Cheap Laptop

TheSheriff

Theyll honour it ! Just print out the confirmation as The_Conductor said!

Ive done it before!

gaillimhabu

Make sure you bring the email confirmation of the discounted price. A family member tried to pick up mine with just the reservation number and they didn't honour it. They need proof I got it for €319.99 as their sale price wasn't that low according to themselves. Mentioned €100 off instead of €180. Will like to see their face once I head in with the email. This was in Galway by the way. Some of the others my be different

Stallingrad

€350 on Pixmania.

http://www.pixmania.ie/search/F551CA.html

Marie212

Asus F-Series F551CA Core i3 15.6 Inch 4GB 500GB Laptop.... reduced to 309.99 again in Argos

Stallingrad

Marie212 wrote: »

Asus F-Series F551CA Core i3 15.6 Inch 4GB 500GB Laptop.... reduced to 309.99 again in Argos

Cheers Marie, nabbed one.

Nono Toure

Marie212 wrote: »

Asus F-Series F551CA Core i3 15.6 Inch 4GB 500GB Laptop.... reduced to 309.99 again in Argos

For those of you who have bought one of these, are they good? I'm looking for a new laptop, my head is wrecked with researching. When I find one I think I'll buy the reviews are not the best. Unfortunately my budget is low, so if this is a good laptop then I'll buy it at that price.

The_Conductor

Nono Toure wrote: »

For those of you who have bought one of these, are they good? I'm looking for a new laptop, my head is wrecked with researching. When I find one I think I'll buy the reviews are not the best. Unfortunately my budget is low, so if this is a good laptop then I'll buy it at that price.

It really depends on what you need the laptop to do.
This is a very good, decent, budget laptop.
You're not going to play games on it though- and they have used some cheaper components to keep costs down- for example, its single band 2.4Ghz wireless- which is perfectly fine for most people.

At this price point- there is no competitor product available in bricks-and-mortar shops in Ireland.

Nono Toure

The_Conductor wrote: »

It really depends on what you need the laptop to do.
This is a very good, decent, budget laptop.
You're not going to play games on it though- and they have used some cheaper components to keep costs down- for example, its single band 2.4Ghz wireless- which is perfectly fine for most people.

At this price point- there is no competitor product available in bricks-and-mortar shops in Ireland.

Thanks for that.

I'll only be using it for internet, email, YouTube and Skype the odd time. I won't be gaming. My current laptop is an Acer which I've had for over 5 years.

Is this one on Amazon better? Dam, can't post a link. It's an Asus X551MA-SX018H

I can get it for €300 in a brick & mortar shop. Thanks

The_Conductor

Nono Toure wrote: »

Thanks for that.

I'll only be using it for internet, email, YouTube and Skype the odd time. I won't be gaming. My current laptop is an Acer which I've had for over 5 years.

Is this one on Amazon better? Dam, can't post a link. It's an Asus X551MA-SX018H

I can get it for €300 in a brick & mortar shop. Thanks

Depends on which processor is in it.
The Argos one is a Core i3 Haswell.
If this is an Atom or a Celeron- despite it being 'newer' it won't have the same processing power as the Argos one.

At this price point- you're looking at the processor pretty much in isolation of everything else (as there is bog all difference in the other components)

Nono Toure

The_Conductor wrote: »

Depends on which processor is in it.
The Argos one is a Core i3 Haswell.
If this is an Atom or a Celeron- despite it being 'newer' it won't have the same processing power as the Argos one.

At this price point- you're looking at the processor pretty much in isolation of everything else (as there is bog all difference in the other components)

Thanks, it's a Celeron N2815 which runs at 1.5GHz.

So do you reckon the one in Argos as mentioned by the OP is the one I should buy for its price and for what I need in terms of basic use?

The_Conductor

Its more than capable of doing anything you've described (and more).
I'd go with the Argos one- if it were me (I'm not in the market for a laptop).

Nono Toure

The_Conductor wrote: »

Its more than capable of doing anything you've described (and more).
I'd go with the Argos one- if it were me (I'm not in the market for a laptop).

Thanks for that.

RickyBobby1

Wife is looking for a new laptop and we are on a tight budget. She will be using it for internet , online streaming and research for course work.
Would the Argos one be good enough?

40now

On the Dell website they have a 15 inch laptop, 4gb ram, 500 gig hard drive, hdmi connection and includes delivery for 219e, I've seen this on boards somewhere and looks good to me, but I know very little about this kinda stuff.
I think the laptop is called Dell 15.

40now

On the Dell website they have a 15 inch laptop, 4gb ram, 500 gig hard drive, hdmi connection and includes delivery for 219e, I've seen this on boards somewhere and looks good to me, but I know very little about this kinda stuff.
I think the laptop is called Dell 15.

The_Conductor

40now wrote: »

On the Dell website they have a 15 inch laptop, 4gb ram, 500 gig hard drive, hdmi connection and includes delivery for 219e, I've seen this on boards somewhere and looks good to me, but I know very little about this kinda stuff.
I think the laptop is called Dell 15.

The lowest priced laptop on the Irish Dell website is 249
It has no DVD drive- and is a Celeron/Atom processor.
Their lowest priced i3 laptop- is 379.

Nono Toure

Sh1t, all the Asus laptops mentioned by the op are out of stock in most, if not all the Argos shops!

branners69

Nono Toure wrote: »

For those of you who have bought one of these, are they good? I'm looking for a new laptop, my head is wrecked with researching. When I find one I think I'll buy the reviews are not the best. Unfortunately my budget is low, so if this is a good laptop then I'll buy it at that price.

I picked one up over the weekend and it is fine for web, netflix, and streaming HD etc. Was streaming the football in HD no problem.

I moved from a 6 year old Acer Aspire 6920g and whilst the ASUS has a very plastic feel to it in comparison to the solidness of the Acer, I am happy with my purchase so far!

One downside is the 2 usb ports, I use a wireless mouse so I am down to one port being free. And if I want to connect two hard drives I have to unplug the mouse and use the touch pad. I will have to pick up a USB hub.

MRTULES

So what are the contenders for best value budget laptop available either in store or on line? Say sub €350 unless there is something ridiculously good for not much more.
There seems to be consensus for things like phone= moto g and tablet= nexus 7. I know things change quickly but is there even a comparable bang for buck laptop that can be used as a reference point?
Thanks.

branners69

MRTULES wrote: »

I know things change quickly but is there even a comparable bang for buck laptop that can be used as a reference point?
Thanks.

I think this laptop is it! You cant get much better for the price! And this is from a Nexus 7 owner and whose wife has a Moto g!

MRTULES

branners69 wrote: »

I think this laptop is it! You cant get much better for the price! And this is from a Nexus 7 owner and whose wife has a Moto g!

Thanks. I will use this as my benchmark so. Unfortunately its pretty much sold out everywhere with Argos. Much appreciate the advise.

branners69

MRTULES wrote: »

Thanks. I will use this as my benchmark so. Unfortunately its pretty much sold out everywhere with Argos. Much appreciate the advise.

Unless you want to game or do some serious video editing this laptop will do pretty much everything else!

The_Conductor

Basic budget laptops- change far more frequently than does the Moto G or the Nexus 7 though- and they tend to be available in far lower quantities than the other products.

If you're looking for a basic entry level product- that evolves but hovers under the 400 mark- the Dell 15 basic model is probably as good as it gets (for a consistent choice).

You will get short term offers that feature better spec'ed machines- Lenovo in particular are infamous for offloading stocks of rather pleasingly spec'ed machines at improbably low prices- however, they are only ever in small quantities- and for very short periods of time.

Offers- immediately preceding the launch of new processors- tend to be pretty good all round- for example- a lot of people have been holding off on buying Nexus 7s- as there is a new Nexus 9 with an Nvidia K chip due out at Google's October bash- so its entirely foreseeable that there will be really good offers on Nexus 7s in the run-up to Christmas- as retailers offload stocks- prior to restocking with the new tablets (should be nice tablets too- HTC are doing them this time).

So- you keep your ear to the ground and keep abreast of whats happening- and time your purchases accordingly.

CYHSN

Picked up one of those asus f551c in argos and pretty happy with it, had to install classic shell to get the start menu back with windows 8.

Is this the same asus laptop that was in argos? It's on Sam Mccauley's with free delivery for €299.99

edit: Its X551MA while argos model was X551C

MRTULES

Just saw your edit above. Pity its not the i3 alright.

beauf

CYHSN wrote: »

Picked up one of those asus f551c in argos and pretty happy with it, had to install classic shell to get the start menu back with windows 8.

Is this the same asus laptop that was in argos? It's on Sam Mccauley's with free delivery for €299.99

edit: Its X551MA while argos model was X551C

The argus one seems to be a i3 and the other a atom?

Is the N2815 a lesser one than the N2830 sold in the Dell one?

conzy

These are also great value for anyone looking for a budget machine,

Lenovo G500, Pentium 2020M, 6GB ram, 1TB disk, USB3, HDMI, not going to get much better for €349. Picked one up for a friend, shipping was €2 for some reason

Nono Toure

I bought one today. Not happy really. When I got home (110 mile round trip) I opened the box to find it had already been opened. There was finger prints all over the laptop and signs of wear on the little rubber grips underneath it!!! I find the cursor unresponsive at times also.

It's an F-series ya? My desktop says Asus X-series... Anyone elses say that?

balfe1990

Anyone ever have a problem when updating to Windows 8.1?

I got my GF this laptop and was attempting to update to 8.1 after *many, many* restarts. It would configure and restart and rinse and repeat at least 10 times.

Finally, tonight, after installing 29 of 29 updates, it tried to configure said updates but the process failed.

Then I got a screen that simply said "Configuring updates failed, reverting to previous settings" or something to that effect.

It'll reboot after a straight 15 mins, hit the ASUS splash screen, attempt to configure updates and "revert" back again, before it restarts. Over and over, endless loop.

Nothing works and its driving me f'ing nuts. Please for the love of God, someone have a solution, my sanity is wearing thin. MS support want a product key, but I cant get the bloody key because I can't boot the thing up!

balfe1990

Nono Toure wrote: »

I bought one today. Not happy really. When I got home (110 mile round trip) I opened the box to find it had already been opened. There was finger prints all over the laptop and signs of wear on the little rubber grips underneath it!!! I find the cursor unresponsive at times also.

It's an F-series ya? My desktop says Asus X-series... Anyone elses say that?

Below the bar code on the underside, it says " F551CA"

Think that's the model number

beauf

balfe1990 wrote: »

Anyone ever have a problem when updating to Windows 8.1?

I got my GF this laptop and was attempting to update to 8.1 after *many, many* restarts. It would configure and restart and rinse and repeat at least 10 times.

Finally, tonight, after installing 29 of 29 updates, it tried to configure said updates but the process failed.

Then I got a screen that simply said "Configuring updates failed, reverting to previous settings" or something to that effect.

It'll reboot after a straight 15 mins, hit the ASUS splash screen, attempt to configure updates and "revert" back again, before it restarts. Over and over, endless loop.

Nothing works and its driving me f'ing nuts. Please for the love of God, someone have a solution, my sanity is wearing thin. MS support want a product key, but I cant get the bloody key because I can't boot the thing up!

Is there any documentation on the Asus site to tell you how to do a clean boot and start over.

Nono Toure

balfe1990 wrote: »

Below the bar code on the underside, it says " F551CA"

Think that's the model number

Ya, mine says F551CA underneath, just confused as to why it says X-series on desktop, even though I'm only after copping on the image on the desktop was just an Asus background pic, but still they should have used one that said F-series!!

Lemmy Scott

Lemmy Scott wrote: »

got an asus from argos a few months back-thing is a disaster turns off by itself and is constantly over heating load of crap never again asus

I told ye lads asus cheap laptops are crap :P

balfe1990

Lemmy Scott wrote: »

I told ye lads asus cheap laptops are crap :P

This problem is exclusive to Windows 8 software, not the manufacturer. There's enough evidence on the web from people to support that.

Once you hit this screen, there's basically no recourse as far as I can see. Apart from a wipe, as beauf mentioned above

balfe1990

beauf wrote: »

Is there any documentation on the Asus site to tell you how to do a clean boot and start over.

I haven't checked as I'm not at home and navigating the web on my phone is a bit fiddly.

Stallingrad

Had exactly the same issue, drove me f****n crazy. After hours the thing did revert and restarted and seems ok since. Bottom line is do NOT try to update to 8.1. If you do find a solution let me know.

balfe1990 wrote: »

Anyone ever have a problem when updating to Windows 8.1?

I got my GF this laptop and was attempting to update to 8.1 after *many, many* restarts. It would configure and restart and rinse and repeat at least 10 times.

Finally, tonight, after installing 29 of 29 updates, it tried to configure said updates but the process failed.

Then I got a screen that simply said "Configuring updates failed, reverting to previous settings" or something to that effect.

It'll reboot after a straight 15 mins, hit the ASUS splash screen, attempt to configure updates and "revert" back again, before it restarts. Over and over, endless loop.

Nothing works and its driving me f'ing nuts. Please for the love of God, someone have a solution, my sanity is wearing thin. MS support want a product key, but I cant get the bloody key because I can't boot the thing up!

branners69

beauf wrote: »

Is there any documentation on the Asus site to tell you how to do a clean boot and start over.

If you start it holding F9 you can do a refresh! Keeps all data but removes apps and programmes!

balfe1990

Stallingrad wrote: »

Had exactly the same issue, drove me f****n crazy. After hours the thing did revert and restarted and seems ok since. Bottom line is do NOT try to update to 8.1. If you do find a solution let me know.

Can I ask, was it doing the infinite loop thing? Configuring, failing, reverting, restarting and so on?
How many hours did it take the machine to cop on and go back to normal?

Stallingrad

balfe1990 wrote: »

Can I ask, was it doing the infinite loop thing? Configuring, failing, reverting, restarting and so on?
How many hours did it take the machine to cop on and go back to normal?

It took about 3 hours in its 'reverting' state, restarted a couple of times and resolved itself. I really didn't ave to do anything but wait and curse!

Akrasia

Any new laptop on windows 8 is going to be mind numbingly slow for the first day or two while it downloads, configures and installs all the necessary updates.

It's a pain in the hole, but can't be avoided really.

You're probably best to stick on a really long movie or 3 (Apocolyopse Now redux edition followed by 2001 a space odyssey and the Lord of the rings trilogy), bring it fully up to date and then leave automatic updates turned on and every now and then, make sure you do a full restart of your computer so it can apply the updates (closing the lid or going into sleep mode isn't enough)

Stallingrad

Akrasia wrote: »

Any new laptop on windows 8 is going to be mind numbingly slow for the first day or two while it downloads, configures and installs all the necessary updates.

It's a pain in the hole, but can't be avoided really.

The problem here is the updates are not successful, then reverting takes forever, or goes on an endless loop.

branners69

Stallingrad wrote: »

The problem here is the updates are not successful, then reverting takes forever, or goes on an endless loop.

I read online that one lad's laptop was reverting for over 12 hours, so I decided to refresh mine. It took 20 minutes or so and just meant I had to reinstall a few things.

Akrasia

Stallingrad wrote: »

The problem here is the updates are not successful, then reverting takes forever, or goes on an endless loop.

That happened to me before. You can either wait for ages and hope for the best, or try and restart the install again. It can be a pain but if you try holding f12 when the computer is restarting, that usually brings you into a recovery mode where you can re-install windows from the recovery partition and try the updating process again. (if F12 doesn't work, try f8, f9.. etc
or sometimes even ctrl alt and delete)

Stallingrad

branners69 wrote: »

I read online that one lad's laptop was reverting for over 12 hours, so I decided to refresh mine. It took 20 minutes or so and just meant I had to reinstall a few things.

Mind if I ask how do you reinstall things? Mine was a new Assus laptop that doesn't come with anything?

beauf

Are you doing this over WiFi or via Ethernet?

Stallingrad

beauf wrote: »

Are you doing this over WiFi or via Ethernet?

Wifi.

branners69

Stallingrad wrote: »

Mind if I ask how do you reinstall things? Mine was a new Assus laptop that doesn't come with anything?

When you turn on the laptop hold in F9 (someone else has said F12) then you get the windows logo and eventually this screen loads.

I selected the middle option and refreshed it!

beauf

On my desk top the update failed, but it recovered quickly enough. But its hard wired to UPC so updates come down really fast.

jive

Rather than start a new thread does this seem a good deal? http://www.amazon.de/gp/aw/d/B00K1VB368?cache=e93c7da40eba82eb9965a4640eb42a2c&pi=SX200_QL40&qid=1411483882&sr=8-1#ref=mp_s_a_1_1

I know you can get the similar spec for less with lenovo but that spec with a full HD IPS display seems excellent value to me?! Slim and relatively light laptop too with good build quality

balfe1990

jive wrote: »

Rather than start a new thread does this seem a good deal? http://www.amazon.de/gp/aw/d/B00K1VB368?cache=e93c7da40eba82eb9965a4640eb42a2c&pi=SX200_QL40&qid=1411483882&sr=8-1#ref=mp_s_a_1_1

I know you can get the similar spec for less with lenovo but that spec with a full HD IPS display seems excellent value to me?! Slim and relatively light laptop too with good build quality

There's pretty good Dell on sale that they're discussing over at HUKD. It's on sale and with two seperate 10% off codes brings the cost down to around 730€.

Only issue is, the VIP codes don't seem to be working for Irish users.

Specs:

Intel Core i7 Haswell CPU
16GB DDR3 RAM
1TB 5400rpm SATA Hybrid Drive (with 8gb cache)
1080p Touch Display
nVidia GeForce 750M 2GB DDR5 GPU

Link.

If anyone has a fix, I'd appreciate it, because I'm now looking into buying one of these for myself.

EDIT: Think I'll post this in another thread