop.

With you on the visuals, although for a work laptop this wouldn't really bother me so much. The XPS has such an amazing screen I'm somewhat spoilt.

I'm also looking at the Dell Studio 15, I can get one of these with the 1920x1080 LED screen for £510, similar core specs to the R580 but with less connectivity (BT, HDMI),

[V]

Don't have much experience with the Studio 15 but on paper looks quite good, and you will be able to see much more on the screen with it been 1920 x 1080.

[TurricanII]

If you already have a computer in one office, I would suggest you consider using a clunky old computer in the other office to remote control your main computer. Saves lugging a laptop around!