Cheap Laptop

The_Conductor · 20-09-2014 10:26am

Its more than capable of doing anything you've described (and more).
I'd go with the Argos one- if it were me (I'm not in the market for a laptop).

Nono Toure · 20-09-2014 10:33am

The_Conductor wrote: »

Its more than capable of doing anything you've described (and more).
I'd go with the Argos one- if it were me (I'm not in the market for a laptop).

Thanks for that.

RickyBobby1 · 20-09-2014 10:45am

Wife is looking for a new laptop and we are on a tight budget. She will be using it for internet , online streaming and research for course work.
Would the Argos one be good enough?

40now · 20-09-2014 10:55am

On the Dell website they have a 15 inch laptop, 4gb ram, 500 gig hard drive, hdmi connection and includes delivery for 219e, I've seen this on boards somewhere and looks good to me, but I know very little about this kinda stuff.
I think the laptop is called Dell 15.

40now · 20-09-2014 10:56am

On the Dell website they have a 15 inch laptop, 4gb ram, 500 gig hard drive, hdmi connection and includes delivery for 219e, I've seen this on boards somewhere and looks good to me, but I know very little about this kinda stuff.
I think the laptop is called Dell 15.

The_Conductor · 20-09-2014 12:16pm

40now wrote: »

On the Dell website they have a 15 inch laptop, 4gb ram, 500 gig hard drive, hdmi connection and includes delivery for 219e, I've seen this on boards somewhere and looks good to me, but I know very little about this kinda stuff.
I think the laptop is called Dell 15.

The lowest priced laptop on the Irish Dell website is 249
It has no DVD drive- and is a Celeron/Atom processor.
Their lowest priced i3 laptop- is 379.

Nono Toure · 20-09-2014 2:55pm

Sh1t, all the Asus laptops mentioned by the op are out of stock in most, if not all the Argos shops!

branners69 · 22-09-2014 9:21am

Nono Toure wrote: »

For those of you who have bought one of these, are they good? I'm looking for a new laptop, my head is wrecked with researching. When I find one I think I'll buy the reviews are not the best. Unfortunately my budget is low, so if this is a good laptop then I'll buy it at that price.

I picked one up over the weekend and it is fine for web, netflix, and streaming HD etc. Was streaming the football in HD no problem.

I moved from a 6 year old Acer Aspire 6920g and whilst the ASUS has a very plastic feel to it in comparison to the solidness of the Acer, I am happy with my purchase so far!

One downside is the 2 usb ports, I use a wireless mouse so I am down to one port being free. And if I want to connect two hard drives I have to unplug the mouse and use the touch pad. I will have to pick up a USB hub.

MRTULES · 22-09-2014 10:37am

So what are the contenders for best value budget laptop available either in store or on line? Say sub €350 unless there is something ridiculously good for not much more.
There seems to be consensus for things like phone= moto g and tablet= nexus 7. I know things change quickly but is there even a comparable bang for buck laptop that can be used as a reference point?
Thanks.

branners69 · 22-09-2014 10:50am

MRTULES wrote: »

I know things change quickly but is there even a comparable bang for buck laptop that can be used as a reference point?
Thanks.

I think this laptop is it! You cant get much better for the price! And this is from a Nexus 7 owner and whose wife has a Moto g!

MRTULES · 22-09-2014 10:53am

branners69 wrote: »

I think this laptop is it! You cant get much better for the price! And this is from a Nexus 7 owner and whose wife has a Moto g!

Thanks. I will use this as my benchmark so. Unfortunately its pretty much sold out everywhere with Argos. Much appreciate the advise.

branners69 · 22-09-2014 10:55am

MRTULES wrote: »

Thanks. I will use this as my benchmark so. Unfortunately its pretty much sold out everywhere with Argos. Much appreciate the advise.

Unless you want to game or do some serious video editing this laptop will do pretty much everything else!

The_Conductor · 22-09-2014 11:03am

Basic budget laptops- change far more frequently than does the Moto G or the Nexus 7 though- and they tend to be available in far lower quantities than the other products.

If you're looking for a basic entry level product- that evolves but hovers under the 400 mark- the Dell 15 basic model is probably as good as it gets (for a consistent choice).

You will get short term offers that feature better spec'ed machines- Lenovo in particular are infamous for offloading stocks of rather pleasingly spec'ed machines at improbably low prices- however, they are only ever in small quantities- and for very short periods of time.

Offers- immediately preceding the launch of new processors- tend to be pretty good all round- for example- a lot of people have been holding off on buying Nexus 7s- as there is a new Nexus 9 with an Nvidia K chip due out at Google's October bash- so its entirely foreseeable that there will be really good offers on Nexus 7s in the run-up to Christmas- as retailers offload stocks- prior to restocking with the new tablets (should be nice tablets too- HTC are doing them this time).

So- you keep your ear to the ground and keep abreast of whats happening- and time your purchases accordingly.

CYHSN · 22-09-2014 5:38pm

Picked up one of those asus f551c in argos and pretty happy with it, had to install classic shell to get the start menu back with windows 8.

Is this the same asus laptop that was in argos? It's on Sam Mccauley's with free delivery for €299.99

edit: Its X551MA while argos model was X551C

MRTULES · 22-09-2014 5:46pm

Just saw your edit above. Pity its not the i3 alright.

beauf · 22-09-2014 5:48pm

CYHSN wrote: »

Picked up one of those asus f551c in argos and pretty happy with it, had to install classic shell to get the start menu back with windows 8.

Is this the same asus laptop that was in argos? It's on Sam Mccauley's with free delivery for €299.99

edit: Its X551MA while argos model was X551C

The argus one seems to be a i3 and the other a atom?

Is the N2815 a lesser one than the N2830 sold in the Dell one?

conzy · 22-09-2014 5:53pm

These are also great value for anyone looking for a budget machine,

Lenovo G500, Pentium 2020M, 6GB ram, 1TB disk, USB3, HDMI, not going to get much better for €349. Picked one up for a friend, shipping was €2 for some reason

Nono Toure · 22-09-2014 8:53pm

I bought one today. Not happy really. When I got home (110 mile round trip) I opened the box to find it had already been opened. There was finger prints all over the laptop and signs of wear on the little rubber grips underneath it!!! I find the cursor unresponsive at times also.

It's an F-series ya? My desktop says Asus X-series... Anyone elses say that?

balfe1990 · 22-09-2014 9:10pm

Anyone ever have a problem when updating to Windows 8.1?

I got my GF this laptop and was attempting to update to 8.1 after *many, many* restarts. It would configure and restart and rinse and repeat at least 10 times.

Finally, tonight, after installing 29 of 29 updates, it tried to configure said updates but the process failed.

Then I got a screen that simply said "Configuring updates failed, reverting to previous settings" or something to that effect.

It'll reboot after a straight 15 mins, hit the ASUS splash screen, attempt to configure updates and "revert" back again, before it restarts. Over and over, endless loop.

Nothing works and its driving me f'ing nuts. Please for the love of God, someone have a solution, my sanity is wearing thin. MS support want a product key, but I cant get the bloody key because I can't boot the thing up!

balfe1990 · 22-09-2014 9:12pm

Nono Toure wrote: »

I bought one today. Not happy really. When I got home (110 mile round trip) I opened the box to find it had already been opened. There was finger prints all over the laptop and signs of wear on the little rubber grips underneath it!!! I find the cursor unresponsive at times also.

It's an F-series ya? My desktop says Asus X-series... Anyone elses say that?

Below the bar code on the underside, it says " F551CA"

Think that's the model number

beauf · 22-09-2014 9:13pm

balfe1990 wrote: »

Anyone ever have a problem when updating to Windows 8.1?

I got my GF this laptop and was attempting to update to 8.1 after *many, many* restarts. It would configure and restart and rinse and repeat at least 10 times.

Finally, tonight, after installing 29 of 29 updates, it tried to configure said updates but the process failed.

Then I got a screen that simply said "Configuring updates failed, reverting to previous settings" or something to that effect.

It'll reboot after a straight 15 mins, hit the ASUS splash screen, attempt to configure updates and "revert" back again, before it restarts. Over and over, endless loop.

Nothing works and its driving me f'ing nuts. Please for the love of God, someone have a solution, my sanity is wearing thin. MS support want a product key, but I cant get the bloody key because I can't boot the thing up!

Is there any documentation on the Asus site to tell you how to do a clean boot and start over.

Nono Toure · 22-09-2014 9:26pm

balfe1990 wrote: »

Below the bar code on the underside, it says " F551CA"

Think that's the model number

Ya, mine says F551CA underneath, just confused as to why it says X-series on desktop, even though I'm only after copping on the image on the desktop was just an Asus background pic, but still they should have used one that said F-series!!

Lemmy Scott · 22-09-2014 9:27pm

Lemmy Scott wrote: »

got an asus from argos a few months back-thing is a disaster turns off by itself and is constantly over heating load of crap never again asus

I told ye lads asus cheap laptops are crap :P

balfe1990 · 22-09-2014 9:55pm

Lemmy Scott wrote: »

I told ye lads asus cheap laptops are crap :P

This problem is exclusive to Windows 8 software, not the manufacturer. There's enough evidence on the web from people to support that.

Once you hit this screen, there's basically no recourse as far as I can see. Apart from a wipe, as beauf mentioned above

balfe1990 · 22-09-2014 9:55pm

beauf wrote: »

Is there any documentation on the Asus site to tell you how to do a clean boot and start over.

I haven't checked as I'm not at home and navigating the web on my phone is a bit fiddly.

Stallingrad · 23-09-2014 11:45am

Had exactly the same issue, drove me f****n crazy. After hours the thing did revert and restarted and seems ok since. Bottom line is do NOT try to update to 8.1. If you do find a solution let me know.

balfe1990 wrote: »

Anyone ever have a problem when updating to Windows 8.1?

I got my GF this laptop and was attempting to update to 8.1 after *many, many* restarts. It would configure and restart and rinse and repeat at least 10 times.

Finally, tonight, after installing 29 of 29 updates, it tried to configure said updates but the process failed.

Then I got a screen that simply said "Configuring updates failed, reverting to previous settings" or something to that effect.

It'll reboot after a straight 15 mins, hit the ASUS splash screen, attempt to configure updates and "revert" back again, before it restarts. Over and over, endless loop.

Nothing works and its driving me f'ing nuts. Please for the love of God, someone have a solution, my sanity is wearing thin. MS support want a product key, but I cant get the bloody key because I can't boot the thing up!

branners69 · 23-09-2014 11:53am

beauf wrote: »

Is there any documentation on the Asus site to tell you how to do a clean boot and start over.

If you start it holding F9 you can do a refresh! Keeps all data but removes apps and programmes!

balfe1990 · 23-09-2014 12:04pm

Stallingrad wrote: »

Had exactly the same issue, drove me f****n crazy. After hours the thing did revert and restarted and seems ok since. Bottom line is do NOT try to update to 8.1. If you do find a solution let me know.

Can I ask, was it doing the infinite loop thing? Configuring, failing, reverting, restarting and so on?
How many hours did it take the machine to cop on and go back to normal?

Stallingrad · 23-09-2014 1:18pm

balfe1990 wrote: »

Can I ask, was it doing the infinite loop thing? Configuring, failing, reverting, restarting and so on?
How many hours did it take the machine to cop on and go back to normal?

It took about 3 hours in its 'reverting' state, restarted a couple of times and resolved itself. I really didn't ave to do anything but wait and curse!

Akrasia · 23-09-2014 2:24pm

Any new laptop on windows 8 is going to be mind numbingly slow for the first day or two while it downloads, configures and installs all the necessary updates.

It's a pain in the hole, but can't be avoided really.

You're probably best to stick on a really long movie or 3 (Apocolyopse Now redux edition followed by 2001 a space odyssey and the Lord of the rings trilogy), bring it fully up to date and then leave automatic updates turned on and every now and then, make sure you do a full restart of your computer so it can apply the updates (closing the lid or going into sleep mode isn't enough)

Cheap Laptop

Comments