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| Topic: Laptop Help! | |
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So I need to buy a cheap laptop for work. It's not required but it will make my job A LOT easier. Because it's out of my pocket I don't want to spend a lot.
The only things I will use it for is MS Word for to fill out reports and tresspass flyers where I will be loading pictures from my digital camera, Adobe for the same reports, Excel for creating my time sheets and tracking my stats and the internet to access the county website so I can issue and print citations. I was thinking about just a basic laptop with 2GB ram, 320 HDD, 15.6 screen WXGA. I don't know much about brands anymore but Best Buy has a Lenovo for $299.99 with 4GB ram, 320 HDD, 15.6 screen, Office Starter built in (Which means I don't have to buy office!) AMD E-1200 series Dual Core processor, ATI Radeon HD 7310 graphics, 0.3mp webcam, 2 in 1 memory card reader, DVDRW+CDRW multiformat. For $20.00 more they have pretty much the same model with an Intel® Pentium processor B960 Featuring a 2MB L3 cache and 2.2GHz processor speed and an Intel video card with HD graphics and a 720p web camera. Which one would be better I wonder? I have always been an Intel fan. |
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Lenovos are kind of poor.
Acer is better but HP can be competitive. A way of getting better bang for the buck is to shop for factory refurbs. Ideally the smallest screen you should concern yourself with is 15". For comfort shoot for a 17" monitor. A i3 Intel iCore CPU should serve you well if all you are doing is word processing BS but you still should be able to do streaming video. If you intend to do Video Conferencing I would strongly recommend an i5 iCore Intel processor. You get better video without the skipping and frame lag. At MINIMUM get a comp with 4GB of RAMM and Windows 7. Don't touch Vista with a pole! its got Blue Screen Cooties! I would also say shoot for DVD burn capacity at minimum. Blue Ray is unnecessary. Hard Drive, 320 GB is acceptable! That is a lot of space. 4 or more USB ports is important! USB is THE interface standard for right now. One important thing to look for also is battery life. If you can get 4 or more hours on the battery that is a decent computer. I'm lucky if I get two hours with my old Dell Inspiron B120. You should be able to get a NICE refurb for about $500 for a beefier machine and $350 for a not so beefy machine. Sites to shop for deals: Newegg.com Amazon.com Dell.com Directron.com tigerdirect.com frys.com Good brands, Dell Toshiba HP Acer Asus Panasonic (but bear in mind, "toughbooks" are SPENDY!) OK brands Sony Gateway Aspire LG Liteon Anything else is questionable... |
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Lenovos are kind of poor. Acer is better but HP can be competitive. A way of getting better bang for the buck is to shop for factory refurbs. Ideally the smallest screen you should concern yourself with is 15". For comfort shoot for a 17" monitor. A i3 Intel iCore CPU should serve you well if all you are doing is word processing BS but you still should be able to do streaming video. If you intend to do Video Conferencing I would strongly recommend an i5 iCore Intel processor. You get better video without the skipping and frame lag. At MINIMUM get a comp with 4GB of RAMM and Windows 7. Don't touch Vista with a pole! its got Blue Screen Cooties! I would also say shoot for DVD burn capacity at minimum. Blue Ray is unnecessary. Hard Drive, 320 GB is acceptable! That is a lot of space. 4 or more USB ports is important! USB is THE interface standard for right now. One important thing to look for also is battery life. If you can get 4 or more hours on the battery that is a decent computer. I'm lucky if I get two hours with my old Dell Inspiron B120. You should be able to get a NICE refurb for about $500 for a beefier machine and $350 for a not so beefy machine. Sites to shop for deals: Newegg.com Amazon.com Dell.com Directron.com tigerdirect.com frys.com Good brands, Dell Toshiba HP Acer Asus Panasonic (but bear in mind, "toughbooks" are SPENDY!) OK brands Sony Gateway Aspire LG Liteon Anything else is questionable... I don't buy used anything, especially computers. This Lenovo has all of that except the I3 processor and price wise is perfect. I honestly wont be using video conferencing, the only thing I would use video wise is CCTV playback on a standard CDR disc. |
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Refurb does not necessarily mean used. I have managed to get overstock for friends that way and saved them hundreds of dollars on a machine better than they could have afforded otherwise.
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Refurb does not necessarily mean used. I have managed to get overstock for friends that way and saved them hundreds of dollars on a machine better than they could have afforded otherwise. Still makes me nervous. at $299 with all the features I don't think I can beat that. Honestly right now $299 on a laptop is going to set me back. It honestly wont be used a lot. Just when I catch someone stealing so maybe 3 times a day for not more then an hour each time or if I have to check CCTV video or make a flyer and when I write my schedule. |
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Edited by
viara125
on
Tue 11/06/12 02:25 AM
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In additional, I just want to share the best deal...
"Buy a Computer, Get 10% off on Logitech Computer Accessories" Recently i have got this deal with the help of www.ezcouponsearch.com/Target-Coupons_cm_3039.aspx and save 10% in shopping. Mostly i have used it and save a lot. You can also find here many other best deals for latest laptops. |
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Ive had several different laptops... Went to school for programming on on my dell latitude d620... It executes applications perfectly.. Cannot play brand new video games but will play just about anything from 5 years ago ......due to the graphics card and portability isues of laptop circuit boards..... Simply cannot change them out for better ones... They usually come with a dual core intel that operates at a 2 - 2.5 gigahertz processor....run it on xp or 7 keep your desktop clear of all actual program icons ( use short cuts on your desktop ) and it will run like a top...costs about 200 ebay
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So I need to buy a cheap laptop for work. It's not required but it will make my job A LOT easier. Because it's out of my pocket I don't want to spend a lot. The only things I will use it for is MS Word for to fill out reports and tresspass flyers where I will be loading pictures from my digital camera, Adobe for the same reports, Excel for creating my time sheets and tracking my stats and the internet to access the county website so I can issue and print citations. I was thinking about just a basic laptop with 2GB ram, 320 HDD, 15.6 screen WXGA. I don't know much about brands anymore but Best Buy has a Lenovo for $299.99 with 4GB ram, 320 HDD, 15.6 screen, Office Starter built in (Which means I don't have to buy office!) AMD E-1200 series Dual Core processor, ATI Radeon HD 7310 graphics, 0.3mp webcam, 2 in 1 memory card reader, DVDRW+CDRW multiformat. For $20.00 more they have pretty much the same model with an Intel® Pentium processor B960 Featuring a 2MB L3 cache and 2.2GHz processor speed and an Intel video card with HD graphics and a 720p web camera. Which one would be better I wonder? I have always been an Intel fan. Spend the money on decent used/reconditioned hardware. As for the software, I would recommend trashing anything Microsoft or Adobe. Your OS needs would be best met by a friendly distro of Linux, such as Lubuntu (my current favorite). Your word processing, PDF & spreadsheet needs can be well met by LibreOffice (free software). I've been helping people with Windows machines who are sick and tired of the endless pay-for-upgrade cycles and insecure commercial software to migrate to Linux. In general, they couldn't be happier, and they are usually surprised at how easy the transition is. |
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Go with the Intel for twenty bucks more. I've seen issues with ultra cheap AMD processors. I think you'd be happier with the Intel processor and gpu. My two cents
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