After a laptop

[Ian]

Hey fellas

Im keen on buying a decent laptop to help me with my uni work. Needs to have decent onboard Grapics and a decent (preferably intel) processor. At least 80 GB of HDD, more the merrier.

I dont mind buying second hand.

Anyone selling or know where I can get decent laptops cheap?

Thanks
Ian

[CHiMPY]

dell.com.au

[Mad Mat]

hahaha. man i recon dell is ****. i have had some bad **** happen with there systems. go an asus mother board. i will get back to u with the rest. :)

[CHiMPY]

hahaha. man i recon dell is ****. i have had some bad **** happen with there systems. go an asus mother board. i will get back to u with the rest. :)
I have not actually ever owned a dell, but I do know quite a number of people who have them and have not had any problems.

I would personally buy one of the new Toshiba or IBM laptops with the duo core intels, but they are far from a bargain.

And if he gets an ASUS mobo he kinda needs to buy a whole ASUS laptop since you generally don't have much choicem in individual parts of a laptop.

[Rupewrecht]

check the forsale section - someone was selling one a few weeks ago

[chipa]

For a bargin go Dell. For the price they are sometimes hard to beat. But you do get product with less quality. Remember most of the time with laptops you get what you pay for. I generally stick with the IBM's as I know they can take a beating and keep going. But Toshiba have always been quality and the old Compaq business line of laptops wern't bad either.

The only problem with the new mobile duo core Intel CPU's is that they are still quite expensive. Somewhere between 2-4 months should see them going at good prices tho.

[CHiMPY]

The only problem with the new mobile duo core Intel CPU's is that they are still quite expensive. Somewhere between 2-4 months should see them going at good prices tho.

There is a few Toshiba ones with quite impressive specs for ~$3k which is nice.

The T60 IBM's are only about $3.5k but they have horrible resolution.
The ones with a decent res are like $6k

[skippy]

Lets just pretend for a second I know nothing about computer hardware and I need a PC or possibly a laptop for Tafe and wouldn’t mind a bit of gaming don’t need to play all the latest and greatest.

What do I really need? Whats a good budget?

[chipa]

There is a few Toshiba ones with quite impressive specs for ~$3k which is nice.
The T60 IBM's are only about $3.5k but they have horrible resolution.
The ones with a decent res are like $6k

It seems I should my supplier pricing a bit more carefully ;)

[CHiMPY]

Lets just pretend for a second I know nothing about computer hardware and I need a PC or possibly a laptop for Tafe and wouldn’t mind a bit of gaming don’t need to play all the latest and greatest.

What do I really need? Whats a good budget?
The question you have to ask yourself is how much do you want to spend.

You then find the best product to suit your needs.
You can get away with a much smaller budget with a PC because $3k on a PC will get you an almost top of the range PC that will do everything you ask it and more.
But $3k on a laptop is seriously going to struggle in the games department (laptops were NEVER designed to be gaming machines, and those that are built that way have ****house battery life).

As I said, decide how much you want to spend. Then go shopping for the best available products within that price range.

Having said that. I would be looking to spend around $2k.

It seems I should my supplier pricing a bit more carefully ;)
Huh?

[chicaboo]

EVERY IBM laptop I have had at work has had mobo related failures. Not all the same model or release year either...

[Cincinnatus]

Odd, most IBM think pads i've owned have been nigh on bullet proof, but that dosen't mean much (a sample of three is still a small sample).
Figure out exactly what you need, trawl ebay, you can pick up some second hand bargains if you don't mind older models. Only recomendation i will make to a fellow student, try and pick one up with a Pentium M or Centrino chipset. Reason being you will probably get about 4 - 6 hours life from the battery. Getting a P4 or P3 will see your battery life in the 1 1/2 - 2 hour life span. Makes working at uni harder.
My 2 cents worth. PM me if you like my mate runs a Computer shop(in Sydney) might be able to sort you out something with warranty.

[andrewgrazier]

have a look at the ACER brand of laptops, they dont look brilliant but you get good specs for the price you pay, so if looks dont mean anything then might as well get one!

laptops arnt gaming machines
sure you can get some that will go really nice with the latest games, but its not what laptops are for.
just remember
once its warranty is up if it breaks its pretty much throw me out or spend $500 to fix it

id seriously look at the specs
what you get, whats actaully included, battery life is pretty important, what type of CPU is on it


have a look at BIG W and DSE
i know for a fact that the big w acer laptops are cheaper to buy from big w than from even any IT wholesaler :S

[Ian]

Okey Guys:

Thanks for all the feedback! a lot of great ideas in there.

That being said, im studying software engineering at the moment with a side in games development, and I do need a laptop with grapical oomph. I know there not gaming rigs, but you can get some that can do gaming.

I was more after seeing if anyone knew any1 who was selling one. I dont really have the money to buy a brand new one.

[chicaboo]

Graphical oomph will cost you, I don't think you'll see that this side of $3000...

[Laser the Amazer]

I have not actually ever owned a dell, but I do know quite a number of people who have them and have not had any problems.
.

I've had my Dell Desktop for 3 years in May

still going strong.

I would buy Dell again. I went LG for my laptop simply cause I could get it on Interest Free

Rob

[chipa]

My experience with IBM laptops has been damn good, maybe close to 2000 current models 'in the field' with clients' and I'd say we get less problems with them compared to other brands I've sold in the past. Acer laptops I've almost always had bad experiences with. Try picking one up by the sides and see how much it twists with just a little amount of pressure, not good usually!

[89sp1.8]

i think mazdamanik was selling a laptop..

[ATOMIC]

http://www.alienwaresystems.com.au/dnn2/Default.aspx?tabid=35

[Ian]

Alienware make a good laptop if your willing to pay, but there budget systems are just dodgy.

Intel onboard GFX chipsets arent winners. And if you want a nvidia or ATI chipset from alienware you pay lots. Dell can do a decent system for a shade over 2k... I will have to pinch some pennies I think.

[CHiMPY]

Alienware do NOT make good laptops.
They take a semi decent unknown brand of laptop and put a bright pink case on it, then jack up the price $1k just for the stupid thing.

If you are going to spend that kind of money on an Alienware laptop, go and buy the top of the line IBM T60 or even the "desktop replacment" dell (I forget what model it is).

[chipa]

Huh?

Missed that earlier, I work for an IT integration company, I just meant I hadn't checked my pricing on Toshiba laptops for a while.

[CHiMPY]

I see.
The Tecra A7 series look like very good buys atm.
Especially when you consider they have WXSGA screens and to get that in the IBM you are talking something like $6k

[Rupewrecht]

Compaq bad mmkay?. Where i worked a few years ago had a heap of Compaq laptops and they were utter ****e. Always breaking. And those stupid docking stations were half the problem.

[chipa]

Compaq bad mmkay?. Where i worked a few years ago had a heap of Compaq laptops and they were utter ****e. Always breaking. And those stupid docking stations were half the problem.

Which models tho? I found the compaq business line are totally different to the lower levels.

[Rupewrecht]

No idea. They were PC...so i didn't care ;)

but would have been whatever was mid-to-top off the range 4 years ago specwise

[skippy]

Well looking like its PC for ME,
Thanks.

Don't really need the laptop but if it was not much more why not, (plus I can get my IT guys at work to fix it easier) but yeah guess a no go,

I am only looking at fairly low-mid spec machines I don't really know much about computers so getting top of the line is not really necessary as I don't know what I am doing.

It will basically be a word processor with net, storage and gaming abilites.

What do you guys think of this from Dell
for $1079.

Pentium® D Processor 820 with Dual Core Technology (2.80GHz, 800FSB)
Genuine Windows® XP Media Center 2005 Edition
Graphics card,
128MB PCI Express™ x16 (DVI/VGA/TV-out) ATI Radeon X300 SE HyperMemory
Memory,
1GB Dual Channel DDR2 at 533MHz- 2DIMMs
HD,
160GB Serial ATA Hard Drive (7200RPM) w/DataBurst Cache
Drives,
Dual Drives: 16x DVD-ROM Drive + 16x DVD+/-RW w/dbl layer write capability
3.5 in Floppy Drive
Monitor,
19 inch E196FP Analog Flat Panel
Sound,
Integrated 7.1 Channel Audio
Plus keyboard, mouse, speakers.
Not including Office.


What ya think?
Any advise or insults for selected products welcomed.


Cheers,

[andrewgrazier]

the dell desktiops arnt that bad
they have a very very low profit margin
i just had a lok at dells website n cant find it for 1079 thoguh
thers one for 2098 thou
but i duno

[skippy]

That was the
XPS 400 Entry-level Gaming
With a DVD rom and 3.5 floppy.

http://configure.us.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?c=us&cs=19&l=en&oc=DXPS400G2&s=dhs