# Solved: Best laptop for cheap



## tsukihanyou (Jul 22, 2007)

Okay. Here's the deal. A few months ago, my Toshiba laptop died on me. So, now that I'm about to come into some money ($800), I'm going to buy a new laptop. The only problem is, I don't know what to get. At this point, it's between a Sony Vaio, a Dell, a Gateway, and an HP. I've heard mixed reviews about all of them, which I'm sure is common. Any thoughts? I'm trying my best to go for quality over cheapness this time, which I'm sure is what lead to the death of my last laptop. Any advice would be appreciated. Thank you.


----------



## JohnWill (Oct 19, 2002)

Well, I've always considered Toshiba laptops to be a pretty good quality unit, so it may have just been "luck of the draw". I have an HP, Averatec, and a Toshiba, all have given me excellent service.


----------



## z0rkny (Aug 1, 2007)

I would check out www.cnet.com for editor reviews and compare them to user reviews. What would this laptop be used for? Word Processing, Music, and Internet? Any media editing or gaming? When you say a good laptop you need to be specific about what its good for, because there are a TON of good laptops out there all ranging from 650-3,000 depending on what you use it for.

Personally, I am a Dell person. I've owned toshiba satelites, Gatewyas, and Hewlett Packard's over a six year span - all of which have failed me in some way or another. Even the dell I own and like has its problems.

Things you want to look out for when purchasing a laptop are:
1. It's ventilation system: My dell Inspiron 9300 is great, it has a 17 inch screen and serves as the perfect media desktop replacement for me at college. It's main issue, however, is that the fans suck in more dust than they put out air. This can cause your laptop to overheat, creating wear, tear, and slowdown overtime. Laptops have been more frequently referred to as notebooks these days, because its not really such a great idea to place a computer on your lap (it coveres the ventilation ports).

2. Size: Where are you going with this laptop, and again what are you doing with it? There are a lot of nifty thing and small notebooks these days, but not all come with standard features like a cd drive. The standard laptop size seems to be between 12-15 inches.

3. Components and Speed: As always, check the usual computer specs. Whats the CPU speed? How much RAM does it come with (this is upgradable)? How many USB ports? What size HD (Also upgradable)? What type of video and sound card (also upgradable - look into the audigy z2 PCMIA card if you want to attach your laptop to desktop speakers... I have it and I love it)

Your best bet is to sit down and write out everything you possibly want to use for your computer. From there you can determine what specs you might want the best of (If you put down gaming and image editing for example you're going to want a good CPU and Graphics card, vs. Downloading music and videos where you might want to invest into a laptop with more hard drive space).

Post your needs here and I can help you search and make a couple of reccomendations


----------



## 1002richards (Jan 29, 2006)

If you use e-bay, choose a seller near where you live and try before you buy. I did and got good after sales support.

Richard


----------



## tsukihanyou (Jul 22, 2007)

Sorry about that. I didn't even think about putting what I use the computer for. I mainly use it for school and writing. I do a little bit of online gaming (Guild Wars), some very basic Anime Music Video making with Movie Maker, and some image editing. Other than that, it's just normal internet surfing and stuff like that. As far as taking it places goes, I pretty much take it everywhere, since I use it to take notes in class. I also know that because of Vista, I'm going to need about 3gb of RAM and at least 200gb of harddrive, which I've taken into consideration when looking at laptops. I'm trying to do more research this time around. If you need anymore information, let me know.


----------



## z0rkny (Aug 1, 2007)

RAM and a hard drive are always upgradable, so the concern for 3gb of ram and a 200gb hd isn't sooooooo vital, but its important none-the-less. Below are some reviews for computers from various places that you might want to take a look at*. Make sure to read the reviews of people who have purchased the notebooks already, but don't take it all at face value.

While you look at what I have posted here please make sure that A.) You note how many reviews are posted (A review of 6.7 out of 10 on an item is bad, but if only 6 people have given reviews that isn't entirely indicative of the products performance. People tend to be more motivated to post reviews if they have a complaint) B. ) Note how old the product is and when feedback was given. If a product has just ten user reviews then perhaps its new, not as popular, or good enough to pass for a good computer but nothing worth raving about (given the price range you are shopping in, you are likely to run into computers review that fit this trend) C.) Look at what the editor says, take it with a grain of salt - technology editors usually have good things to say, but sometimes they give more favorable reviews to companies and products that post advertisements on their website D.) Read both good and bad reviews and see WHY a computer got a bad review. Sometimes its for stupid reasons like "new egg shipped me a dead product". Thats not helpful, and discard that advice. Other times its for good reasons "Computer just isnt as fast as you may think it is". E.) Read the specs on the computer and compare, like I said you can upgrade a laptops HD and and RAM, but its a bigger pain to sufficiently upgrade a CPU with the proper ventillation it needs so make sure to compare CPU speed, screen size, etc. (all the things that are harder to upgrade).

If you have any questons, or if none of these really appeal to you please post some feedback and I would gladly do some more searching for you. Also, feel free to browse these websites on your own:

http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/dell-latitude-d630-laptop/4505-3121_7-32445398.html

http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/toshiba-satellite-p105-s6024/4505-3121_7-31952936.html

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834115465 <---- I reccomend this one highly. Its made by ACER a microsoft corp, and it has good reviews and the exact specs you need (2.0 processor 3.gb of ram, big hard drive).

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834115464

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834101150

*(Note: Unfortunately my work prohibits me from viewing videos, so I don't know what is feature in those editorial videos.)


----------



## Ianc5444 (Jul 3, 2008)

Just to throw it out there $800 should atleast! get you a 2.2ghz Dual core processor, atleast 250gb hard drive, atleast 3gb of ram, and a HD display. dont settle for anything less than that for 800 bucks


----------

