New laptop, recommendations please?

riddik

I have about 2000 budget, and I'm lookin for what is basically standard [or will be fairly soon] :

-2gigs ram
-200 gig HD
-Dual core processor
-decent graphics card [not mad into games so not crucial]

etc etc.

anyway i was lookin between dell and sony, but just checkin the prices of HP laptops, they seem cheap. are they worth the money or to be avoided like the plague?

ANY RECOMMENDATIONS APPRECIATED!!! this is a lot of money and i want to get it right. the last time i bought one I spent 2000 or so on my dell, which is 512mb/60gig/1.7GHz which seems terribley basic now, but thats almost three years, it aged very well, so I want this one to do the same!

Sleepy

Have to say I'm not a fan of HP laptops, the ones we have in work all seem horribly under-powered and pretty unreliable. Toshiba are well worth a look.

voxpop

Acer Travelmate 8200

thebman

Personally I wouldn't buy a HP because I don't like the laptops.

Overall though if you buy a Toshiba you could still buy a bad model of Toshiba that has a design flaw or other problem.

You need to decide on the companies your willing to buy from and then look at the models that they offer that suit you. Research each of these using Google to find out if users are reporting any problems with them online.

You should probably stick away from the very latest model aswell as you can't get existing user feedback and problems only come up after a few months at the earliest.

I bought a Latitude D810 when I got my laptop and was really happy with it. Having had an Inspiron and Latitude and used other peoples Inspirons, I have to say that if your looking for a high quality laptop from Dell, the Latitude line is the way to go.

regedit

From my point (open to corrections), do not get an Acer laptop. If it develops a fault is will have tro be sent for repair to the North (Bambridge) and their service dpt is somewhat "slow".
Having said that, I never owned another laptop but all my PC were desktops. Somehow, I trust brands like Toshiba and Sony. I was reading a few reviews lately and HP was one of the best in most categories (albeit this is relative). Ask a lot of questions befor you buy the machine and make sure to take out extra warranty.

is_that_so

I would recommend the Toshiba Satellites. Some really lovely machines at good prices. Very reliable in my experience and they give a good extended warranty. I also like the Acers which tend to be well-priced and also fairly reliable. The Acer Aspire 5102WLMi is very well-rated. With Dell you might want to look at something like the Inspiron 6400.

development.ie

I would recommend HP or Dell...I have had friends with bad experience with Acer laptops. Since they are not in Ireland and have to bought in the UK if anything happens they get sent to a void in northern ireland and support is bad.

BostonB

I'd go sony if I had the money.

Sony VGN-FE31Z
I think theres a new all black one, but its a similar spec to this... http://tinyurl.com/2mdqhw

Tom Dunne

riddik wrote:

but just checkin the prices of HP laptops, they seem cheap. are they worth the money or to be avoided like the plague?

They are that price for a reason. I have a HP laptop and I wouldn't recommend it - avoid like the plague.

Dell, Sony or, my personal favourite, IBM/Levono are recommended. Dell are the cheaper end of the spectrum, with Sony and IBM, you are paying that bit more for quality.

thebman

I've heard bad reports of Sony support although not from Irish people. I just don't trust Sony myself. Overpriced, underspeced laptops IMO. Your paying for Sony's name on top of any quality etc... IMO.

I've worked at an office with nothing but IBM laptops and not one had a failure. Rock solid but again spec wise they are office computers, not the most powerful machines.

I still think Dell Latitude range is the best value for money as long as you do a search to see if users are having any issues with the laptop. The Latitude I got came with a 3 year warranty so if Dell are still offering that then I'd go for it. I've had an Inspiron, badly built. Cheap plastic and you can feel how cheap it is. My Inspiron broke straight away after the warranty expired so I'd never buy another one as Dell offered no help what so ever other than offering me the chance to pay 400 Euro to get it fixed. So for my next laptop (Latitude), I researched for about a month before buying and I've had it two years and couldn't be happier.

What I did was type the model number into Google followed by problems. Generally if Dell's have problems, it'll come up straight away (usually from Dell's own forums. If all that comes up on the first two pages is problems with compatibility with Linux than its probably okay assuming you don't run Linux.

riddik

Fair play lads. yeah i been doing a bit of checking, i think the lattitude is a front runner, but im still going to head out to pc world [no intention of buying there, dont worry!!!!] and the likes just to see if there's anything else that catches my eye. But dell's approach to customization is really the full stop on it i think. still, any other suggestions, please let me know!

Urban Weigl

I'd have a very good experience with the Apple MacBook Pro. Looking at www.applestore.ie the 15.4" MacBook Pro with 200GB hard drive and 2GB memory comes in at €2399, which is a bit over your budget, though you can get an educational discount on it if you know someone who is a teacher or student.

The price includes delivery and 21% VAT. I've found that the graphics card in it runs all the latest PC games, and the laptop has dual DVI output, so you can power displays like the 30" Dell, which most laptops cannot.

From personal experience, I'd stay away from Dell laptops. IBM/Lenovo ThinkPads are very high quality in my experience.