Another Annoying Laptop Request

gaffmaster

Hi all.

I come on here now and again and read all of your excellent advice and wonder how you have the patience to help so many buyers with their research. Kudos to the helpers

Now for the most annoying of all pleas for help...

I am going to buy a laptop in the next couple of weeks and would love some input from people who know more about them than i do.

Budget: €1,300

Uses: Internet, Word Processing, Photograph Manipulating, Possible CAD work, eventually recording music (non-professionally).

Processor: minimum speed 1.8gHz

RAM: 1Gig MIN!!

Memory: 60 Gig min

Features: Need to do more research on this but... Wireless internet, Multi-media, Bluetooth (maybe not completely necessary but could be handy), TV Tuner (maybe this is overkill?)

Screen: Lower than 17". I'd rather a more portable laptop than one with a big screen.

I would preferably buy the laptop in a shop in Dublin or the suburbs so i can bring it back if needs be.

I would like to avoid Dell as most people i know who have a Dell laptop say they would not get another one.

I would like the system to come with as little programs installed as possible, theres so much crud you get with PCs now that you never use.

I would like it to be relatively future-proof?


So if anyone can recommend a brand or model for me i'd be greatly appreciative.

Cheers!!

thebman

http://www.pcworld.ie/productDetails.aspx?productRID=1418&image=Sony

You'd probably have to check if it's in stock in your local Pc World. I ran some checks to see could I find common problems and didn't find anything bad on it.

I don't think you should just not buy from Dell because of what you've said. I've had two. First wasn't great, broke a week outside warranty and it was an Inspiron. After that I did my homework and I've gotten a Latitude model which has stood the test of time and has a 3 year warranty and I've been knocked off my bike on the way to college twice and landed on it and other than a few scatches, it's fine.

With Dell you'd probably get everything you want aswell because you can customize them so easily. I suspect most of the people you know that are unhappy with Dells bought Inspiron's and some probably increased all the specs and ended up with something that overheated itself until it broke.

I looked at some of Toshiba's etc.. there but there doesn't seem to be a match for your specs for that price unless you want a Compaq which was suspiciously cheaper than the other models there. The Sony is also much nicer IMO and comes with Intel where as the Compaq has an AMD processor.

All laptops come loaded with crap softwre at this stage, it's one of the ways they get the price down.

Intel Graphics Media Accel 900 <- worst thing about the Sony laptop IMO. You won't play many games with it and it might make some of the CAD & Photo Manipulating sluggish at times. I don't know much about CAD but I presume it works the graphics cards a bit.

By the way for messing with music etc.., check out Audacity. free, Open Source sound editor/recorder etc... Really good for what it is.

Your also in an unfortunate position in that you want a small laptop for doing photo work which is better done on a big screen IMO. Also a portable laptop with beefy desktop replacement specs doesn't exist IMO. Weight relates to power generally as it's the battery and fans that are adding most of the weight.

Anyway Sony laptops are supposed to be pretty good. I've not heard of anyone that had serious issues with them.

gaffmaster

Thanks for the detailed reply Brim4brim.

Hugh_C

gaffmaster wrote:

So if anyone can recommend a brand or model for me i'd be greatly appreciative.

Cheers!!

You should have a look at an Apple MacBook, pretty much meets all your requirements except the TV tuner, although I believe you can get some sort of outboard box to do this. 1GB ram is a BTO on the Apple Store, does wifi as standard, bluetooth, >2GHz (Intel Core Duo), SuperDrive (DVD±RW, CD-RW), great OS virus-free, built in firewall, word processing, image manipulation comes as standard. etc etc. You should kust take a look at the website and see for yourself. About €1300 inc VAT.

thebman

Yeah OSX instead of Windows on a Macbook.

If you have a valid Windows License thats not a problem but most people want or need Windows.

It takes a bit of getting used thats all and some of the codecs for playing Windows Media Player files have to be setup. It's not too much but IMO they cost too much for what they are and the OS isn't worth it.

For AV and stuff, you can free downloads in seconds to cover that stuff for Windows and then your done. With Macs you have to worry about drivers etc... especially in the Windows flooded Ireland, most people won't know what a Mac is.

Not trying to put you off it but read up on it first. Those are reasonable specs though if they are correct, there are also rumours they are being updated soon so might be worth waiting if the price won't go up.

By the way, check out extended warranties on any laptop you buy, they might be worth it as with a laptop, you can just get unlucky. They take a lot of abuse are impossible to fix yourself usually so it might be worth it.

realblackstuff

Check out Dawn Micro Systems, 2 Willowfield Park, D14 (corner of the Clonskeagh road, where Victor Motors used to be).
He sells some quite decent used Asus (and other) laptops.

gaffmaster

Thanks for the replies!

I'm afraid a mac is out of the question for me. The reason is i will most likely be running a CAD package on the machine. Microstation or AutoCAD and they run best / only run (not sure) on PCs.

Are Asus a good brand?

Hugh_C

brim4brim wrote:

For AV and stuff, you can free downloads in seconds to cover that stuff for Windows and then your done. With Macs you have to worry about drivers etc... especially in the Windows flooded Ireland, most people won't know what a Mac is.

Not necessarily true - any digital stills or movie camera I've hooked up to my Macs so far have been recognised instantly without a need for downloading drivers - this covers Canon, Nikon, Sony and Fuji brands. Don't have any experience outside of those devices.

There are CAD applications that run on Mac, don't know which ones though...

:mad:

Tom Dunne

Ok ladies, this is not going to descend into a flamewar of Macs vs. Windows.

Keep the handbags firmly on the shoulders or I'll have to whip out my Manbag*






























*There are so many things so wrong with that statement. I apologise, but you get the point.

thebman

hughchal wrote:

Not necessarily true - any digital stills or movie camera I've hooked up to my Macs so far have been recognised instantly without a need for downloading drivers - this covers Canon, Nikon, Sony and Fuji brands. Don't have any experience outside of those devices.

There are CAD applications that run on Mac, don't know which ones though...

:mad:

I was more talking about printers, MP3 players and basically everything you'll connect. When you buy a mac, you check to see if it's compatible. With Windows you can just assume it'll work about 99% of the time.

As for ASUS.

Short answer yes you should consider them but again do homework on the particular model.

Good read (Why choose ASUS notebooks):
http://store.agearnotebooks.com/asusnotebook.html

IBM/Lenovo Thinkpads are another excellent buy IMO if you have the cash that is.

Hugh_C

brim4brim wrote:

I was more talking ...MP3 players

you mean there's something out there other than the iPod?