where's a good site to buy a laptop?
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Posted on Jan 06, 2013 09:48 pm
whosyourdaddy00
Hold 'Em Czar
Member Since: Dec 30, 2004
the good folk here were the first to come to mind fer this one...sorry i'm not 'round here much...but i still love ya....anywhooo
i'm in the market for a laptop runnin' windows 7 (not quite ready to make the plunge to 8....i'll wate 'till that settles some)..
4gb 'o ram prefering intel i5 prossessor or equvilent but i am flexable if i really won't notice
as far as harddrive space goes, i dont really care (4TB external)
screen size i wanna say i think i want a 17" ...is that the smallist with a full size keyboard?
[edit] i want a 15"ish screen size
i don't really care so much about battery life as it will be plugged into something 90% of its life.
budget is 400-500 $ US
thanks and hope all is well with y'all =)
wyd
anything come to mind in this sweet
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Jan 06, 2013 10:32 pm ....sweet spot price range...lol
im replacing a toshiba satalite series (vista 32 dual core 2gb ram) and it seems theres ALOT to choose from....darn near everything (new and stock) is shipping with windows 8 =(
...but i digress...my question to you was (and still is)...wheres a good site for good deals and reliability for stock laptops?
JovhatoMusic is everythingMember
Since: Apr 01, 2010
Jan 07, 2013 04:49 am I paid about that much for my Sony Vaio w/17" screen, i5. I don't remember where I got it but I found it on slickdeals.net. Check that site out for the next couple of days and you're bound to find something.
Jan 07, 2013 05:41 am Do you live around a MicroCenter store?
They sell refurbished PC's and laptops for very reasonable prices. I have bought a couple of their PC's over the years and have had very good luck with them.
TheTincanbugsloppy dice, drinks twiceMember
Since: Aug 05, 2003
Jan 07, 2013 07:05 am Newegg.com (good all around electronics retailer)
bhphoto.com (has amazing deals on electronics of all kinds, including musician gear)
amazon.com (aint just for bookworms anymore)
I personally got mine through the Sony online store, due to a modest employee pricing benefit I was eligible for. Theyre not the cheapest but sony makes a great laptop.
J-botByte-MixerMember
Since: Dec 04, 2007
Jan 08, 2013 04:06 pm I'll second Tincanbug's online vendors, particularly Newegg and BHphotovideo.com sometimes BH has some really really good prices on stuff.
On laptops themselves, I'm fond of the Lenovo Ideapad series at this juncture. The hospital I was deploying machines at a couple years ago used the Thinkpads for their laptops, and I found them to be pretty reliable and felt solid, if not having all the bells and whistles of, say, Asus, or HP or Dell.
There is a version of the Lenovo IdeaPad P500 that is going for about $580 right now, but I think it's only through BestBuy. I haven't seen that model anywhere else, but it's quite nice for the price. 6GB DDR3 ram, 750GB HDD, wifi b/g/n, no firewire, but 2 USB 2 ports and 1 USB3 port, HDMI, optical drive, and I think it was either a 3rd-gen i5. 15.6" display @ 1366x768. The only real downside is there is no dedicated graphics card. It's an internal Intel HD 4000 chip. :P But it should make for a good work laptop.
Scratch the $580, I just saw it at $560. :P
The more expensive version has 1TB HDD, core i7, and 8GB RAM.
Also, it's not listed in the specs whether or not it has a card reader (SD card and etc.) The pics show one on the left side by the USB port, but I'm not 100% on that.
There was some talk about flaky wi-fi, but that was due to a windows 8 problem, and there is a driver fix for it currently. And yeah, alas, it does come with Win8 on it. :/
Jan 11, 2013 01:59 am wow thanks for the good info! ..!...the lappy i'm replacing is primarily used for netflix, youtube, pandora, and spreadsheets! lol!..the nerd in me is drooling over j-bots recommendation....BUT if i can save money.....aww heck...nevermind...i can keep a quality box around for a good while...prolly is worth the extra $100 to last twice the time...lemme do some research....
J-botByte-MixerMember
Since: Dec 04, 2007
Jan 11, 2013 04:30 am Yeah, I was in NC visiting the In-Laws (wife's dad is former Microsoft employee) and we came across that Lenovo in BestBuy when we were mucking around. It looked like a solid deal to both of us, and I've got my wife looking at it.
Wife's laptop is an older HP Pavilion dv9000 that is kinda bulky, and probably bigger than she needs (though she does kinda like the 17" screen, she's also comfortable with 15.6") She liked the size and features of the Lenovo, and the price is pretty reasonable for the cheaper one. She got hers back in 2008 when her gateway laptop was on the fritz and she wasn't trusting it anymore, and she needed to finish her dissertation. I think both her dad and I had troubles getting it back up again.
The HP laptop has had on and off issues with the fan being noisy even when the laptop wasn't pushed very hard, and often is cranky/slow at bootup. (she's using Vista on the laptop) And now, the fan noise is pretty regular and constant...I think the fan might be on its way out so me and her dad told her to make constant backups. At least weekly anyway.
Anyway, hopefully it will hold until she decides it's time to get a new one. And in a pinch, there's my MSI laptop (which is in a semi-permanent home next to the TV to watch hulu on the TV via HDMI)
Edit: I think there is a version of the IdeaPad Z580 that is going for about $430. It is very similar to the P500 in features, but has an i3 CPU, and only 4GB RAM.....also the casing is a tad more bulky. :P But it should be a good solid option.
HippieRockstar Vatican AssassinMember
Since: Mar 20, 2009
Jan 11, 2013 01:44 pm Just adding a few more online options:
www.mwave.com
www.tigerdirect.com
And when you want to comparison shop (once you find a model you like)
www.nextag.com
I had a many lenovo... good laptops /durable. Dell, meh! HP's are OK, Toshiba's are OK. Sony products are very proprietary.
You'll find a few gems looking at MSI, ASUS, or ACER laptops. They're not as durable as Lenovo, but they'll get the job done (and usually have more bang for the buck cause they're gamers laptops... and beefy). And if you got the money.... Alienware!!!
You'll be hard pressed to find anything less than $700 though.. unless used.
Jan 12, 2013 09:10 pm i think ive settled on a true jem (under 500)!!
amazon has a toshiba satalite S855d for $480
amd quad core
6GB RAM
750GB hard drive
and my first ever blue-ray player! lol
not to mention its the same family of the lappy i'm replacing (bonus points for the wife)
=D
Keith WarrenMans reach exceeds his graspMember
Since: Oct 23, 2007
Jan 14, 2013 01:56 am If you live in the nor easter area, there's a company by the name of rentpro who happens to be a great source of used and off lease equipment.
My father in law got a laptop from them about a year ago, though old, still viable, for about 170$ And for Christmas I got an exact copy of what he has.
Not state of the art, but I can run windows 7 ultimate, Cakewalk Sonar 8.5, and have room for expansion. I love old HP Comps!
Jan 14, 2013 07:14 am Keith, good to see ya man!
Keith WarrenMans reach exceeds his graspMember
Since: Oct 23, 2007
Feb 04, 2013 01:16 am Daddy- Toshibas are hit or miss laptops, but great none the less if you get a good one. Only thing I would really be concerned about with them lately is their hard drive manufacturers. Lot of DUDS because of their switch a few years ago.......
They switched from a Samsung operated WD site to a Seagate operated Seagate site- which sounds great, but they moved to the wrong side of Harlem so to speak.....
Seagate lives in China. And little Harlem existed in China. The bad part. Where bad stuff happens. Like little Harlem in China; where bad stuff happens; like little China in Harlem......
STCC (So The Cycle Continues.)
Feb 04, 2013 01:12 pm interesting you bring that up...after settin it up, i ran the included windows performance test and everything performed as expected EXCEPT the harddrive read/write speed which got the lowest marks....im not gonna stress it though...this box isn't gonna be used for audio or anythinng.
thanks for the heads up though =)
