which laptop? upto £500 spend

marymilkmaid

im in need of a laptop for work.

Spend up to £500 ish. wont be used for gaming. I need it for accounts & general office work. could do with adobe reader. Also where is the best place to get office package, i use excel & word a lot?

Any advice would be much appreciated

DCodd

marymilkmaid wrote: »

im in need of a laptop for work.

Spend up to £500 ish. wont be used for gaming. I need it for accounts & general office work. could do with adobe reader. Also where is the best place to get office package, i use excel & word a lot?

Any advice would be much appreciated

Do you really want a laptop for Accounts work? Accuracy is the all important aspect for such data input, surely a larger screen and a decent desktop keyboard and mouse is essential?

wallbash

marymilkmaid wrote: »

im in need of a laptop for work.

Spend up to £500 ish. wont be used for gaming. I need it for accounts & general office work. could do with adobe reader. Also where is the best place to get office package, i use excel & word a lot?

Any advice would be much appreciated

Radical thought ! save some money . Daughter at this precise moment is unpacking her new lap top ( her third ) every one has been cheaper than the previous one. The cheapest on the market today does everything you want a laptop to do .
As for the package , if you have the money go for the MS Office , its the market leader for a reason . YES the free ones do the job , but there is reasons why the pros stick with MS ( although there are some that will post here to defend the open source. )

marymilkmaid

i thought about a desktop but thought i may need to be out & about with laptop. Im running courses & taking my laptop may be of use but it is not essential.

I use a laptop for the farm accounts & can manage ok so far. Im needing a separate computer as this is a totally different job & everything needs to be kept apart.

Im open minded to looking at desk tops or lap tops. I would appreciate any info on either.

marymilkmaid

I defiantly want MS office but am unsure of laptop or desk top & which to get.

I know nothing but need something reliable with a good memory & one that runs quite fast as i dont want to be waiting for ages for it to do tasks.

NiftyDigits

Inspiron 17 - 3721 from DELL Outlet

Inspiron 17 - 3721
Processor: Intel® Core™ i5-3337U (3M Cache, up to 2.70 GHz) with Intel HD 4000 Graphics
Windows® 8
4 GB DDR3 Dual Channel 1600MHz SDRAM Memory (1 DIMM)
500 GB SATA Hard Drive (5400 RPM)
8X DVD+/- RW Drive
17.3 inch High Definition+ (1600 x 900) LED Display with TrueLife
Back Up Media Not Included
Windows® 8 64bit (Englilsh)
Wireless : Dell Wireless 1704 Card
LCD Back Cover : Black
Battery : Primary 6-cell 65W/HR
Internal Qwerty Keyboard

Two choices, one at £304.15, the other at £347.18

Jivesinger

marymilkmaid wrote: »

I use a laptop for the farm accounts & can manage ok so far. Im needing a separate computer as this is a totally different job & everything needs to be kept apart.

Assuming it's just you that will be using it, why not keep your original laptop, and separate the accounts some other way?

One easy way is by setting up different users on the laptop - you could have a user account called "FarmAccount" and another one called "{OtherJob}Account", and even tweak the background wallpaper or something so you can quickly tell which is which. Then you can save the relevant files in each user's folders and it should be easy not to mix them up.

Then you can use one set of software, which will be simpler and (if you use MS Office) cheaper.

DCodd

marymilkmaid wrote: »

i thought about a desktop but thought i may need to be out & about with laptop. Im running courses & taking my laptop may be of use but it is not essential.

I use a laptop for the farm accounts & can manage ok so far. Im needing a separate computer as this is a totally different job & everything needs to be kept apart.

Im open minded to looking at desk tops or lap tops. I would appreciate any info on either.

Are you using dedicated software for the accounting or Excel spreadsheets and is the new job a paid for service that you are providing for a third party?

I have used Sage on a laptop before but even with a seperate keyboard and mouse I find that personally I prefer a desktop with at least a 19"+ screen (more if it is a wiescreen format). I also find the "side by side" feature of office a far better experience on a larger screen.

Having said all that, it is personal preference at the end of he day.

marymilkmaid

I always use excel & yes it is for a 3rd party.

Ive got a MacBook for my own work but a lot of what I need to put on is coming from ms office & I struggle with my mac & windows. I've got quite a bit from a memory stick to transfer on to my computer & it doesn't recognise a lot of it .

DCodd

marymilkmaid wrote: »

I always use excel & yes it is for a 3rd party.

Ive got a MacBook for my own work but a lot of what I need to put on is coming from ms office & I struggle with my mac & windows. I've got quite a bit from a memory stick to transfer on to my computer & it doesn't recognise a lot of it .

So are you running your MacBook as a dual boot with Windows and OS x?

macman

Are you running MS Office for Mac on the MacBook then? It should work fine with Excel and Word files from a Windows PC.
What isn't converting properly?
Absolutely any laptop built in the last 5 years will do the tasks you specify with ease.