What do you think of this laptop for the price?

Recon

HP Pavilion with 15.4" screen
AMD 64 x 2 processors
2 GB RAM
120 GB hard drive
NVidia garphics card (can't remember how big exactly but something around 512 MB)
only 2 USB ports
Firewire port
Remote control
Built in webcam
5 or 6 in 1 memory card reader
Vista home premium.

€850

I think it's fairly decent, what do you think?

Recon

It's here on the HP site.

Is it worth €850.

AlmightyCushion

That graphics card is utter muck. If you plan on gaming, stay away.

Recon

The newest game I might play on it would be Age of Empires 2! And then only if I'm stuck in an airport.

Besides that what do you think of it?

AlmightyCushion

Recon wrote:

The newest game I might play on it would be Age of Empires 2! And then only if I'm stuck in an airport.

Besides that what do you think of it?

It should be fine so then. I'm not to sure on amd processors these days so I'll take a look and see what that one is like and report back to you.

AlmightyCushion

I found this dell vostro that has an AMD TL-60 which has a higher clock speed (2Ghz vs 1.7Ghz) and more cache (1MB vs 512KB). Same ram, same size hard drive, graphics card would be pretty similar and this has a much better warranty (3 year next business day vs 1 year).

It works out at just under €800 and that includes upgrading the battery to a 6 cell. You can also choose between vista and xp with this. I would go with this over the HP.

Ghost Train

Vostro™ 1500 NB(N0915001)
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T5470 Processor (1.6GHz,800MHz,2MB L2 cache), Genuine Windows Vista® Ultimate (32Bit) - English
Duo T5470 Processor (1.6GHz,800MHz,2MB L2 cache) edit
Microsoft Operating System Genuine Windows Vista® Ultimate (32Bit) - English edit
Enhanced Service Packs Base Warranty - 1 Year Business Hardware Support edit
LCD 15.4" Wide Screen WXGA (1280 x 800) Display edit
Colour Choice Matte Jet Black without Camera edit
Memory 1024MB 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM [2x512] edit
Hard Drive 120GB (5400rpm) SATA Hard Drive edit
Video Card 256MB nVidia® GeForce® 8600M GT edit
Optical Devices Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive edit
Primary Battery Primary 6-cell Lithium-Ion Battery (56 WHr) edit
€ 797.39

you can get also get vostro 1000, with amd x2 tk-53, 1gb ram, vista home, 60gb hard disk, 1yr warrenty for about €450

of course you can configue the above machines how you want, but you should be able to get get better value for the same spec you listed for cheaper

Recon

Thanks for that Almighty.

Would the vostro have a firewire connection? Or one of those built in web cams?

AlmightyCushion

eolhc wrote:

Vostro™ 1500 NB(N0915001)
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T5470 Processor (1.6GHz,800MHz,2MB L2 cache), Genuine Windows Vista® Ultimate (32Bit) - English
Duo T5470 Processor (1.6GHz,800MHz,2MB L2 cache) edit
Microsoft Operating System Genuine Windows Vista® Ultimate (32Bit) - English edit
Enhanced Service Packs Base Warranty - 1 Year Business Hardware Support edit
LCD 15.4" Wide Screen WXGA (1280 x 800) Display edit
Colour Choice Matte Jet Black without Camera edit
Memory 1024MB 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM [2x512] edit
Hard Drive 120GB (5400rpm) SATA Hard Drive edit
Video Card 256MB nVidia® GeForce® 8600M GT edit
Optical Devices Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive edit
Primary Battery Primary 6-cell Lithium-Ion Battery (56 WHr) edit
€ 797.39

you can get also get vostro 1000, with amd x2 tk-53, 1gb ram, vista home, 60gb hard disk, 1yr warrenty for about €450

of course you can configue the above machines how you want, but you should be able to get get better value for the same spec you listed for cheaper

Vista ultimate is a bit of a waste of money.
Running Vista idealy you would want 2 gigs of ram.
The graphics card is overkill for what the OP is looking for.

@Recon - I don't know but my Inspiron 9400 has a firewire so I imagine it would, I'll take a look.

AlmightyCushion

I can't find anything about a webcam or firewire on the vostro 1000 range so assume the worst and that it doesn't have them or you could ring them and ask. I doubt it would have a webcam as these are aimed at businesses (although they could be used for video conderencing so you never know) and I presume they would have a firewire connection as my Inspiron does.

Recon

Thanks for all the help and advice AlmightyCushion.

AlmightyCushion

Recon wrote:

Thanks for all the help and advice AlmightyCushion.

Any time man. If you are getting the laptop I recommended above you could save a few quid by decreasing the length of the warrenty. Also I would recommend getting at least the 6 cell battery but consider getting the 9 cell. It may add to the weight but battery life will be greatly increased which is always a good thing.

AlmightyCushion

OP you could also get this. If you drop the warranty down to a 1 year warranty it works out as €820. It's got a better processor, better graphics card and bigger hard drive than the other one I recommended although you do miss out on that nice warranty.

Linoge

The Vostro 1500 (at least mine did) have integrated cams and mics, v handy. Also have multimedia controls at the front that the 1000 doesn't have. Vostro does have firewire.

Briefly (after cutting eolhc's post), my machine is this

Vostro™ 1500 NB
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T5470 Processor (1.7GHz,800MHz,2MB L2 cache), Genuine Windows Vista® Business (32Bit) - English
Enhanced Service Packs Base Warranty - 1 Year Business Hardware Support edit
LCD 15.4" Wide Screen WXGA (1280 x 800) Display edit with trulife
Colour Choice Matte Jet Black with Camera edit
Memory 2gb 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM [2x512] edit
Hard Drive 160GB (5400rpm) SATA Hard Drive edit
Video Card 256MB nVidia® GeForce® 8600M GT edit
Optical Devices Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive edit
Primary Battery Primary 6-cell Lithium-Ion Battery (56 WHr) edit

Also,
Bluetooth and 802.11n (pre-n)
€ 847.00 ca

One thing that the HP does have which I would love is the remote control that slots into the PCMCIA slot. You can get a generic bluetooth one for the vostro, but it doesn't fit perfectly:(

That said, I certainly wouldn't sacrfice the processor and 40gigs of HD space for it.

All in all though, you know that the HP will be a better build quality. HP is the biggest PC manufacturer in the world for a reason!

AlmightyCushion

Linoge wrote:

The Vostro 1500 (at least mine did) have integrated cams and mics, v handy. Also have multimedia controls at the front that the 1000 doesn't have. Vostro does have firewire.

Briefly (after cutting eolhc's post), my machine is this

Vostro™ 1500 NB
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T5470 Processor (1.7GHz,800MHz,2MB L2 cache), Genuine Windows Vista® Business (32Bit) - English
Enhanced Service Packs Base Warranty - 1 Year Business Hardware Support edit
LCD 15.4" Wide Screen WXGA (1280 x 800) Display edit with trulife
Colour Choice Matte Jet Black with Camera edit
Memory 2gb 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM [2x512] edit
Hard Drive 160GB (5400rpm) SATA Hard Drive edit
Video Card 256MB nVidia® GeForce® 8600M GT edit
Optical Devices Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive edit
Primary Battery Primary 6-cell Lithium-Ion Battery (56 WHr) edit

Also,
Bluetooth and 802.11n (pre-n)
€ 847.00 ca

One thing that the HP does have which I would love is the remote control that slots into the PCMCIA slot. You can get a generic bluetooth one for the vostro, but it doesn't fit perfectly:(

That said, I certainly wouldn't sacrfice the processor and 40gigs of HD space for it.

All in all though, you know that the HP will be a better build quality. HP is the biggest PC manufacturer in the world for a reason!

Well the laptop I have linked to in the post above yours has the following specs.

Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T7100 Processor (1.8GHz,800MHz,2MB L2 cache)
Genuine Windows Vista® Business - English
Base Warranty - 1 Year Business Hardware Support
15.4" Wide Screen WXGA (1280 x 800) Display
INTEGRATED WEBCAM Matte Jet Black without Camera
2048MB 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM (2x1024)
160GB (5400RPM) SATA Hard Drive
128MB nVidia® GeForce® 8400M GS
Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive
Primary 9-cell Lithium-Ion Battery (85 WHr)

It has a better processor and better battery. The graphics card isn't as good but it will handle aoe2 no problem. It works out as €845

Linoge

AlmightyCushion wrote:

It has a better processor and better battery. The graphics card isn't as good but it will handle aoe2 no problem. It works out as €845

Didn't know it was a contest man

At the end of the day, we're both saying the same thing. Go with the Vostro.

And OP, if you do go with the Vostro, be aware that a 9cell battery will stick out the back a bit on the 1500.