Decent laptop for under €1,000?

hypnotic

Hey,

I'm looking to buy a laptop so thought I might get a few pointers here. I'd ideally like to spend around €800 but will go up to €1,000 or so if needed.

Will mainly be used for internet, movies, music, and gaming (to some degree anyway).

Mobility isn't really an issue as I won't be carrrying it around too much and I was thinking of getting an extended warranty for a few years just in case, but not essential if it raises the price too high.

I would like a big enough hard drive (at least 250gb, or is that considered small now? )and screen (15 - 17").

Don't really know what processors or graphics cards are any good though, but I would like them to be decent enough. Any ideas of what would be a good one to get? Thanks for any help

hinduhamster

Interent (wired or wireless) shouldn't be a problem on any new laptop. As for movies I guess it will depend in whether you are into blu-ray movies or not? If you are you'll want to be sure you have both a blu-ray drive and a monitor capable of supporting the resolution - so should mention "1080p viewing" (Hdmi port if you're looking to hook up to a hd tv)

I found a 17" monitor makes it very heavy if you do decide to move it around. I now have a 15" laptop and really don't notice the difference at all.

As for hard drive space you might be best off getting a relatively small hard drive with it and spending some cash on an external drive. They are dirt cheap now. I got a 500gb for less than €100 and I run everything off it (games, music e.t.c) and there is no lag or anything.

With regards to graphics/processor, I guess it depends how future proof and into gaming you are? A 256gb nvidia card should do for most past and current games, could damage the pocket though!
Core duo is pretty much standard in all laptops and will keep you going for a good while but I'd reccomend 2.2ghz+.

Beefing up the ram will cut down on load times too

Hope this helps somewhat.

Alanstrainor

For your budget i'd be expecting a core 2 duo 2ghz+, 4Gb of RAM, a mid range graphics card (there's more to it than just graphics memory so dont base it on just that), and at least a 250Gb drive built in, not much point getting less and an external harddrive, although it is an option if you find you are running out of space in the future.

hypnotic

Cheers for the advice guys. There's a couple I've found that I am interested in.

There's the XPS M1530 (Intel® Core™ 2 Duo Processor T9300 (2.50 GHz)from Dell for €1,169, it has €230 off the price and looks pretty good

http://ireland.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/xpsnb_m1530?c=ie&cs=iedhs1&l=en&ref=lthp&s=dhs

And there's an Asus I saw on Dabs which seems decent value, Asus M50VC Core 2 Duo P8400 4GB 320GB Vista P BluRay

http://www.dabs.ie/productview.aspx?Quicklinx=5F8F&CategorySelectedId=11105&PageMode=1&NavigationKey=11105,50220000,49350000,23,4294952849

So do you think these are good value for the price and any thoughts on which would be better to go for? I've read some good things about Asus today, and it does seem to be better value than other brands

TerrorFirmer

Dabs one has a crap video card. Dell one is OK on paper but there's been horrible hardware problems with the 8 series of video cards.

This is a really solid buy as a gaming machine, well under 1k.

hypnotic

Thanks for the warning on the video cards

Don't really want to go with laptopsdirect though from what I've heard on here

Have found this one on komplett though, seems quite good, decent graphics, big screen, good ram. Only issue I can see from the earlier replies might be the processor, do you think 2.0GHz is enough?

ACER Aspire 7730G-734G32BN
Penryn 7350 (2.0GHz) 4GB 320GB HDD GeForce® 9600M-GS 512MB/1280MB Blueray

http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.aspx?sku=422867

me-skywalker

Cant go wrong with this...



DELL INSPIRON STUDIO 1537 (System Identifier. 010LHL5J)
Studio 1537 Intel Core 2 Duo P8400 (2.26GHz)
Windows Vista SP1 Home Premium

---

System Price EUR 559.22

Operating System: Windows Vista SP1 Home Premium
English Windows Vista Home Premium SP1 (32Bit OS)
Memory: Memory 3072MB (1x2048 + 1X1024) 800MHz DDR2
Hard Disk Drive: Hard Drive 320GB SATA (5400rpm)
Video: Graphics 256 MB ATI Mobility RADEON HD 3450
NoteBook Screen: Display LCD 15.4 WXGA LED
CD Read-Write Drive: Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive
System Color: LCD Back Cover Ruby Red Microsatin Finish
MISC: MS Vista Premium Logo Label NB (small
Vista OnLine Getting Started Guide (WW
Wireless Intel WiFi Link 5100
6 cell 56W HR LI-ION Battery
Power Cord European 90W AC Adaptor 3-pin
Wireless Europe Dell Bluetooth 370 Card
Camera Integrated 2.0 Mega Pixel Camera CCFL

TerrorFirmer

me-skywalker wrote: »

Cant go wrong with this...



DELL INSPIRON STUDIO 1537 (System Identifier. 010LHL5J)

Yes you can, the video card is pretty **** for the latest games.

The Acer from Komplett is OK and not bad for games, though the one from Laptopsdirect I linked to is far superior....

hypnotic

Is the one you suggested better because of the video card? Is GT much better than GS because that seems to be the difference between the two video cards?

Or is it because of the processor?

I don't know much at all about the technical side of things, but the two acers seemed to be quite similar in spec or am I completely wrong

And in your opinion are laptopsdirect ok to deal with so? I've bought off komplett before and never had any problems, unlike dabs.

TerrorFirmer

Yes the GT is faster then the GS, but both are still good cards. The CPU is also considerably faster in the 6930G, though this would not be of huge consequence in most games - though keep in mind that the 6930G would be running games at 1366x768 with a 9600GT, the 7730G would be running them at 1440x900 with slightly inferior video card and slower CPU - so it could mean the difference between high settings and medium-to-high in some games. In a few select games there would be a considerable drop, depending on how CPU intensive it is.

I've never dealt with Laptopsdirect, though I've heard terrible stories. Like most retailers, most of them are 'brilliant' until suddenly you have a problem - that's when the real worth of a company shows through. For example, the company Pixmania have brilliant prices on a lot of computer hardware and are normally OK for buying and delivery, but I wouldn't touch them due to absolutely atrocious beyond belief support in the event of problems. At least Komplett are known and proven to be fair, reliable and generally decent in the event of problems or returns.

hypnotic

Cool thanks for all your help, sure I'll have a think about it I guess.

I'm not majorly into games or anything, just want something that will be able to run most new games say, though doesn't have to be at maximum settings. And the fact that the komplett acer is a 17" screen is a plus too.

The desktop I have atm can only run Rome Total War on minimum settings so anything will be an improvement on that anyway :pac: