Which Laptop should i buy...***more details***...?

Question

I am looking to buy a laptop but not sure what to go for...
*Broadband plug in and wireless needed (not sure if i trust wireless, but if it's there setup maybe i'll use it one day) Medium to heavy usage.
*Budget of £250
*Watch films, listen to music, download (but not loads)
*Website designing/building (This and Internet will be main uses)
those are what i have to consider.

Preferences: I would rather stick to XP, Vista doesn't sound all that good.

Thank you in advance.

I am willing to spend more if it is the right deal

Answer 1

Hi,

I gave the answer below for a similar question recently. You won't get a lot for £250 but stretch a LITTLE bit and you'll get something useable.

For web-design, you don't need anything at all powerful. Just don't get stuck with a pentium 3 machine - the front side bus is literally last century, get a P4 instead - guaranteed to have 400MHz or more FSB, rather than Max of 133 for P3 processors (Not that I'm glued to Intel - AMD are no problem these days, I just don't have advise for AMD laptops).

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Right! This is a subject that's very close to my heart lately!

I'm proficient at building PC's and run web based businesses so my answer is informed and my own decisions in this area have been carefully considered.

1 - I bought a modern laptop with Vista. Had to send it back as Vista ran none of the programs I need it to run. It cost me £64 in restocking fees.

2 - I bought a cheap IBM thinkpad 2 weeks ago (never thought I'd end up with a thinkpad). I love it. Had to buy and install XP and get all necessary drivers from IBM but that was easy enough.

- Modern Dual core 2Gb Ram, respectable Gfx, up to date operating sys - £800 - useless

- Solid, dependable, reliable business oriented IBM machine - £300 (Inc XP) - Gods Gift!!!
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My opinion:

Vista - never (Going back to win2k would be better)

Dual Core - thoroughly overated so far - esp in current lappies. Waste of money.

2Gb ram - unnecessary. I've never run more than 1.5 Gb in any machine and I run LOTS of progs at the same time.

The important thing: Laptops took a giant leap when they moved from P3 to P4 (P3 has a 133MHz FSB and even the lowliest P4 has 400MHz FSB). When buying any laptop DON't if it's a Pentium3.

2nd important thing: 1Gb RAM is very useful, 256Mb is useLESS, 512 is OK
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DO:
Thinkpad, Toshiba (I rate Dell too if bought new from them)
Don't:
Acer, Packard Bell, Sony, HP (Though some disagree)
No Idea:
Compaq, Fujitsu, Samsung (Sam should be good but no real knowledge)
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Spec of what I got for £250 (+£41 for WinXP):

1.6GHz P4 with 1Mb cache on 400MHz FSB
1Gb RAM (Blimey!)
40Gb hard drive ,DVD drive
Built in Wifi, modem, LAN, usb.
Only 14" screen but can plug in a monitor (And proper keyboard/mouse)

It's my new workhorse and it's TINY!
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To answer your question - NO, you don't need huge RAM and dual core!!! Laptops are just slower than desktops (I assume you've been running with a desktop so far?).

Some laptop specs sound PATHETIC, dual core specs LOOK good but as long as you have at least 1.2GHz processor with 400FSB and 512+ RAM and whatever specific features you need, you'll be able to use it well.

ALSO:

If you're doing graphics seriously have a monitor to plug in at home.
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I usually edit my posts down a lot after rambling for a while but It's bedtime for this overworked poweruser so I hope you enjoyed reading and take my educated advice!

Thats me done :)

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As I said, the bulk of this is an answer to a previous question but it REALLY covers how to choose a laptop.

Hope it helps :)

T

Answer 2

If you get Vista on a sub £250 laptop then, yeah, forget Vista, it would be too much of a resource hog.

Some good Christmas deals around at the mo. Also, have a look at refurbished laptops, I got a fantastic laptop for £500 refurbished. Refurbished can just mean taken back to the shop opened and unwanted.

Most of the stuff you want to do will be fine on a sub £250 machine. Oh, don't be scared of Wireless, just make sure your router isn't broadcasting your SSID and use WPA or at least 128bit WEP.

Answer 3

You can install up to 2GB of ram. This will help the laptop from not slowing down when you run more than one program simultaneously. It will not make it a lot faster though. It also depends of what OS you are running. I hope you are not running Vista, because that takes a lot of resources from your laptop. I usually runs a stripped version of XP called XP light with only the core of the OS. This give a huge performance gain on older laptops. Many people want to run Vista because it has a beautiful graphical interface, but mostly it causes your PC to run slower. There are a million things that causes your PC to run slower, just goggle for simple tips that you can fix yourself.

Answer 4

Due to your Budjet i would give u sujestion that
buy an acer laptop coz they are cheaper than dell as well as compaq
if u dont use games and heavy software then acer is best

Answer 5

Go to pcmag.com and do some homework, it is an amazing site, and I use it all the time for technology stuff. After you determine what unit you want, go to epinions.com and get some user reviews on that unit.

Answer 6

Hmmmm i think your asking for too much with a budget of £250, but there must be something out there for you, good luck x

Answer 7

u can use Acer it has a good specification with a low price respectivelly

Answer 8

go with compaq they are well made and ive had a few.....
for me the presario is perfect

Answer 9

Try www.dell.com

Answer 10

try www.dell.co.uk