mkennedy

hi.
i'm considering replacing my 3 yr old laptop, a dell inspiron 2650.

can anyone give me some tips about what to look out for when buying a new laptop.

i'm interested in something with these kind of specs:
something relatively lightweight (not necessarily ultraportable)
15 inch screen;
60-80gig (80 gig preferably; 512-1024mhz ram (1024 preferably); wi-fi (presumably intel centrino?); dvd recordable drive; decent battery life (over 3 hrs if possible) and if possible bluetooth, an integrated tv tuner and maybe an integrated card reader.

i'm looking to spend anything up to 1700-1800 euro (2000 at a stretch) but preferably under 1500.

anyone with any suggestions.
dell? hp? fujitsu siemens?
acer? toshiba? its difficult to know what to choose.

it seems that there are literally thousands of models to choose from. i would therefore really appreciate some advice on this.

also, what sites would ye recommend for laptop reviews / purchasing (european- friendly if possible).

thanks.

Jelloitsalive12

I would recommend this model laptop, or another from the hp dv4000 line. It features quickplay which is a pretty neat feature.
http://tinyurl.com/b4svl

mkennedy

Originally Posted by Jelloitsalive12

I would recommend this model laptop, or another from the hp dv4000 line. It features quickplay which is a pretty neat feature. http://tinyurl.com/b4svl

thanks.
i'll take a closer look at the pavilion range.
anyone else with any suggestions?

bionic4.0

i have a zv6000 and it is smoken fast it is also a hp

mental ambiguity

I recently purchased an HP dv1000. Absolutely love it, and it may fit the bill for you, although it's only a 14" widescreen.

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Jelloitsalive12

dv1000 is my favorite laptop but he mentioned a 15" screen

Chris Leckness

I have a widescreen Dell and a Very small consumer grade Dell that both have their points, but even though its much heavier than the small one, I prefer the larger of the two.

Inspiron 700m ( replaced by 710m ) - Small Lightweight
Latitude 810 - Large Wide Screen

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Jordan Wigley

I also have a Dell widescreen (15.4") laptop that I purchased right at 2 years ago. Mine is the Inspiron 8600, which has since been replaced by the Inspiron 6000 model.

My 8600 has much lower specs than the even the lowest options of the current Inspiron 6000, but I have never had any problems for everyday use. I also use it sometimes for application development, web development, graphics editing, video editing, DVD authoring, etc. It also handles many games okay, though I'm not much of a PC gamer anymore.... but of course I wouldn't have the ability to smoothly play Doom 3, Quake 4, etc on my 2-year old laptop.

Battery life is generally around 4 hours of use per charge when doing everyday things like web browsing, email, etc.

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internetadam

hey, i got one for u. heres the link, take a guess at what it is though before you click it.

www.apple.com/macbookpro

its a new intel centrino core duo processor, lotta ram standard, wi-fi (duh, its centrino), and even more, bluetooth. and if i recall right, its 80gb hdd standard

edit: o yea, it also has the built in iSight webcam right above the screen.

i_hate_indoor

Buy A Mac, Buy A Mac, Buy A Mac...

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dkong

Although this is a very late reply to an older thread, the "Buy a Mac" caught my eye.

With the release of the MacBook, my wife decided that she must have one as it is stylish, innovative and of course the toy to have.

The computer is quite innovative, if nothing else, the MAC is much more efficient than the PC in terms of memory allocation, stability and there is the "ease of use" factor (although that is subjective).

Out of the box, I had it up, running and connected to the Internet in less than 10 minutes. The AirPort was immediately able to detect and join my home network (a VAST improvement on the AirPort that came with the iMAC we bought 3 years ago). It doesn't have a built-in modem so if you are traveling and don't have access like at a HotSpot, you'll have to buy the external add-on. Reminds me of when Apple dropped the floppy drive when the iMac series came out.

The Apple does run hot, there is no question about it, however the battery is supposed to be safe and not blow up like the previous ones the PowerBooks used from Sony. It is also heavier (5.3 lbs) than I would have expected for a computer with a 13" screen and no built-in fan or cooling system, the two USB ports are too close together but other than that, no real complaints.

Consumer Reports rates Apple products highly, they do last and support (in my experience) has always been excellent, so perhaps they are worth the premium. Best of all, one can use a two-button mouse with it (although I have been told, so do the older MACs) and of course with the duo-core, one could run Windows XP if one must have that environment, or perhaps even Linux, another excellent alternative.

An in-depth review by Clint Ecker written May 19, 2006 (and pictures) can be found at this URL:

http://arstechnica.com/reviews/hardware/macbook.ars

So far the MacBook has performed up to expectations, I did have to do some hunting to find a White USB mouse to match the case (the $150 tariff for a black MacBook is ridiculous), but my wife is quite pleased with it and the bottom line is that is what really matters.

DAVID

thefactor

Consumer Reports ranks Notebooks as of 9/06...


Low Cost Models:

1 - Gateway NX510S
2 - Lenovo (IBM) 3000 N100
3 - Dell Inspiron B130



Work Horse Models:

1 - Apple Macbook Pro
2 - Toshiba G35-AV600
3 - Dell Inspiron E1705



*Ratings based on ease of use, keyboard, touch pad, and switches...
as well as case design.

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World Wide Wireless
Advanced Wireless Technology
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Harry TB

DO NOT buy and Asus.

My A7J Duo Core 17" screen (including a lot of add ons that don't actually function) dropped dead after 6 months and has been in Service (?!?!?) for over two weeks now as they ponder on whether to send it back to Taiwan or not.

Ridiculously bad all round.

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ie2special

I have an E1505, I can't believe how fast it is. Duo 1.66 I thought would be slow but my husband has the HP Power horse dual 3.0 desktop and I load the big games like Battlefield 2 as fast as he does. I never slow down the game. I got a lot of memory and the big video card.

I bought it through the military exchange catalog and only paid 843 out the door. I couldn't be happier.

Cons, screen not bright when unplugged. Battery life short. A lot of useless dell add on crap, otherwise great. I run photo shop pro, adobe pro, office pro, and a bunch of other large apps at once and it takes it like a champ.

Ingrid

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mkennedy

hi.
should have posted this a few months ago but in the end i actually purchased a 14' hp pavilion dv1448ea.

its specs include a 1.73ghz processor, 1gb ram, 80gb hdd, wifi, usb2.0, firewire and cardreader.

unfortunately i couldn't get my hands on a 14-15' notebook with a built-in tvtuner and bluetooth, or built-in 3g capability for that matter.

but overall i'm fairly happy and the pavilion serves me nicely.

the only thing i will say is for some strange reason i just can't get the laptop to work with my bluetooth adaptor and this really wrecks my head.

anyone know why this might be?