recommend me a laptop thread

[TheJew]

after 3 years i'm looking to get a new laptop...about 6 months after i bought my dell latitude d800 from my school i regretted not buying one from an outside party (my school only sells dell/apple laptops/desktops). i'm looking for a laptop with solid battery life (3hrs+), min 15" screen, min 1.8ghz core duo, 2gb memory...and i'm lookin to spend less than $3000

i've been lookin into a few notebooks from acer, asus, toshiba & voodoo...anyone got an ideas?

[sknight]

I loveD Acer, but at this point, I can't recommend them anymore based on the fact that 18 months after my purchase, my hinges broke and they claim to not have them anymore. It remains to be seen if the source I bought some from has any. The sole US source recommended by Acer tried to gouge me for 95+shipping. Ebay, no gots. If I were you, check out ebay first, buy a pair and keep them on hand. If you can get a spare set, I can recommend Acer. CS is very good and Americans, although wait times on the phone are fairly long.

Plusses are good pricing, XP Pro and not loaded with all sorts of garbage, and good specs. My gf has one too, but an upper end model.

[ruckstande]

I hear the new Gateways are pretty good. I read that they are really trying to make a comeback and fix their shitty reputation.

[TheJew]

I hear the new Gateways are pretty good. I read that they are really trying to make a comeback and fix their shitty reputation.

yeah i heard some stuff about that too...trying to look into their website but i can't connect to it.

[ruckstande]

yeah i heard some stuff about that too...trying to look into their website but i can't connect to it.

Not a good sign.:icon_mrgr

[Aero 1]

thinkpad or apple, more expensive but they will not fail.

[TheJew]

Not a good sign.:icon_mrgr

down for maintenance it says... :icon_conf

[Deadbent]

www.dynamism.com has the slickest laptops and micro-portable pc's out there. Especially if you're not down with a dell or apple laptop.

You'll pay a bit of a premium price, but no one you know or ever run into will have the same thing as you.... and... dynamism offers 100% lifetime customer support by REAL AMERICAN people. (usually it's one of the same 8 people that work for the company)
Can't say enough good things about them.

[Boogotshot69]

Toshiba Satellite series are excellent. I've owned several of them and have never been disappointed.

[Sinn Fein]

Gateway's new laptops are excellent. Check out Best Buy. Their prices generally beat the prices from Gateway direct.

Toshiba is an excellent choice as well, and I've also strongly recommended HP laptops for years and still do.

[Chin nuts]

Try Costco online:

http://www.costco.com/Common/Category.aspx?cat=56670&eCat=BC|84|56670&whse=BC&topnav=

I've bought a couple of HPs and Toshibas from them in the past no problems so far. Good Luck.

[jsc315]

macbook pro do i need to say more.

[HumpX]

http://www.ibuypower.com/mall/notebook.asp

[sknight]

http://www.ibuypower.com/mall/notebook.asp
Surprisingly well priced there.

[NightStalker3]

http://laptop.media.mit.edu/

http://static.flickr.com/29/64471325_7669c703cd.jpg

[HumpX]

Surprisingly well priced there.

Initially they had some shaky reviews regarding support but over the past couple of years they've supposedly gotten quite good. The two people I know that have done business with them are happy.

They use name brand stuff as opposed to Dell's built-by-the-lowest-bidder OEM garbage.

[Bill Lehecka]

Sadly, I couldn't find a laptop with an integrated bong attachment.

[wes mantooth]

I bought this Acer laptop back in August and so far I'm loving it.

Acer Aspire AS5672WLMi 15.4" Notebook PC (Intel Core Duo Processor
T2300, 1 GB RAM, 100 GB Hard Drive, Super-Multi Drive)


.

[westben2002]

iBook....trust me dude, i used to be a PC lover, but my iBook is so much better...you can buy it so it can both run apple and windows on it

[Aero 1]

iBook....trust me dude, i used to be a PC lover, but my iBook is so much better...you can buy it so it can both run apple and windows on it


ibook? you still living in 2001? :action-sm

[Cage]

Just get a mac book pro. No need to keep looking.

[BCH]

How many times do I have to say it.

Falcon Northwest Fragbook TLX.

[TheJew]

Sadly, I couldn't find a laptop with an integrated bong attachment.

why all the hate lately...dear bill?:action-sm

[westben2002]

ibook? you still living in 2001? :action-sm

whatever, and apple hahaha

[TheJew]

How many times do I have to say it.

Falcon Northwest Fragbook TLX.

i dig what you're sayin homie but i can't drop $3500+

[westben2002]

honestly dude, get a MAC that also runs windows.....Macs are so much better for doing buisness, vs. my pc is better for games

[TheJew]

honestly dude, get a MAC that also runs windows.....Macs are so much better for doing buisness, vs. my pc is better for games

sorry i refuse to work with mac's & dell's anymore...

[westben2002]

Dell i can understand...but why not MACs

[HumpX]

get a Mac, get a Falcon NW, get anything but God help us all, stay the fuck away from Dell & Hewlett-Packard. Bigger does NOT = better and unless you have a national radio show any problems that crop up you'll be at the mercy of their notorious support pyramid.

[TheJew]

get a Mac, get a Falcon NW, get anything but God help us all, stay the fuck away from Dell & Hewlett-Packard. Bigger does NOT = better and unless you have a national radio show any problems that crop up you'll be at the mercy of their notorious support pyramid.

i will never buy a dell again...and hp i'm not too hip to as well. i'm lookin into the falcon nw but those are really expensive.


....i mean the base price on the TLX is $3400 and i'm lookin for less than $3000

[Warfarer]

Why wouldn't you buy a Macbook Pro again? 2.33 ghz C2D, 256 1600 pro video, 2 gigs ram, 120 gig hd, runs vista (I have it on mine using Boot Camp), XP, Mac OSX and Linux. This is standard fair for the $2500 MB Pro and no other company comes close to those specs for that price, especially factoring the Apple support.

Not sure what good is for the Vista performance thingy, but my Macbook Pro is a 4.6 overall and is only hurt by the hard drive performance which is around a 4.0 or so.

[HumpX]

i will never buy a dell again...and hp i'm not too hip to as well. i'm lookin into the falcon nw but those are really expensive.


....i mean the base price on the TLX is $3400

If you buy a regular brand name at least buy it here (http://www.newegg.com/ProductSort/Subcategory.asp?Subcategory=32&name=Notebooks-Laptops), their RMA policy is without peer.

Edit: Good (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16834220104) deal

[sknight]

I bought this Acer laptop back in August and so far I'm loving it.

Acer Aspire AS5672WLMi 15.4" Notebook PC (Intel Core Duo Processor
T2300, 1 GB RAM, 100 GB Hard Drive, Super-Multi Drive)


.
Seriously, start looking for hinges. You might not ever break them, but if you do, you'll be shit out of luck come this august, according to what Acer told me. It's cheap insurance to get them and they took 25 minutes to replace. I had a hell of a time getting mine.

Otherwise, I have been loving my acer, a 4652 lmi, and my gf has an 8100 series.

[TheJew]

If you buy a regular brand name at least buy it here (http://www.newegg.com/ProductSort/Subcategory.asp?Subcategory=32&name=Notebooks-Laptops), their RMA policy is without peer.

Edit: Good (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16834220104) deal

i know i've bought routers and other stuff from newegg...but can i trust them with a laptop? and not just get one custom made?

[sknight]

Two laptops and a ton of stuff through newegg. Perhaps 5k in the last 20 months.

Great service. Sometimes if you're a new customer, they might spend an extra day verifying you, but their service is perhaps the best in the industry. Shipping terms are great and they sometimes even upgrade you, especially if they call to verify on a big order and spend an extra day.

[Ol'BloodyBottom]

commodore 64

[thelord68]

Toshiba... best bang for the buck. I deal with an amazing variety of hardware and I always recommend them first for notebooks.

Dell - shed parts, too many repairs, at any price point you get less equipment unless you catch some deal (Costco, etc.)

Sony - overpriced, also shed parts, had a few customers demand them, but ended up returning all but one for a variety of reasons (noise, heat, etc.). Replaced with Toshiba

Compaq/HP (same company) - Better than Dell right now, but Compaqs feel really cheap and slow for configuration, HPs match Toshiba for configuration, but I've experienced some weird issues.

Gateway - if you really need a lightweight notebook for half the price of the Sony, they've got some choices, but they feel cheap and slow compared to sim. notebooks and the ones I've handled were crippled by lack of expandibility (2 USB ports, 1 memory slot, short battery life, etc.)

Acer - not bad, good value - AMD option - but odd problems, like sknight's hinge issue, I've had touchpad issues on a couple, stuff like that.

As far as Newegg - right now they are one of the largest online stores - they do something like 5mil a day in sales. I've been using them for a majority of my purchases (10K in the last 2 months - 50K+ in the last year) because they are comparable in price to the wholesalers I was using and shipping is cheaper. Also, whenever I've had to return something (damaged, etc.) they have credited me for the return shipping. Customer service in general is good.

[TheJew]

Toshiba... best bang for the buck. I deal with an amazing variety of hardware and I always recommend them first for notebooks.

looked into some toshiba laptops and there a lot of negative feedback on their customer support...has anyone dealt with them?

[thelord68]

looked into some toshiba laptops and there a lot of negative feedback on their customer support...has anyone dealt with them?

The important factor is that you don't have to deal with them. I can't even count the number of times I've had to contact Dell or Sony and many times never got the issues resolved and ended up replacing the units.

I've had to deal with Toshiba 2 times for minor stuff - once for a driver issue - they emailed me the driver and another for a replacement keyboard when a client's notebook got attacked by his dog.

The only total loss Toshiba's I've had to handle was one that had a large glass of chocolate milk spilled on it and another one that had it's screen punched in by a client on a particularly bad stock market day. Warranties had run out on both units, not that they would have necessarily been covered.

[TheJew]

The important factor is that you don't have to deal with them. I can't even count the number of times I've had to contact Dell or Sony and many times never got the issues resolved and ended up replacing the units.

I've had to deal with Toshiba 2 times for minor stuff - once for a driver issue - they emailed me the driver and another for a replacement keyboard when a client's notebook got attacked by his dog.

The only total loss Toshiba's I've had to handle was one that had a large glass of chocolate milk spilled on it and another one that had it's screen punched in by a client on a particularly bad stock market day. Warranties had run out on both units, not that they would have necessarily been covered.

wow...are there any particular models that you recommend? also i was out and about today and i looked at a couple of the gateway models and a while back i had gateways and i enjoyed them for a while. i liked the look and feel of the new gateway laptops. anyone got thoughts on gateway? haha

[HumpX]

Wasn't Gateway sold to Dell or some larger company not to long ago?

TJ, check out ConsumerReports.com and subscribe for the month. Its really cheap and you can take your time going over their test summary's. Other places like epinions.com have a lot of consumer product reviews.

[sknight]

emachines is gateway, if I'm not mistaken.

Oh, as an incidental, I got my hinges from a place in Canada for way cheaper than the US outlets.

Get this- the labels and invoices are from Acer, for hinges they said don't exist.

[TheJew]

emachines is gateway, if I'm not mistaken.

Oh, as an incidental, I got my hinges from a place in Canada for way cheaper than the US outlets.

Get this- the labels and invoices are from Acer, for hinges they said don't exist.

it may be dated?

[sknight]

Dated the day of my order, shipped from the Acer factory. Invoices all say acer. Box labels say Acer America.

[TheJew]

Dated the day of my order, shipped from the Acer factory. Invoices all say acer. Box labels say Acer America.

that's crazy...

[TheJew]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16834220127

what do people think about this?

EDIT: noticed there's only 1gb memory...anyone know if this can be upgraded to 2x 1gb sticks? and if so...what route should i go?