SRL Archive - News and General

Quick :
I need to buy a laptop on a budget of 800$ total max. Would like to spend around 700$.

Extended :
My school laptop died. I made the bad decision two years ago of buying an HP. .. I have had nothing but overheating problems with it. Well, the motherboard fried, and not it would cost stupid amounts of money to replace a part on a laptop that keeps giving me crap.

I need to buy a new laptop. Owning a laptop is required at my school for CS/CE majors. The laptop needs to be able to render graphics & compile code, and not overheat.

I am not looking for something to play the upcoming Skyrim on.

This is what I have come up with:
- MSI i3 laptop < http://www.msimobile.com/level3_productpage.aspx?cid=8&id=295 >
- purchaseable at amazon.com for 689$
- I would consider putting an 120 - 160 GB SSD in it to help with speed, cooling, and batter life.

Suggestions and all sorts of input please.

Thanks!

I plan on buying this sometime soon: http://www.dell.com/ca/p/inspiron-14r-n4110/pd?oc=ni14r2_f_4e&model_id=inspiron-14r-n4110 :)

Would it work for you?

I am REALLY not a fan of Dell or HP, I have had more problems with their stuff than anything… which is funny because I am dell certified to repair stuff - work has a dell contract.

Thanks,I will look into it, but I adamantly don't want to buy one.. not that I would take one for free.. but I just don't want to spend money on something that will die soon or have problems or is known to have problems.

I always look up the individual parts ( graphics card, processor, etc ) just to make sure.

My mom has a HP and has never, ever had a problem with it.
IMO HP is a more than decent brand but if you don't feel comfortable with them, don't get one.
Also, I'd recommend staying away from Acer's laptops… Personal experience :)

I like Sony, Samsung(, HP), Apple from experience and MSI looks pretty legit. The one you put up will probably do with rendering gfx (photoshop, presumably?) easily.

What lappy does she have? Does your mom compile projects and render video/graphics?

LOL, yea… stay away from acer…

From: anonymity
I am REALLY not a fan of Dell or HP, I have had more problems with their stuff than anything…

Get one of the HP business laptops with a nice warranty. My sister has an EliteBook with a 3 year warranty. The only issue she has had with them was a loud fan (which was replaced at no cost).

From: anonymity
What lappy does she have? Does your mom compile projects and render video/graphics?

LOL, yea… stay away from acer…

Na lol she just uses it for email… And very rarely some video watchin'.
BUT! The laptop also goes with us on vacation and that's the reason why it's this one: Hp Pavilion DV6-3130sd. Kinda OP for the routine work my mom does on it.

It's got 4gigs of RAM and a 5470, 512mb dedicated ram. Not quite fit for modern 3d games (bulletstorm would be almost unplayable) but alright for running 1 Simba+SMART, for example.

I could even slap After Effects on it l0l (it's got x64 win7). I guess Photoshop would still run OK on it.

It looks sleek, runs straight out of the box but that's what you expect for €628,- == $900 apx. (what she paid for it at the time; a few months ago).

Get a Toshiba. I have had good experience(s) with their laptops :)

Toshiba is pretty good too, yup. Don't know if they still do laptops but IBM makes a tank of a laptop tbh.

Asus! The bestttt quality by far. I don't hbave access to look one up right now, but asus is insanely nice.

Every brand makes good laptops. Even HP and Dell.

HP really turned things around as far as build quality goes and they've made some decent laptops.

From: Smarter Child
Get a Toshiba. I have had good experience(s) with their laptops :)

Agree 100% I've had my Toshiba for years and no problems.

From: Nava2
Asus! The bestttt quality by far. I don't hbave access to look one up right now, but asus is insanely nice.

Not with video, I love Asus as well but a friend of mine bought an Asus laptop and had issues with the video driver force closing and shutting down his computer. It was some Intel/Nvidia Hybrid.

From: Capricorn
Every brand makes good laptops. Even HP and Dell.

HP really turned things around as far as build quality goes and they've made some decent laptops.

No. Every single person I know who owns an HP, even recently purchased ones, hates it. Know about 5-6 people who have had overheating problems with them with only lite gaming.

The MSI you selected looks pretty good. I don't see anything on the page about battery life, which means it's probably awful, other than that looks good. For your money and from what I can find it really looks like a very good option. I honestly couldn't find anything better at that price point. Good choice.

From: nathanator22
No. Every single person I know who owns an HP, even recently purchased ones, hates it. Know about 5-6 people who have had overheating problems with them with only lite gaming.

I'm on a HP right now actually, so maybe now you know one person who doesn't have overheating problems. I've played TF2 and CSS on my lap. Still have both my balls.

Treat your shit proper and it'll last forever, barring stuff like bumpgate.

Just do your research, because every OEM makes shitty laptops.

http://www.newegg.com/Store/SubCategory.aspx?SubCategory=32&name=Laptops-Notebooks

Asus for sure. Look in the 750 range, there are the i5s. Tbh, I dont know much about the i* mobile cpus, but Asus + newegg generally gives the best bang per buck. Plus Asus is a great brand.

My HP laptop AMD overheats ridiculously fast, for sure stay away (at least for their cheaper laptops).

Asus, Lenovo, and MSI are good.
Don't buy one more powerful than you need.

From: TRiLeZ
I plan on buying this sometime soon: http://www.dell.com/ca/p/inspiron-14r-n4110/pd?oc=ni14r2_f_4e&model_id=inspiron-14r-n4110 :)

Would it work for you?

I have an Inspiron that is the same/very similar model to that.
In one year: Charger broker, Battery life is down to ~30 minutes, and every start-up I get a message that my hard drive is dying (I've had this for a few months, and as far as I can tell it's been working just fine it's just annoying getting the error).

Dell makes good desktops, but not laptops in my experience.

From: Capricorn
I'm on a HP right now actually, so maybe now you know one person who doesn't have overheating problems. I've played TF2 and CSS on my lap. Still have both my balls.

Treat your shit proper and it'll last forever, barring stuff like bumpgate.

Just do your research, because every OEM makes shitty laptops.

True. Most problems are caused by users, and congratulations on having a working HP! Lol, what model do you have? I agree with you on taking care of your stuff. Like i said earlier my Toshiba has been going strong for about 5 years now, and I have a 250Gb HDD in my desktop that has been around since before I can remember. (Seagate + WD = win)

Anyway back on topic. I agree with the others that ASUS is a good brand, as that's the type of motherboard I have, I just know from experience that their intel + Nvidia video chip-sets have issues. If you get an ATI version you would probably be fine.

From: nathanator22
True. Most problems are caused by users, and congratulations on having a working HP! Lol, what model do you have? I agree with you on taking care of your stuff. Like i said earlier my Toshiba has been going strong for about 5 years now, and I have a 250Gb HDD in my desktop that has been around since before I can remember. (Seagate + WD = win)

Anyway back on topic. I agree with the others that ASUS is a good brand, as that's the type of motherboard I have, I just know from experience that their intel + Nvidia video chip-sets have issues. If you get an ATI version you would probably be fine.

The e-350 dm1z

my experiences: EVERY friend that has bought an Asus has regretted it. now part wise, its a great company. but as a pre-made computer, they are below par. My future roommate spent about 50% of the last school year without his laptop because of issues (needed a new HD, and a few other parts that decided to die out… he had it for not even a year). another friend didn't have his for about 30% of the school year (he had major graphical issues with the screen and the gfx card, dont know exactly what was wrong, but it sucked for him… he had his for about a year also). yet another friend just bought his brand new asus… he immediately regretted it. right when he turned it on, it had problems. couldn't access operating system, bad hardware parts, the whole works.

that is just some of my experience with asus. i must say i am glad i bought an alienware about 3 years back. been working beautifully ever since. trip-booting ubuntu, win7, bt5. :) i love it.

EDIT: why did it take so long for them to fix the computers? well they got the insurance with Asus or w/e. so when it was sent to Asus… the company decided to keep the computers for some time.

From: x[Warrior]x3500
my experiences: EVERY friend that has bought an Asus has regretted it. now part wise, its a great company. but as a pre-made computer, they are below par. My future roommate spent about 50% of the last school year without his laptop because of issues (needed a new HD, and a few other parts that decided to die out… he had it for not even a year). another friend didn't have his for about 30% of the school year (he had major graphical issues with the screen and the gfx card, dont know exactly what was wrong, but it sucked for him… he had his for about a year also). yet another friend just bought his brand new asus… he immediately regretted it. right when he turned it on, it had problems. couldn't access operating system, bad hardware parts, the whole works.

that is just some of my experience with asus. i must say i am glad i bought an alienware about 3 years back. been working beautifully ever since. trip-booting ubuntu, win7, bt5. :) i love it.

EDIT: why did it take so long for them to fix the computers? well they got the insurance with Asus or w/e. so when it was sent to Asus… the company decided to keep the computers for some time.

Friend of mine had the same issue with screen and gfx card. In his case it was the intel+ nvidia not playing nice.