Free laptop

chaucer

chaucer wrote: »

Ebuyer seem to have sold out of them already (at £279 I think) so they are in demand.

CORRECTION -
83 in stock with ebuyer at £297.98 inc vat

iviv

Alternatively, you could just format the laptop as soon as you get it and stick XP on it, assuming you have a copy lying around

Hermann

iviv wrote: »

Alternatively, you could just format the laptop as soon as you get it and stick XP on it, assuming you have a copy lying around

However this may void the warranty.

toasterman

Not just warranty. It's also against illegal unless its a retail copy you have lying around that isn't installed on another pc.

Ems - the laptop from AOL is slightly better - its got 1gb of ram (whereas the BT one has 512mb). However, if you're with BT - going to AOL for internet/email is going to be like getting out of a ferrari and driving a fighter jet...everything is different.
AOL are funny for their email, for example. I don't think you can use outlook/outlook express/thunderbird with them, and if you use a third party email provider, everything has to be set on different ports.

AOL are just a funny lot, and now the uk brains is owned by the carphone warehouse, I'd be even less likely to give them a go.
If you're happy with BT's service, I'd stick with them.

For what you want to do, and what you've told me, I'd stick with BT, flog the laptop, and put the money towards a desktop. That laptop isn't really suited to CAD - I would have thought a desktop machine with a nice big screen would be much better for that.
Quick example, with no discount codes or anything - just a quick look on Dell's website, you can get a Dual core 1.8ghz desktop with 1gb ram, windows xp pro (so you don't have to worry about compatibility with your software), 160gb hard drive and a 19" flatscreen monitor for £249 ex vat and shipping.
Ask on these forums before you buy anything though - I'd guarantee someone will have a code to get you a much better deal than that.

Ems*Honie

THanks Toasterman

I run a Dell Dimension 5100 with XP at the mo, which works really well for my CAD work, the Laptop really would just be back up , and to show drawings if I'm unable to send them over to the office for plotting. (the really important bit is that having a laptop would mean that when me and my 6 year old are both wanting the internet I dont have to pull age rank over him) I am very very tempted to call BT and see if I can push them, when I spoke to them a few weeks back they said they couldn't offer laptops, it was only seeing the OP here that I have heard of them doing this.

I'm planning on talking to my dad tonight, he is far more techi than me and hopefully he can help me decide, but at the end of the day if BT wont give then it will have to be AOL. I did have a trial with them in 2003 and hated their software.

Thank you for your help

Ems*Honie

I ended up going for the BT deal, but be warned, it is a 3 year contract. I've had BT for years but still feel about that one. In the long run though it costs me exactly what it does now, with the same service but with a laptop, black home hub and another internet phone (i really must set up the internet phone that I got last year :rolleyes: ) I now will have 3 hub's, which will be handy if things go wrong lol

Thank you for the help all, specially Toasterman and Chaucer. I haven't seen this deal anywhere and it took 3 calls to BT to find someone there who did know what it was, it was only launched on Friday, so he said anyway.

I'm_With_Stupid

If I was going to get that laptop, I'd definitely want it with XP rather than Vista. Our old desktop PC is similar in spec to that, and it just about runs XP after a few years. I imagine it'll be quite sluggish on Vista. Other than that though, it seems okay for a basic machine, as long as you're not expecting it to last you too long.

Oh and as for the person who asked about it running CAD software, I'm no expert, but my initial intuition says not a chance. It's start the program well enough, but as soon as you load a file of any sort of detail and size, I'd imagine it'll struggle. Minimum system requirements are just what you need to start the program. You'll need more than that to actually do anything with it.