Best New Laptop

pokermanpat

Hey i am just wondering where my euro1000 would best be spent on a new laptop. I had a packard bell, easynote 1G ram etc and found it very slow booting up, the wireless reciever was very weak and it overheated a lot causing it to freeze.
Antways its time to upgrade, I play poker online, do college work and do a lot of downloading. Just wondering where and on what my money would be best spent. Obviously would like 2gigs of ram and a core 2duo processer. Any advice for a stylish laptop much appreciated.

Cheers

RoyalMarine

you could pick up a c2duo 2ghz, 7950gtx 512mb, etc dell xps on adverts.ie

absoloutly amazing laptop. worth over 1,600

Passenger

I don't know if you have any Mac preferences and you won't get a new one in your price range but it might be worth raising it for one. The new Vaios are powerful and stylish but you'd prob be best to raise your spending for a good 2gig laptop.

Squeeonline

I have a HP dv2535, cost €1150 about 3 months ago in Cantech maynooth (since changed name) It has a 1.6Ghz c2d, 160Gb HD, 64Mb nVidea gfx ( geforce 8400m gs) and the usual WiFi, Blutooth, dvd -rw. edit: also 2Gb ram

It has a small 14.1 inch screen, but i find that fine. Comes with Vista Home Premium.

The only major downside that i have found with teh laptop is the short battery life, just over 1hr :30mins. Very short if you arent plugged in. That could probably be lengthened a little by dimming gfx and screen brightness.

I wouldnt really consider it a gaming laptop as when playing Unreal Tournament 2004 demo, the laptop overheads and the game crashes, but for regular desktop work, its excellent and quick.

I have reformatted many times and now installed a dual boot beween HP and Ubuntu. I have found my self not using Vista at all.

I'd really recommend this machine but i havnt had much experience with any other, so you may want to get other peoples views on their machines.

Hope this helps!

IncredibleHulk

Passenger wrote: »

I don't know if you have any Mac preferences and you won't get a new one in your price range but it might be worth raising it for one. The new Vaios are powerful and stylish but you'd prob be best to raise your spending for a good 2gig laptop.

Vaio NR11Z is 999 in most sony shops - or was couple weeks ago, and it has 2 gigs ram Core 2 Duo T7250 processor at 2GHZ and FSB 800MZH

Passenger

IncredibleHulk wrote: »

Vaio NR11Z is 999 in most sony shops

Sounds pretty good that actually.

AlmightyCushion

IncredibleHulk wrote: »

Vaio NR11Z is 999 in most sony shops - or was couple weeks ago, and it has 2 gigs ram Core 2 Duo T7250 processor at 2GHZ and FSB 800MZH

What graphics card does it have? It's probably integrated, which is still a good price for a sony laptop at that spec.

BostonB

If you don't need a good gfx card, you could ge away with a lower spec too.

Sony Vaio VGN-NR10ES
* T2310 Intel Pentium Dual Core Processor, 1.46GHz
* 2GB of RAM(2 x 1024Mb)
* 160GB Hard Drive
* DVD-RW drive
* 15.4" Widescreen Display
* Windows Vista Home Premium
* 4 x USB2.0 ports

Is €799

Though if you hang on I'm sure you'd get something with a better spec on the Dell outlet. That said I think Sonys are lovely.

Capt'n Midnight

Toshiba's are nice too.
I've had too many bad experiances with the small format Sony's where the spec on paper was fine but they were dog slow, and I ruled out software by swapping hard drives.

Webmonkey

I've found Asus laptops excellent in quality and what you get for the price is really good. They look really smart also. Take this for example:

http://www.laptopsdirect.ie/Asus_F3Sv-AP077G_Laptop_F3Sv-AP077G/version-1.asp

# Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo T7500 - 2.2GHz (x2), 800MHz FSB, 4MB L2 Cache
# RAM: 2GB DDR2-667MHz Low cost double memory offer, call for details!
# Hard Drive: 320GB Serial ATA 5400rpm
# Screen: 15.4" Widescreen TFT (1280x800)
# Optical Drive: DVD±RW Super Multi
# Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce 8600M 256MB
# Wireless LAN: Intel Wireless WiFi Link 4965AGN
# Bluetooth: No
# Weight: 2.95Kg
# Warranty: 2-year limited global hardware warranty 1-year battery pack warranty
# Operating System: Windows Vista Ultimate
# Gigabit Ethernet 10/100/1000
# S-Video Output
# Built-In Stereo Speakers
# Built-In 1.3 MegaPixel Camera

€1146.49

Though they have better ones that include bluetooth/infra red etc. But still not bad.


Edit: - Seems poor rating on the laptopdirects site there now strangely enough. I've got a older spec one and I'm very happy with it.

IncredibleHulk

AlmightyCushion;54717330]What graphics card does it have?

15.4" WXGA X-black LCD Graphics Card according to specs at http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sony-Widescreen-Centrino-processor-technology/dp/B000X42NB2

It's probably integrated,

What does that mean, how do I find out?

IncredibleHulk

Sony's where the spec on paper was fine but they were dog slow,

Mine is not slow anyway

BostonB

Some chipsets are slow unless you've the right driver. Bit of black art. I've never had much problems with Sony myself though. I say they are not as good as you'd hope but are generally better up their with the better manufacturers. Its either Acer or Asus that have a poor rep for customer service. Not sure which. I suspect it Acer though I've no direct experience of either to be honest.