Help! Can I really get a decent laptop for £300?

jena

Just need internet and office functions. Have been trawling through various recommendations and now totally lost. Would welcome any help at all.

Thanks

Jolaaled

Dell Dell Dell everytime. Just keep you eye on their website for current offers. Got mine fo 329...very happy with it.

Millionaire

You can get a half decent new laptop for just over £300 unless second hand etc.

It will be fine for general stuff like internet browsing, documents, photos, watching video etc.

and it will most likley boot and load stuff at an acceptable level.

just dont expect blazing speeds though on anything that requires abit more oompph!

itsakidsworld

Look at https://www.ebuyer.co.uk

Type in laptops and they have a laptop for under £300 just! My father in law bought one and upgraded the memory for a bit extra to 1gb which I think you need at least for Vista?

It might be good it might not?

Hope it helps you.

Zagu

To keep the cost down, go for one with XP, not Vista. It'll do everything you want, and will run ok on 512mb. A Vista one needs 1gb.

Little_John

jena wrote: »

Help! Can I really get a decent laptop for £300?

The simple answer is no, it is possible to get a new laptop for just more than £300 but it wont be anywhere near decent never mind really decent. It also depends on what you are wanting to use it for. a glorified calculator and word processor then yes one of the £350 dell inspiron 1501 will do hay for the donkey to carry it arround will cost you a little more.

If you are wanting a portable laptop that will last you a few years and not really suffer from performance issues in the future then you need to spend at least £700 up to £1200 for a really decent laptop.

I spent about £1000 on mine a few years ago, the build quality is fantastic and the performance is great, I can play some of the games that require high spec graphics and it has plenty of memory, and for a 15" screen it isnt too heavy, yes after 3 years it needs a new battery but most laptop batteries do after a few years anyway.

olive84

I just bought the inspiron 1501 mentioned in the OP and it came in at £480. I don't think you can get want you want (which is exactly what I wanted) for much cheaper than that. Microsoft Office Basic (Word, Outlook, Excel) was £104 on its own. Only had it for today, it is running fine now I've removed all the rubbish they put on it for you.

Agree with the OP about longevity of use, but I don't think you were planning on spending £1000 were you? Me neither, and I'm sure this will do me just fine for a couple of years for basic tasks like you want.

shown73

Try the Dell outlet on Ebay. Slightly cosmetically damaged, (who cares?), laptops with very good spec for around your price. I gather that you should avoid the ones with Sempron processors, and stick to the Turion, or Intel versions. Full normal guarantee, etc. Worth a look, anyway.

mjr600

Little_John wrote: »

The simple answer is no, it is possible to get a new laptop for just more than £300 but it wont be anywhere near decent never mind really decent. It also depends on what you are wanting to use it for. a glorified calculator and word processor then yes one of the £350 dell inspiron 1501 will do hay for the donkey to carry it arround will cost you a little more.

If you are wanting a portable laptop that will last you a few years and not really suffer from performance issues in the future then you need to spend at least £700 up to £1200 for a really decent laptop.

I spent about £1000 on mine a few years ago, the build quality is fantastic and the performance is great, I can play some of the games that require high spec graphics and it has plenty of memory, and for a 15" screen it isnt too heavy, yes after 3 years it needs a new battery but most laptop batteries do after a few years anyway.

Not a very helpful post when the OP is asking for a decent laptop for the £300 mark.

To answer the question properly, the answer would be yes, a decent laptop is possible for £300, during the last year I have bought a number of Dell 1300's and Dell 1501's for around the £300 mark. They are budget models but are solidly built, reliable, well specified and more than capable of undertaking all tasks bar 3d games.

Remember that 3-4 years after a purchase any laptop will be past its sell by date when compared to the latest models and at that time if you consider selling then £300 Dell beats them all. It will be worth £150 at that time, a loss of £150, a £700 laptop bought now would be worth only slightly more at £200, a bigger loss of £500.

You won't go far wrong with a Dell.

Blacksheep1979

Bit strange how almost all the problems seen here though are with lower spec'd lower priced computers, whereas the more powerful/more expensive computers from better brands seem to have fewer problems....

mjr600

Blacksheep1979 wrote: »

Bit strange how almost all the problems seen here though are with lower spec'd lower priced computers, whereas the more powerful/more expensive computers from better brands seem to have fewer problems....

People who've been daft enough to spend too much money on a laptop often don't want to admit that it has problems.