The Great 'Cheapest Decent Laptop' Hunt

minxtress

littleange_com wrote: »

Shame it's a celeron, I'd spend a little extra and get a Core 2 duo

Its only for my 8yr old so more than adequate Id imagine.

diamondlight

bugeyed wrote: »

As this thread is huge I apologize if someone has posted the same.
Ebay hosts 2 major computer manufactuers factory outlets. HP and Dell.
Search for 'hp_marketplace_uk' and 'dellfactoryoutlet' (try searching product description if you dont find them straight away)
They sell off three types
reconditioned/refurbished - been found faulty and returned = now perfect
Old stock - Lines no longer produced/replaced by newer model
Overstock - Ordered more than they think they can sell

There are fantastic bargains to be had

I just bought a new desktop HP Pavilion a6355
8800ghz Phenom quad core processor clockable to 9600ghz
3GB Ram
500gb sata hard drive
Nvidia GT8500 graphics card
Dual layer DVD burner with lightscribe
Windows Vista home Premium
80gb pocket media drive
Media keyboard and a mouse

Auction number 380073460357

All that for £272 + £5 postage (yep - £5 to post a whole desktop system)

Last year I bought a widescreen laptop, 4ghz P4, 120gb hard drive, DVD rewriter, 128mb graphics card, wireless, bluetooth - £232 again from HP

Also check out 3M outlet (3mselect) for stationary supplies on ebay (the scotchtape people)

My favourite seach for a real bargain on ebay is to search for the word 'outlet'

Try 'brother_uk' for printers and 'canon_uk1' - cameras and photo printers

Worried about refurbished - they come as new, unmarked, and have been through the quality assurance twice

:money:

Thank you for this helpful post, I have just bought a laptop

vescolove

Get a contract phone with a free laptop
Pay no more than 350pounds
Build a PC its cheaper, need any help message me im an it technition(yeah and i cant even spell it lol)

MissPop

vescolove wrote: »

Get a contract phone with a free laptop
Pay no more than 350pounds
Build a PC its cheaper, need any help message me im an it technition(yeah and i cant even spell it lol)

But building a PC isn't exactly easy...! My other half is doing a Computer Science degree and he couldn't, for love nor money, get his to work. Even the local repair shop couldn't sort it out. It could easily turn out more expensive!;)

vescolove

MissPop wrote: »

But building a PC isn't exactly easy...! My other half is doing a Computer Science degree and he couldn't, for love nor money, get his to work. Even the local repair shop couldn't sort it out. It could easily turn out more expensive!;)

Lol fair enough, but anyone wanting too do this make sue u have compatible hardware, search lessons on youtube, if u CAN do it it is cheaper lol

littleange

It's not hard to build a pc, just might take some time to research what bits are compatible. I'm sure there is enough info on the web to help.

But this thread is about laptops, a PC maybe cheaper to buy, but will cost more in electricity!

chrisdarkfire

Anyone know anywhere that sells laptops without Microsoft operating systems - preferably pre-loaded with linux but empty is fine. Ideally around the £300 mark

Really don't see the point in paying for a huge insecure OS that is slow and eats hard drive and memory when I all I want is
Office Apps - Open Office is free, good and fast (and opens saves in MS if required)
Email - Thunderbird, free, good and fast
Browsing - Firefox free, good and fast

real1314

chrisdarkfire wrote: »

Anyone know anywhere that sells laptops without Microsoft operating systems - preferably pre-loaded with linux but empty is fine. Ideally around the £300 mark

Really don't see the point in paying for a huge insecure OS that is slow and eats hard drive and memory when I all I want is
Office Apps - Open Office is free, good and fast (and opens saves in MS if required)
Email - Thunderbird, free, good and fast
Browsing - Firefox free, good and fast

There's loads of lappys for around £300, if they've got XP/vista just wipe it and use linux if that's what u want, or dual boot it?
Or was it more about making a point about linux vs MS?

Anyways, I've gone for the Acer dual core 2.2ghz from Tesco, £330 after a £9 voucher and quidco, plus 1050 club card points.

fedupconsumer

looking for a cheap laptop with the following basic specs

15inc Screen
100GB HD
DVD RW Drive
1gb RAM
Memory card slot


For about £250-£325

any help will be appreciated

bumpydog

chrisdarkfire wrote: »

Anyone know anywhere that sells laptops without Microsoft operating systems - preferably pre-loaded with linux but empty is fine. Ideally around the £300 mark

Really don't see the point in paying for a huge insecure OS that is slow and eats hard drive and memory when I all I want is
Office Apps - Open Office is free, good and fast (and opens saves in MS if required)
Email - Thunderbird, free, good and fast
Browsing - Firefox free, good and fast

Dell do a line of laptops preloaded with Ubuntu:
http://www1.euro.dell.com/content/topics/topic.aspx/emea/segments/gen/client/en/ubuntu_landing?c=uk&cs=ukdhs1&l=en&s=dhs

hope this helps.