New laptop that plays Sims 3?

mothballs39

Hi everyone

Just joined although I've lurked for years!

We need a new laptop for our daughter. Looking to spend around £500-600. She needs it to take to uni, to run Microsoft Office and play the Sims 3.

Does anyone have any recommendations? PC World have recommended one costing £629 with a Radeon graphics card, i5, the HP Envy m6-1178sa. Are Hewlett Packard laptops generally reliable?

She has a three year old Dell which has suddenly died - 6 beeps and a black screen which we figure probably won't be worth repairing. I'm guessing another Dell isn't a good idea?

Thanks everyone

jaydeeuk1

http://www.simplyacer.com/Acer_Aspire_Timeline_Ultra_M3-581TG_1290266.html

There ya go. i3, geforce GT 640, 8 hour battery (6 more realistic), 20gb SSD and 500gb HD, USB 3.0 - even has a built in DVD drive. May be an acer, but this line is well screwed together. Excellent imo for £399, infact when playing sims it will be smoother than the HP at the same res - the 640 is a really good budget graphics card. The only thing against it is the relatively low res screen (same as the £600 HP though), but unless you love having several windows open at the same time I doubt it will matter much.

Not much point spending £600 imo, will get you a quicker processor but the i3 even in low power form is still pretty quick and for stuff like surfing, office stuff and playing sims you won't notice any difference.

Edit - Changed link.. this is the 3rd gen i3

rmg1

What's the make and model of the Dell?
You can get a diagnosis of the beep codes from t'interweb.
Are they long beeps or short beeps?


::edit::

A quick Google for beep codes for Dells leads me here:-
http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/laptop/f/3518/t/19435242.aspx

For an Inspiron M5030 6 beeps is Video card or chip failue which sounds expensive but I wouldn't know for definite.

magoogy

i bought my daughter this one http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B005EY1SE4/ref=oh_details_o02_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 for exact same reason - sims 3 and all her expansion packs - she loves it and has never had any complains nearly a year later........ ok, its out of stock on amazon atm but you can compare the specs or look elsewhere for it...

mothballs39

jaydeeuk1 wrote: »

There ya go. i3, geforce GT 640, 8 hour battery (6 more realistic), 20gb SSD and 500gb HD, USB 3.0 - even has a built in DVD drive. May be an acer, but this line is well screwed together. Excellent imo for £399, infact when playing sims it will be smoother than the HP at the same res - the 640 is a really good budget graphics card. The only thing against it is the relatively low res screen (same as the £600 HP though), but unless you love having several windows open at the same time I doubt it will matter much.

Not much point spending £600 imo, will get you a quicker processor but the i3 even in low power form is still pretty quick and for stuff like surfing, office stuff and playing sims you won't notice any difference.

Edit - Changed link.. this is the 3rd gen i3

Thanks, that's really useful to know. And still in stock

mothballs39

rmg1 wrote: »

What's the make and model of the Dell?
You can get a diagnosis of the beep codes from t'interweb.
Are they long beeps or short beeps?


::edit::


For an Inspiron M5030 6 beeps is Video card or chip failue which sounds expensive but I wouldn't know for definite.

Can't remember off hand, but when we looked it up it sounded like the motherboard or video card as you say. I think we've agreed to give up on it!

mothballs39

magoogy wrote: »

i bought my daughter this one for exact same reason - sims 3 and all her expansion packs - she loves it and has never had any complains nearly a year later........ ok, its out of stock on amazon atm but you can compare the specs or look elsewhere for it...

That's useful magoogy. I wouldn't have considered that one so it's handy to know your daughter is happy with it. Thanks