The Great 'Cheapest Decent Laptop' Hunt

SaqibQ

Looks like you have to buy direct from Toshiba!

tinker15 wrote: »

I decided to buy the Toshiba L300 1AQ for £349.00 yesterday. Is this a good buy?
I was browsing the Toshiba website as well and read about their extended guarantees but was unsure whether I need to buy the laptop direct to take up the extended warranty, could someone in the know please clarify?

http://uk.computers.toshiba-europe.com/innovation/individual_services_page.jsp?service=UK&isOption=2&ACTION=SHOW_ATTRIBUTES&OPTION_ID=94034

Thanks

Jobee

Hi guys,
I'm looking to get a laptop for my mum for christmas - she'll be using it to surf, store music and photos. i like the look of :

Toshiba L300-11V for £341.56
AMD Athlon X2 Dual Core Processor TK57 <LI class=indentFeature>(1.9GHz, 1600MHz, 512KB Cache)
[URL="javascript:showEditorial('Genuine-Windows');"]Genuine Windows Vista (R) Home Premium[/URL]
2 GB memory
160GB hard drive
ATI Radeon X1200 shared graphics
15.4" TruBrite Widescreen Display
DVD ReWriter
Wireless enabled
webcam

or

Toshiba L300 1BW for £342.53
Intel Celeron Dual Core Processor T1600 <LI class=indentFeature>(2GHz, 667 MHz, 1 MB Cache)
[URL="javascript:showEditorial('Genuine-Windows');"]Genuine Window Vista (R) Home Premium[/URL]
1 GB Memory
160 GB Hard drive
15.4" Trubrite widescreen display
DVD ReWriter
wireless enabled
3 USB ports
Silver/black colour

Does anyone have any thoughts on which may be the better of the two?

Thanks!!

dharm999

I'm looking at either a Dell Inspiron 1525, with the 4Meg of Ram, or the Toshiba Satellite Pro s300 11g. It will be used for surfing the web, word processing etc.. and not for heavy gaming use, but will be used for simple games, e.g. Luxor. Which would you recommend?

Thanks for the advice.

chipbeck

Had to email Dell over the weekend after finding out the great deal they offered me was beaten by Currys. No advisors at weekend hence email. Delivery was due for the 23rd so wasn't worried about cancelling. Rang to cancel this morning and they say my lappies have been dispatched and if I want to cancel I have to pay £20 + vat on each machine.
Don't really know where I stand but I'm very dissapointed with them as I assumed I could get the best deal by taking the trouble to ring them. How wrong can you be. Waiting for a call from a manager now as the Indian girl I was talking to was like a stuck record so I had to tell her I was not prepared to listen to her repeating over and over again from a script.

barnishroader

Jobee wrote: »

Hi guys,
I'm looking to get a laptop for my mum for christmas - she'll be using it to surf, store music and photos. i like the look of :

Toshiba L300-11V for £341.56
AMD Athlon X2 Dual Core Processor TK57 <LI class=indentFeature>(1.9GHz, 1600MHz, 512KB Cache)
Genuine Windows Vista (R) Home Premium
2 GB memory
160GB hard drive
ATI Radeon X1200 shared graphics
15.4" TruBrite Widescreen Display
DVD ReWriter
Wireless enabled
webcam

or

Toshiba L300 1BW for £342.53
Intel Celeron Dual Core Processor T1600 <LI class=indentFeature>(2GHz, 667 MHz, 1 MB Cache)
Genuine Window Vista (R) Home Premium
1 GB Memory
160 GB Hard drive
15.4" Trubrite widescreen display
DVD ReWriter
wireless enabled
3 USB ports
Silver/black colour

Does anyone have any thoughts on which may be the better of the two?

Thanks!!

i would shop about a bit more.
dont go for anything with celeron processor.

look for
At least 2gb ram
Intel core duo processor at least 2mb
At least 100gb hard drive
Would go for windows xp rather than vista if possible.


well thats my opinion anyway!!

**woody123**

Jobee wrote: »

Hi guys,
I'm looking to get a laptop for my mum for christmas - she'll be using it to surf, store music and photos. i like the look of :

Toshiba L300-11V for £341.56
AMD Athlon X2 Dual Core Processor TK57 <LI class=indentFeature>(1.9GHz, 1600MHz, 512KB Cache)
Genuine Windows Vista (R) Home Premium
2 GB memory
160GB hard drive
ATI Radeon X1200 shared graphics
15.4" TruBrite Widescreen Display
DVD ReWriter
Wireless enabled
webcam

or

Toshiba L300 1BW for £342.53
Intel Celeron Dual Core Processor T1600 <LI class=indentFeature>(2GHz, 667 MHz, 1 MB Cache)
Genuine Window Vista (R) Home Premium
1 GB Memory
160 GB Hard drive
15.4" Trubrite widescreen display
DVD ReWriter
wireless enabled
3 USB ports
Silver/black colour

Does anyone have any thoughts on which may be the better of the two?

Thanks!!

The Toshiba L300 -1BW is now £285 at Dixons Direct. You need to use the voucher code "5XMAS" to get it down to that from £299. Hope that helps. The L300-1bw is certainly ok for my parents so they shall order that later on.

surfsister

barryheffron wrote: »

i would shop about a bit more.
dont go for anything with celeron processor.

look for
At least 2gb ram
Intel core duo processor at least 2mb
At least 100gb hard drive
Would go for windows xp rather than vista if possible.


well thats my opinion anyway!!

Thanks why not a celeron processor?

Magenta

chipbeck wrote: »

Had to email Dell over the weekend after finding out the great deal they offered me was beaten by Currys. No advisors at weekend hence email. Delivery was due for the 23rd so wasn't worried about cancelling. Rang to cancel this morning and they say my lappies have been dispatched and if I want to cancel I have to pay £20 + vat on each machine.
Don't really know where I stand but I'm very dissapointed with them as I assumed I could get the best deal by taking the trouble to ring them. How wrong can you be. Waiting for a call from a manager now as the Indian girl I was talking to was like a stuck record so I had to tell her I was not prepared to listen to her repeating over and over again from a script.

What was the price difference between Currys and Dell?
Does Dells cancellation fee work out more than the price difference?

Garetha

surfsister wrote: »

Thanks why not a celeron processor?

The Celeron was originally a crippled version of Intel's normal range. Typically with facilities removed or reduced.

• If it works OK then fine
• If you plan to run processor hungry games or edit video then you'll avoid Celeron.

that's my opinion

Wiki has an article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celeron_M#Mobile_Celeron_and_Celeron_M

JDPower

Jobee wrote: »

Hi guys,
I'm looking to get a laptop for my mum for christmas - she'll be using it to surf, store music and photos. i like the look of :

Toshiba L300-11V for £341.56
AMD Athlon X2 Dual Core Processor TK57 <LI class=indentFeature>(1.9GHz, 1600MHz, 512KB Cache)
Genuine Windows Vista (R) Home Premium
2 GB memory
160GB hard drive
ATI Radeon X1200 shared graphics
15.4" TruBrite Widescreen Display
DVD ReWriter
Wireless enabled
webcam

or

Toshiba L300 1BW for £342.53
Intel Celeron Dual Core Processor T1600 <LI class=indentFeature>(2GHz, 667 MHz, 1 MB Cache)
Genuine Window Vista (R) Home Premium
1 GB Memory
160 GB Hard drive
15.4" Trubrite widescreen display
DVD ReWriter
wireless enabled
3 USB ports
Silver/black colour

Does anyone have any thoughts on which may be the better of the two?

Of those two I'd go for the first one.