Another effin ' "What laptop should I buy?" thread!

PaddyofNine

I have a budget of €1,000, no more.

I want a laptop for college, and I need to buy one by the end of this month. Without buying one in Lidl or Aldi, what is the best laptop I can buy for this price, and where?

Ideally I'd buy on the US ebay or some European site but from what I've read here I'm afraid I'd get done on customs tax.

I'm seeing some nice models on www.dell.ie, but I'd like your input - in other words, if you had €1,000 to spend in the morning what would you buy for me?

Skud

dell are generally overpriced and some ppl were saying that the lower end models are faulty or just badly put together (that's your price range). Try and acer or a fujitsu simens (i got one of those). More detailed account of what you need it for might help... Just typing up and projects? Internet? Or gaming? Battery life importance? etc

jetsonx

Dell might make good Desktop systems but their laptops are badly
put together and their reliabilty after the 12month mark is very questionable.

You cannot go wrong with Toshiba or IBM. Buy one of them here in Ireland or in the UK and expect to pay around 20%-35% more than US or Germany.

PaddyofNine

Internet, projects, word processing, etc. Maybe some gaming - if it ran Half Life 2, that'd be a bonus! (But not necessary). I'd be in and out to college a lot so weight is reasonably important to me.

Liking Acer models more and more - I love the 2702WLMi that can be found http://www.acernotebooks.co.uk/acersite/asp/product.asp?recorprod=1&product=207&cat=78&ph=&keywords=&recor=&SearchFor=&PT_ID=

and it's just inside my budget!Hearing more and more bad things about Dell...

Splash

Acer are a great compny when it comes to monitors Not sure bout laptops though. I`d like one of them sony vaios ( the tiny ones)

dub45

You say you are in a hurry but apparently Intel are launching a new laptop chip on January 19tu which will improve a numer of things including wireless and graphics. Laptops featuring the new chip will appear from the major manufacturers around the time of the announcement.

Some information here.

PaddyofNine

dub45 wrote:

You say you are in a hurry but apparently Intel are launching a new laptop chip on January 19tu which will improve a numer of things including wireless and graphics. Laptops featuring the new chip will appear from the major manufacturers around the time of the announcement.

Some information here.

Sounds good, but they'd proabably be way out of my price league...

dub45

PaddyofNine wrote:

Sounds good, but they'd proabably be way out of my price league...

But may lead to a reduction in the price of existing models based on the older centrino chip.

PaddyofNine

dub45 wrote:

But may lead to a reduction in the price of existing models based on the older centrino chip.

D'oh! That does make sense, thanks!

Hey, anybody know anything about Acer laptops? Any good/bad feedback about them?

Champ

I think this looks to be good value:
http://www.jes-computer.de/product_info.php?pID=19325

Never dealt with Jes myself personally, though from what i've heard they're decent folks.

Bah

Champ wrote:

Never dealt with Jes myself personally, though from what i've heard they're decent folks.

Isn't there some minor problems with ordering from Germany though? German Windows XP, German keyboard layout, etc? Minor things, but fairly annoying none the less.
Jes btw, have always been great to deal with. A little slow to dispatch if you're using a bank transfer, but they've seemed helpful when they reply to any e-mails I've sent.

Col_Loki

Acer are a great compny when it comes to monitors Not sure bout laptops though. I`d like one of them sony vaios ( the tiny ones)

I think Acer are one of the biggest laptop producers worldwide, and ive heard there pretty decent.

Isn't there some minor problems with ordering from Germany though? German Windows XP, German keyboard layout, etc? Minor things, but fairly annoying none the less.

Yea the keyboard being the most annoying thing, one or two of the letters moved around and different symbols . If you could get new keys or something then it might be a great option (jes have a pretty good range).....

Clanc

Here's a place in Germany that sells IBM at Student prices (compare with www.ibm.de to see that they're very cheap). As far as I know you can order with English software + keyboard without any extra charge, but it can take longer cos they need to order from the factory.

http://www.pro-com.org/nofost.de/pages/index_language02.aspx

REDZ

I had to get a laptop for college as well, the uni had a deal with dell but i asked around and was told toshiba was the best, i rang their main distributers in ireland "Business Management Systems" in walkinstown dublin, and got a great deal, way better value than dell and it looks so good as well, no probs 18months later, its my baby :rolleyes:

Skud

planetmicro.co.uk for acer stuff
my friend bought off them. Good laptops, he loves his anyway and he very tekkie so thats a bonus to know he likes it. As i said i have a fujitsu siemens amilo d series and they low budget at higher specs can't complain at all.

trap4

I'm pretty much in the same boat as PaddyofNine. I was going to buy a Dell before the so-called sales finish but wonder if prices on these older specs will lower all around when the Sonoma laptops are introduced shortly? Would it make a lot of sense to wait a few weeks or should I pounce now?

Skud

unless you must have it now... wait a few weeks. There's no point in rushing a system you'll own for next 2 - 3 years minimum for the sake of a couple of weeks.

BTW can we get a laptop sticky thread or with the changing market would this be inadvisable?

at least get a list of links where to buy laptops seperately because everyone seems to be demanding them and there is already a sticky for hardware components