Sub-£350 powerful laptops discussion

stilltheone

Was looking at it earlier. It's relatively good value for money.

JamesF

Thanks stilltheone,

Are there any other good value machines you would recommend as an alternative to this, or is that just too big a question?

stilltheone

JamesF wrote: »

Thanks stilltheone,

Are there any other good value machines you would recommend as an alternative to this, or is that just too big a question?

Depends on your budget. At that price point, other than the Toshiba above for £259(and there is some question as to the specification), no.

rodd-y-ler

JamesF wrote: »

Has anyone bought the Acer eMachines E642 which is currently available for £249.99 and is listed on the MSE Cheap Laptops page? If so would you recommend it?

This seems to be a pretty good deal for the things I'm likely to be using it for: surfing, emailing, managing music in iTunes, viewing & uploading photos, occasional iPlayer and using MS Office when working from home.

Do any experts out there think this is a good deal for £250 or are there technical things in the spec which should be avoided:

Processor: AMD Athlon II M340 2.2GHz
RAM: 3GB
Hard Drive: 500GB
Optical Drive: DVD +/- RW Drive (read/write CD & DVD)
Display: Widescreen 15.6" (resolution 1366 x 768)
Graphics: ATI Radeon graphics (integrated)
Included Software: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-Bit
Warranty: One-year manufacturer warranty

Thanks for any advice,

James.

Not a great processor and poor manufacturer imo.

Better off with one of these:

http://www.saveonlaptops.co.uk/ASUS_X52F-EX469V_1037155.html
http://www.saveonlaptops.co.uk/MSI_CR620_1088301.html
http://www.ebuyer.com/258876-toshiba-satellite-pro-c660-16n-laptop-psc0me-01s00sen

Laptop have the funny price banding where the difference between a £250 laptop and a £300 is very much worth the extra money, but the difference between a £300 and £350 laptop aren't.

FatVonD

Just posted a new thread for this before spotting this one so copying it over...

My son has been assessed and will be allowed to use a laptop for his GCSEs so I will be buying one for his birthday.

I don't want to spend more than about £300 - £350 but I'm sure he'll also want to use it for gaming (I'm aware a proper gaming laptop would be £1,000+!) but am just wondering if any in our price range are likely to have a better graphics card than others. Is there anything in particular we should be looking out for?

(I'm not technically competent enough to start replacing the graphics card!)

Thanks in advance

PS Wouldn't buy from ebay so needs to be proper shop!

atro1

these on refurb. but 12 month warranty.
Anyone tell me the best bargain out of these please?I am not a gamer just day to day.would like to try Skype and burn my photo's to disc. Other than that just boring norm.
http://www.dixons.co.uk/gbuk/refurbished-748-commercial.html

stilltheone

atro1 wrote: »

these on refurb. but 12 month warranty.
Anyone tell me the best bargain out of these please?I am not a gamer just day to day.would like to try Skype and burn my photo's to disc. Other than that just boring norm.
http://www.dixons.co.uk/gbuk/refurbished-748-commercial.html

None of the above.

ACER Aspire 5742Z £259

Toshiba Satellite C660 1D7 £259

The eMachines/ACER in the earlier post.

atro1

Thankyou, but the Acer comes up as £239 on dixons. Sadley I am not a fan of Argos. Too mny past problems.

stilltheone

atro1 wrote: »

Thankyou, but the Acer comes up as £239 on dixons. Sadley I am not a fan of Argos. Too mny past problems.

Which ACER comes up at £239?

If you prefer Dixons, then go ahead.

atro1

Here you go.'stilltheone' Thankyou for answering.
ACER Aspire 5742Z Refurbished Laptop Starts at £299 with discount £239. + tcb.

If I am honest I do not like either seller but I have had a couple of major problems with Argos.