Laptop

cybrandian

Hi,
I am hoping to get a new laptop for Christmas. Bascially I really want one for my own personal use, Internet usage, Videos such as on Youtube, and msn, skype etc.
Can anyone advise on the most reliable laptop to buy, and with decent RAM?
Thanks.

Alanstrainor

What's your budget? What size laptop do you need? Is portability important? Or would you prefer to have a larger screen?

I wouldn't worry too much about RAM these days as most laptops will come with at very least 2GBs of RAM which is more than enough for your needs.

cybrandian

Portability isn't too important, reliability is the main thing.
I don't really want to spend too much, as I really only mainly will use it for surfing the net.
Maybe 500-600 euro?

leninbenjamin

cybrandian wrote: »

Portability isn't too important, reliability is the main thing.

laptop reliability is fairly bog standard, as they all tend to source components from the same few manufacturers. so there's very little variation tbh. A recent survey found laptops have about a 25% chance of failing over 3 years and it doesn't vary massively from brand to brand. So don't get too hung up about it (although Acer, Lenovo, HP came out the worst, it all tends to vary a bit from generation to generation).

If portability isn't too important then I've good experiences with larger Dell laptops in the past. Something like the Studio 17 can be gotten with fairly decent specs that should last you a good bit, although looking at the site Dell's prices aren't too competitive at the moment. Asus also have decent larger screen offerings, but I'm not as familiar with the range.

angel01

leninbenjamin wrote: »

laptop reliability is fairly bog standard, as they all tend to source components from the same few manufacturers. so there's very little variation tbh. A recent survey found laptops have about a 25% chance of failing over 3 years and it doesn't vary massively from brand to brand. So don't get too hung up about it (although Acer, Lenovo, HP came out the worst, it all tends to vary a bit from generation to generation).

If portability isn't too important then I've good experiences with larger Dell laptops in the past. Something like the Studio 17 can be gotten with fairly decent specs that should last you a good bit, although looking at the site Dell's prices aren't too competitive at the moment. Asus also have decent larger screen offerings, but I'm not as familiar with the range.

I have to disagree, I have a HP laptop and I think it is brilliant. I wouldn't go near anything else. Have a look at the Pavilion range. I had a laptop for over 3 years (was a HP) and never had one single problem. I bought a newer HP laptop and again not one issue.

leninbenjamin

angel01 wrote: »

I have to disagree, I have a HP laptop and I think it is brilliant. I wouldn't go near anything else. Have a look at the Pavilion range. I had a laptop for over 3 years (was a HP) and never had one single problem. I bought a newer HP laptop and again not one issue.

That wasn't an opinion, that was the results of a survey of 30,000 laptops from square trade (link to pdf). I've had no experience with HP myself so i wont comment on the accuracy, although with a sample size that large i find it hard to see how they could be in error.

devnull

In work, our HP Laptops are much more reliable than their Dell counterparts.