Sub-£350 powerful laptops discussion

tomordish

Hi all,
Usual request for advice/plea for help here. I have no knowledge about computers but my girlfriends ancient P.C. has finally given up the ghost n died. We are now reduced to Internet connection by iPhone only! As above does Donnie or anyone have advice on a current decent laptop that I can use for surfing, storing my music & pics on without causing crashes, bit of downloading and if it could handle BBC iplayer that'd be a bonus. I had a look at the Argos link above but really are not sure what is good or bad. Any tips or knowledge welcomed.
Many thanks
Tom

Donnie

tomordish wrote: »

Hi all,
Usual request for advice/plea for help here. I have no knowledge about computers but my girlfriends ancient P.C. has finally given up the ghost n died. We are now reduced to Internet connection by iPhone only! As above does Donnie or anyone have advice on a current decent laptop that I can use for surfing, storing my music & pics on without causing crashes, bit of downloading and if it could handle BBC iplayer that'd be a bonus. I had a look at the Argos link above but really are not sure what is good or bad. Any tips or knowledge welcomed.
Many thanks
Tom

For £300 and under:

If you intend to use it out and about, there is the ACER Aspire Timeline 4810T albeit with Vista Home Premium for £300. Up to eight hours battery life.



For basic at home use(because it's just ugly) there is the Lenovo G555 for £264. They claim Windows 7 Starter on the Outlet website, whilst the main site says Windows 7 Home Premium.


You could also do worse than the Toshiba Satellite C650-1CR at £304 Though, like the Lenovo it has no HDMI output for you to plug it into your HD TV.

tomordish

Thanks Donnie

Cheers for the prompt n pretty amazing response. Drawn to the Toshiba due to win 7, although HDMI function would be something I could use. Had a look on the Argos reconditioned though and only one was an msi cr610 Blue-ray that had HDMI. Think it or similar has been mentioned on the thread before. Is it worth spending extra £50ish on this HDMI feature or does the rest of the performance suffer due to having blue ray/HDMI?

Basically happily pay a bit extra for HDMI if there is anything u recommend, otherwise I'll nab the Toshiba.

Thanks again for ur help.

Donnie

No, I don't think it is worth spending the extra for the MSI. Perhaps wait to see what comes up. Not sure about the new crop.

The eMachines G640 offers a lot for the money with it's 17.3" screen and HDMI output for £304, but I'm reluctant to recommend the ACER budget brand.

csa99

Hi guys,

You all seem to be so helpful on here so wonder if you can give me your best advice on a couple of laptops i can't decide between. I've been needing a new one for a while but am so indecisive that by the time i make a decision its normally sold out, so have decided just need to order one and stop looking and confusing myself!! From the millions I've looked at these 2 seem quite good:
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/236678

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/227402

Obvioulsy bit of a price difference so just wondering if you guys think its worth the extra money for the Lenovo. I will mainly use it for normal word processing type stuff, iplayer and the internet,

Thanks in advance for any advice/suggestions!!

leosayer39

Donnie wrote: »

For £300 and under:

If you intend to use it out and about, there is the ACER Aspire Timeline 4810T albeit with Vista Home Premium for £300. Up to eight hours battery life.



For basic at home use(because it's just ugly) there is the Lenovo G555 for £264. They claim Windows 7 Starter on the Outlet website, whilst the main site says Windows 7 Home Premium.


You could also do worse than the Toshiba Satellite C650-1CR at £304 Though, like the Lenovo it has no HDMI output for you to plug it into your HD TV.

Thanks Donnie
Would like a lappy with HDMI though

dulcificum

Any recommendations for a new or used laptop with the following specs (in descending order of importance):

3-4GiB RAM
Dual core processor
Small screen

My budget is £150-250.

Markptp

Hi everyone, I've checked this forum and you guys do a really good job at finding great deals on 15 inch laptops.

I am looking for a 13 inch laptop, and it must have an optical drive. I'm looking to spend no more than £400 and preferably less that £350. I've been looking alot tonight and any help would really be appreciated.

cola_bottle

Is this any good for what I am after?
It is on Ebay and I can't post links yet :mad:


Maybe if you put that it in the search on Ebay you will find what I am talking about
BNIB 15.6" HD eMachines E440 2.2GHz 2GB DDR3 ATI HD4250

The seller is compadvance_ltd, item number is 230538176862


I have also seen this on Ebay, again use the search box for ACER ASPIRE 5410723G25MN 3GB 250GB 15.6" LAPTOP SILVER seller is tesco_outlet

acc

csa99 wrote: »

From the millions I've looked at these 2 seem quite good:

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/236678

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/227402

Obvioulsy bit of a price difference so just wondering if you guys think its worth the extra money for the Lenovo. I will mainly use it for normal word processing type stuff, iplayer and the internet,

Thanks in advance for any advice/suggestions!!

Assuming you're still looking at these two laptops, the Compaq will be more than adequate for the purposes you mention, and the Lenovo's advantages probably do not justify the extra £100 cost.

Specifically, the Lenovo has a faster i3 processor, uses the faster DDR3 memory type, and has a hard drive which is bigger (320 GB) and faster (7200).

The Compaq has an adequate T3500 processor and adequate hard drive of 250 GB with a speed of 5400.

The compaq is actual better in two respects, in the important aspect of having more memory, 3 GB compared to 2 GB, and the minor aspect of having a memory capability of up to 8 GB compared with 4 GB.