The Great 'Cheapest Decent Laptop' Hunt

m_shahin

Hello, I'm looking for a laptop. Budget is £500-£600. Less if possible.

I'm looking at one with an Intel Core 2 duo processor with the number at least t/p 6000 or more. At least 2 ghz.

At least 3gb ram and 256mb dedicated graphics.

Decent wireless n card. Vista premium/ultimate. At least 300 gb hard drive SATA.

Prefer it if it is available with interest free optional. Screen size doesn't matter.

I've found some from Laptops direct. I've heard that they're not any good.

Thanks

newz

chili2001 wrote: »

I usually direct people to this one, has a better spec than the Toshiba and is one of the best value for money laptops around at the moment.

I agree this laptop has a pretty good spec but as it doesn't come with free Win 7 upgrade I was wondering how much it would cost to upgrade, any ideas?

Also as it comes with 2GB ram is this sufficient to run Vista 32 bit or would it be better to upgrade to 4Gb ram?

Thanks in advance, some of these days I'll actually make a decsion on which laptop to buy!!

venomsst

I have been looking around for a laptop for the past month and have been to every site I can think of. Just in case I missed something I thought i'd ask you guys first. The laptop has to have a gpu equivalent or better than the radeon 4650m.

The best deal i've found so far is from pcspecialist and it give you 4gb ddr3 ram, core 2 duo 2.0 ghz processor and a 4650 gpu for £550 if you customize it yourself and don't select an operating system.

I will probably opt for the above system shortly unless any of you out there know of any cheaper options.

It seems that it's hard to find any decent cheap laptops in the UK that are able to play games yet the US is flooded with them. I was tempted to import one but I don't fancy sending it back if it has a fault.

I appreciate any help you can offer.

Jaffa.

venomsst wrote: »

The best deal i've found so far is from pcspecialist and it give you 4gb ddr3 ram, core 2 duo 2.0 ghz processor and a 4650 gpu for £550 if you customize it yourself and don't select an operating system.

Post number 3215 has a Dell Inspiron 1545 Core 2 Duo processor, 4GB RAM for £399 and I think the offers still on till 9th Sep.

pickledtink

newz wrote: »

I agree this laptop has a pretty good spec but as it doesn't come with free Win 7 upgrade I was wondering how much it would cost to upgrade, any ideas?

Also as it comes with 2GB ram is this sufficient to run Vista 32 bit or would it be better to upgrade to 4Gb ram?

Thanks in advance, some of these days I'll actually make a decsion on which laptop to buy!!

*Sigh* Me too. I think an upgrade from what I've seen is going to be roughly £70.00 so the Toshibas I've looked at offering it as included as free update for laptops at or just above £300.00 seem the best option . However there's a belief /rumour/train of thought / speculation doing the rounds that all the Vista laptops will dramatically fall/plummet in price once Windows 7 is launched due about end of October, Which leaves me personally in a complete mess because I'm leaving UK about mid October and must have working set up I understand with all my stuff loaded by then. Argghhhh!!!!!

happychappy69

Mandark wrote: »

I'd get the Acer for its 3 hour battery life alone. I'd also take a look at the Lenovo N500 which is referred to a page or two back in this thread. Take a look at the Toshibas under £400 as well.

But I guess if you're doing photo editing and running multiple applications then you want as powerful processor as you can get in a laptop under £400. That's likely to be Intel T6400 Core 2 Duo or T5750 C2D.

Many thanks Mandark, laptop technology is an enigma to me, processors, discrete cards, memory (ddr2, ddr3) and all the hype leaves my head spinning - when I was a lad :-) it used to be AMD or intel - wasn't life simple. anyway the Lenovo looks very interesting and I'm now off to look at Toshibas.
BTW do you know of any machines that have T5750 or T6400 processors in my price range and what difference do these numbers make in actual speed - would I notice the difference?

Spudnik_2

Hey guys,

I'm after a laptop but don't really know what I'm looking for. I'll be using it for watching videos online, downloading music, listening to music on Spotify, using iPlayer and generally browsing the internet quite heavily, as well as watching DVDs. I'll also need it for the usual word processing/spreadsheet use etc.

I have a budget of up to £500 but would obviously like to spend less if possible. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

bylromarha

happychappy69 wrote: »

Many thanks Mandark, laptop technology is an enigma to me, processors, discrete cards, memory (ddr2, ddr3) and all the hype leaves my head spinning - when I was a lad :-) it used to be AMD or intel - wasn't life simple. anyway the Lenovo looks very interesting and I'm now off to look at Toshibas.
BTW do you know of any machines that have T5750 or T6400 processors in my price range and what difference do these numbers make in actual speed - would I notice the difference?

I'm not an expert,. but the one I've bought was £399 with Core 2 Duo T6500 DDR2. I don't have a clue what these things mean, but do know that its a fast processor, being in high end cpu list on cpubenchmark. Still have no clue what DDR is! I do know thought that the 4Gb ram is great and the 250Gb is more than adequate for my needs!

This one was also recommended on one of the previous techie threads, and is currently in stock, but they apparently go quickly if you'd like one. At £390 (+ quidco) with core 2 duo T5800,4 Gb ram, 500Gb hard drive, I guess it isn't hard to see why!

Spudnik_2

I can get the Dell Inspiron 15 with:
Intel Core 2 Duo Processor T6500
4096MB RAM
256MB ATI Mobility Radeon HD4330
500GB (5400RPM) Serial ATA Hard Drive
6-cell battery

For £455.03 delivered, plus I get £19 via either quidco or topcashback. Is that reasonable?

m_shahin

Spudnik wrote: »

I can get the Dell Inspiron 15 with:
Intel Core 2 Duo Processor T6500
4096MB RAM
256MB ATI Mobility Radeon HD4330
500GB (5400RPM) Serial ATA Hard Drive
6-cell battery

For £455.03 delivered, plus I get £19 via either quidco or topcashback. Is that reasonable?

What is quidco/topcashback and is there any money involved on my side?