Spec me a laptop

[tom26]

Okay I am going to get a laptop for Uni next year and my Gran's offering to get me one for my 18th with a £500 budget. Is this going to be enough for what I need?(I don't need anything fancy as basically I'm only going to be using it for work and the internet no gaming) any ideas on what to get?
Cheers

 

[split]

We can't spec you anything but these.

IME, the Dells have a great battery life tho it seems the cheapest non Celeron is a tad over your budget.

They also seem fairly well put together.

 

[Scream]

If you can stretch to £550, you can get a dell 6400 Dual Core 1.66GHz with 512Mb DDR2 Memory but will end up being 384Mb when take into consideration the 128Mb Integrated gaphics which a lot of laptops offer.

If you hunt around elsewhere, you can find Dell 6000 models with 1Gb of Ram going for £500.

I've mentioned Dell cause they are the best for the money and there aren't many other brands of laptops that can match the spec for the money.

 

[split]

If you can stretch to £550, you can get a dell 6400 Dual Core 1.66GHz with 512Mb DDR2 Memory but will end up being 384Mb when take into consideration the 128Mb Integrated gaphics which a lot of laptops offer.

If you hunt around elsewhere, you can find Dell 6000 models with 1Gb of Ram going for £500.

I've mentioned Dell cause they are the best for the money and there aren't many other brands of laptops that can match the spec for the money.

I have to agree.
I have a friend that was looking for a *bargain* in the boxing day sales.
Looking at all of the £100 off deals, the Dells where more or less the same price and spec if you hunt around.
I've also use a Dell, and it ain't bad.

 

[tom26]

Ok cheers for that. What happens if something goes wrong with a dell I heard that the only people that can fix them are dell and they have to be sent back? Is this true or just rubbish?
Also is it true I preferably need to get a non celeron?

 

[split]

Ok cheers for that. What happens if something goes wrong with a dell I heard that the only people that can fix them are dell and they have to be sent back? Is this true or just rubbish?
Also is it true I preferably need to get a non celeron processor?

I think you'll find it's the same with any laptop.
My nephew got a cheap one from that big PC shop in the UK, and the hard disc died within months.
That took 6 weeks to get fixed after many phone calls, and he had to send it away.
The repair was poor as well, as he got a used hard disc when it was eventually fixed.

I have no idea what Dells repair thing is like, but it can't be much worse than that.

I suppose the rule here is don't think you can just take it back to the shop.
Might be worth checking tho.

I also recently repaired a celeron laptop (another hard disc failure), and it just lacked the 'grunt' of the centrinos I have used.
I think the extra 2MB L2 Cache is worth having.

 

[ted34]

I had to find a friend a similar thing and went with dell. As long as you dont upgrade through dell in the order menu and get their extended warranty stuff they are good value. Ocuk have some dells already picked out which are worth looking at.

 

[GuruJockStrap]

I'd highly recommend a Dell.

Just got my first laptop from them for uni work. Model is an Inspiron 630m.

Paid £450 and got:

Pentium M 1.73GHz (2MB Cache)
512MB RAM
40GB HD
Integrated Intel Wireless
14.1" Display
Integrated Intel Graphics
Windows XP Media Centre Edition
6 Cell Battery
1 year warranty

At the time of purchase (around 3 weeks ago) there was nothing that could come close to it spec wise for the money.

Battery is great and I can easily get just over 4 hours from it.

My only complaint is the default Windows installation. Dell put on so much bloat its unbelievable. First boot had around 50-60 running processes!!!

Reformatted, fresh installation of windows and I only have 21, so a massive improvement and it absolutely flies.

If you stretch the budget a bit more you could go dual core but its no loss if you don't. For the tasks you'll be doing a Pentium M is more than enough imho.

 

[tom26]

I'd highly recommend a Dell.

Just got my first laptop from them for uni work. Model is an Inspiron 630m.

Paid £450 and got:

Pentium M 1.73GHz (2MB Cache)
512MB RAM
40GB HD
Integrated Intel Wireless
14.1" Display
Integrated Intel Graphics
Windows XP Media Centre Edition
6 Cell Battery
1 year warranty

At the time of purchase (around 3 weeks ago) there was nothing that could come close to it spec wise for the money.

Battery is great and I can easily get just over 4 hours from it.

My only complaint is the default Windows installation. Dell put on so much bloat its unbelievable. First boot had around 50-60 running processes!!!

Reformatted, fresh installation of windows and I only have 21, so a massive improvement and it absolutely flies.

If you stretch the budget a bit more you could go dual core but its no loss if you don't. For the tasks you'll be doing a Pentium M is more than enough imho.

Cheers for that just wondering did you buy it from the actual dell website?

 

[GuruJockStrap]

Might be breaking the forum rules if I answered that question.

 

[tom26]

Might be breaking the forum rules if I answered that question.

Doubt it you because you won't be linking to any competitors