Which laptop?

[muzvmc]

Help! My wife needs a laptop for work but as non techie people we don't know where to start.
Had a look round but there is so much choice.
She needs to type reports but also wants to put her mp3 music files on it.
We may as well also get something that wil cope with tracklogs and memory map software if we go away.
Must also talk to the home pc which is running XP.
Anyone got any advice, or bought something good / bad recently?
Thanks in advance
Ian

 

[Gazzr]

Just bought a Toshiba Satellite A03/Y something and its pretty good and the battery life has been impressive at about 2.5hrs. It gets a bit hot underneath though so wouldn't leave it too long on your lap or on the couch. 15inch, XP, 512ram, 40gig hard drive for about 400quid (Aussie price).

It also seems pretty well built.

 

[Fanum]

Pretty much any £400 laptop from any of the big names will do fine.......40GB is an average hard drive size, if you can find one with more that's good.

Don't bother with anything with a whizzy graphics card etc (the spotty kids in Dixons like those ones 'cos they play games on them) unless your wife is into gaming.....but a Wifi enabled one would be sensible (hotspots are becomming more common and you will be able to use it anywhereat home once you've bought a wifi router)

Other than that, go in and play with some......there's a trade off between price, battery life and size.......if she's going to be using it on trains etc than battery life and weight might be the priority, but itf it's going to be more often based on a desk somewhere, the hard drive size and cost might be the factors to lean towards.

Ignore silly software bundles.......unless they chuck in MS Office or similar...certainly don't be swayed because any of them have a year's free copy of Norton or Mcafee....the first thing we'll all advise you to do when you get it home is take that crap off it anyway

Plus ask them for a free bag, and when they agree, add a free wifi router for your other PC......they'll go for it usually,(or at least give you large amounts off) especially on an out of town shopping site, cos they know you could walk next door and get the same deal....don't be afraid to ask

People will tell you allsorts.....some love Dell, some hate them, and the same with all the other big names.....TBH I reckon that these days they're all much of a muchness......my HP from Curries (£399) has done a stirling job and has been bashed about Morocco several times, but some people really don't rate them

In short, don't worry, you can't go too far wrong, just go and fondle some in a shop and see which you prefer

 

[muzvmc]

Thanks for that, much appreciated

 

[judge]

I'll concur with most of Fannykins advice but I will say this, the architecture of all laptops means they get a hard life, moved, bumped, dropped, shaken, knocked etc.

On top of this cramming a desktop amount of components into the smallest possible space means it all gets stressed that much more even in normal usage.

For that reason I always recommend to my clients they get a 3 year warranty with their laptops, maybe less important at the £300 end of the market where some will see that as 'disposable technology' but repair bills for laptops are notoriously expensive and not easy for home repair.

I've know repair quotes to come in at greater than the cost of a new laptop and this is on laptops two months outside of their warranty.

Oh and make sure it is both secure and backed-up properly!!

 

[centaur]

Not much to add to the excellent advice here, simply a warning.

Laptop is often a misnomer for the type which relies on the cooling air intake from underneath. Such types ought NEVER to be used where these vents can become covered by clothing or soft furnishings as they will normally fry the CPU in fairly short order.

 

[Macca2321]

Try having a look here...got myself an all singing dancing ACER full loaded for around 500 Squid a few months back.

www.laptopsdirect.co.uk

Mac

 

[bustupbiker]

Top advice by all above, check out Dabs they have a cracker @ £299 inc vat.
if it only has to do Word and stuff. XP home i think, 512 and 40gig 15" screen.

Any and all knackered laptops taken off yer hands chaps and chappessssesss
i mend um where i can for a local charity group.. HD cleaned or keep it as they are cheap as chips today. I normally end up putting new drives in as my
bit to the group... Ta!

 

[Banjaxed]

This is nice...

Got an Acer for my daughter. Now available with Windows XP Media Center Edition (a better choice) on Fleabay (remember to add VAT to total), or from eBuyer with Windows Vista Basic.

Very nice machine, fantastic price, and listen to Judge and buy a 3 year extended warranty. And add some more memory from Crucial.

Highly recommended.

 

[needlongerlegs]

Shifted a lot of laptops over the last couple of years not much in it as they say above,
Dell, Tosh, never come back, Acers have, had one that left mouse droppings on the desk, customer rang me and I had to go and look, it was little bits of white plastic coming out of vent holes, Acer won't look till it goes pop, avoid nasty ones from PC world etc no support at all. Tosh, Dell support good.

Sony have something going for them long term cost a little more but survive the bike and the stairs fud fud fud crash, LOL; they have fixed price repairs if it does go wrong, at very resonable costs. Good purchse for all you RTW ers, totally shag it on back of bike and get it rebuilt for a fixed price.LOL