Looking to Buy a Laptop - No idea where to start! Eeek!

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Squidgey
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#1 Looking to Buy a Laptop - No idea where to start! Eeek!

Post by Squidgey »

Good Morning everybody,

It's been a while since I posted here, which seems kinda stupid as it's the perfect place to discuss quite alot of interesting biology/science based queries I'm havinga s I study at university.

Anyways, to topic:

I NEED a Laptop, like immediately, as I have limited computer and net access at home and need it on a daily basis, 1, for gaming that I do daily, and 2, for uni work and research etc. I want a laptop overa computer as I need to travel 2 hours each way to get to and from uni and can use a laptop to do work on the train trips.

Anyways, on a technical level i have no idea what the hell anything computer/laptop means, I don't understand how everything works and the difference between this or that graphics card, system or whatever.

So I'm after advice on a laptop that is both an effective gaming laptop (online gaming, RTS, FPS etc etc) and can also be used as a normal computer, so like Microsoft office etc. Windows as opposed to something else, and a PC as opposed to a mac. I was directed at Alienware, but it all seems confusing to me still, all this technical stuff I have no idea abpout! :cry:

So any advice or help people can give me would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers,

Squidgey.
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#2

Post by Ra »

Don't buy a Toshiba Sattelite. I made the mistake of doing that and I'm stuck with a US$1,000 piece of utter shit. That is all.
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#3

Post by Dark Silver »

Acer currently has a very nice sub-1000$ USD which includes a Radeon X1100 video card built in. It runs a intel core duo processor, gig of ram, and 160gb of hdd. The only kick is a 15" screen.

But still, it's nice.....

I suggest taking a closer look at Acer and HP laptops.
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#4

Post by Batman »

If money isn't a concern (yeah, right) insert my token recommendation of IBM ThinkPads. They're high quality, you know you can still get replacement parts two years from now, and above all, they're BLACK. :razz:

On a more serious note, HP has a rather good reputation for their notebooks, and several people I know are quite happy with theirs. Yes, I know, anecdotal evidence, but I'm not digging up any statistics at 1 am.

And while a 15" screen means less screen space it ALSO means more portability, because the notebook will be smaller.
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#5

Post by Lonestar »

Batman wrote:
On a more serious note, HP has a rather good reputation for their notebooks, and several people I know are quite happy with theirs. Yes, I know, anecdotal evidence, but I'm not digging up any statistics at 1 am.
I enjoyed mine for two years, at it was only within the past 6 months or so I started to hit walls in gaming. I think HP is a good buy, but if you feel like tossing Two Grand downrange you can always get a ASUS G2S-A1.
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#6

Post by B4UTRUST »

Batman wrote:On a more serious note, HP has a rather good reputation for their notebooks, and several people I know are quite happy with theirs. Yes, I know, anecdotal evidence, but I'm not digging up any statistics at 1 am.
There are special levels of hell reserved for the HP/Compaq company. I owned one of their laptops. That laptop lasted little over a year before it died a painful, horrible, terrible death. I still owe over $1000 on it. Worst mistake I ever made. Piece of shit all the way from the word go. I got it and I had to get the CD rom drive warrentied as it wouldn't read discs.

So no HP/Compaq products. They are in fact, evil incarnate. The devil himself refuses to touch them for fear he may be corrupted. We're talking Shub-Nigurath levels of evil here...
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#7

Post by Lonestar »

B4UTRUST wrote:
There are special levels of hell reserved for the HP/Compaq company. I owned one of their laptops. That laptop lasted little over a year before it died a painful, horrible, terrible death. I still owe over $1000 on it. Worst mistake I ever made. Piece of shit all the way from the word go. I got it and I had to get the CD rom drive warrentied as it wouldn't read discs.

So no HP/Compaq products. They are in fact, evil incarnate. The devil himself refuses to touch them for fear he may be corrupted. We're talking Shub-Nigurath levels of evil here...
I disagree(as long as we're giving "Come to Jesus" examples :razz: ), I've had mine for two years with no problems, none, that were HP's fault(I had this crazy idea all I would need is 60GB...) and still use it as a backup for my primary. I even was able to upgrade the memory, and I was a little worried about proprietary HP problems, but it was all good.
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#8

Post by B4UTRUST »

Maybe I just managed to get the one bad laptop off the lot. But I've heard others who have had shitty laptops from them.
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#9

Post by Batman »

Might be the difference between genuine HP and used to be Compaq HP. The way I feel about Compaq makes B4 look compassionate so...
'I wonder how far the barometer sunk.'-'All der way. Trust me on dis.'
'Go ahead. Bake my quiche'.
'Undead or alive, you're coming with me.'
'Detritus?'-'Yessir?'-'Never go to Klatch'.-'Yessir.'
'Many fine old manuscripts in that place, I believe. Without price, I'm told.'-'Yes, sir. Certainly worthless, sir.'-'Is it possible you misunderstood what I just said, Commander?'
'Can't sing, can't dance, can handle a sword a little'
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#10

Post by B4UTRUST »

But Bats, they're they same company. Inside is the same components, built by the same people and the same people give you tech support. It's the same company, just a different branding sticker slapped on.
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#11

Post by The Cleric »

I had an HP laptop that was great 95% of the time, and an utter disaster the other 5% (sent back for warranty once, bad HD and they sent me the wrong replacement the first time, and its mobo keeled over 2 weeks out of warranty). However, I know 2 other people who bought the EXACT SAME laptop with the same specs on it and have had 0 problems for the past 4 years. Take that for what it's worth.
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#12

Post by LadyTevar »

Sounds like Monday/Friday Lemons to me.

My dear sister Devonie is the one to give horror stories about laptops. Poor things barely last 6mons around her.

Of course, having "Not Me" drop and break the monitor last month is only the lastest adventure. (for those unable to place the reference, refer to Family Circus)
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#13

Post by Gandalf »

It turns out that I'm in the same boat (and city) as Squidgey.

Are Dell laptops considered good?
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#14

Post by Lonestar »

Gandalf wrote:It turns out that I'm in the same boat (and city) as Squidgey.

Are Dell laptops considered good?
Christ no. The Army issues them out and they suck. There's something in the BIOS that, for the longest time, caused only one of the two Core 2 Duo processors to work. It's since been fixed, but that was enough to permanently turn me off them.
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#15

Post by Batman »

As for someone who worked with Dell laptops in the past, let me add that that's about par for the course for them.

I can't speak for the Dell desktops, but their laptops make Compaq look good.
'I wonder how far the barometer sunk.'-'All der way. Trust me on dis.'
'Go ahead. Bake my quiche'.
'Undead or alive, you're coming with me.'
'Detritus?'-'Yessir?'-'Never go to Klatch'.-'Yessir.'
'Many fine old manuscripts in that place, I believe. Without price, I'm told.'-'Yes, sir. Certainly worthless, sir.'-'Is it possible you misunderstood what I just said, Commander?'
'Can't sing, can't dance, can handle a sword a little'
'Run away, and live to run away another day'-The Rincewind principle
'Hello, inner child. I'm the inner babysitter.'
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#16

Post by Gandalf »

Ok, right now it looks like I might be saving to get an Apple Macbook thingy.

All I really need is something on which to do uni work and basic crap like that. Mac seems the obvious candidate for this because of their supposed stability and such.
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#17

Post by B4UTRUST »

Avoid the cult of Mac! Avoid the cult of Mac! Jobs if not your god! Avoid the cult of Mac!
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#18

Post by The Cleric »

If you can afford it, I've heard amazing things about IBM.
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#19

Post by Batman »

:razz:
'I wonder how far the barometer sunk.'-'All der way. Trust me on dis.'
'Go ahead. Bake my quiche'.
'Undead or alive, you're coming with me.'
'Detritus?'-'Yessir?'-'Never go to Klatch'.-'Yessir.'
'Many fine old manuscripts in that place, I believe. Without price, I'm told.'-'Yes, sir. Certainly worthless, sir.'-'Is it possible you misunderstood what I just said, Commander?'
'Can't sing, can't dance, can handle a sword a little'
'Run away, and live to run away another day'-The Rincewind principle
'Hello, inner child. I'm the inner babysitter.'
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#20

Post by Something Awesome »

If it matters, I'm using a Lenovo 3000 C100 that I got last summer that has given me very few problems (shipped with a faulty LCD [fixed up for free real quick]). I've never once seen a Blue-Screen, no problems running the latest Office programs or Defcon. This one only has a Celeron M, but you can probably get a Core Duo pretty cheap now. I think it only cost me around $7-800 at the time.
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#21

Post by Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman »

Here's what my experience has told me:

Avoid like plague: Toshiba, Sony, Fujitsu. Toshiba particularly SUCKS.

So-so: HP/Compaq & Acer. I have to admit that my old Turion-based HP notebook still runs very fine, but I've also heard unhappy stories about the brand.

Reccommended: Lenovo & Dell. One thing I like I like about IBM is they're extremely durable (one night I got drunk and vomited on my IBM notebook, and it still runs even now!), and they still keep the "durable" quality even after changing the brand name to Lenovo.
Last edited by Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman on Sun Sep 23, 2007 9:28 am, edited 3 times in total.
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