Need some advice; picking a laptop

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dragonspyrit

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Jun 12, 2009
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Came here for some advice on my last pc, and it was very helpful.. was hoping I might be able to get some suggestions on a laptop as well.


1_What is your budget?
~$600... very, very limited flexability. Edit: due to a pleasant surprise by my boss, I can stray a little further than this.

2_What is the size of the notebook that you are considering?
14 inches + would be nice, not too concerned about weight

3_What screen resolution do you want?
Not too picky.

4_Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop?
Desktop handles the musclework, but I may be moving out of the country for a year and can't take ther desktop with me, so I'd still like to use it for games (low settings are fine) and maybe some basic graphics stuff. Personal computer; not for work.

5_How much battery life do you need?
Nothing particular in mind

6_Do you want to play games with your laptop? If so then please list the games that you want to with The settings that you want for these games. (Low,Medium or High)?
Yes. Aion, WoW, DragonAge, Assassin's Creed come to mind for current and imminent future endeavors. I expect to play on low settings, but being able to handle games is an absolute must.

7_What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo / Video editing,watching movies, Etc.)
I use photoshop for art of varying sorts, though nothing huge/taxing. Other than that and some games.. office suite? internet browsing/chat?


8_How much storage (H.D.D Capacity) do you need?
200+ would be nice.


9_If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post the links to them.
Crossing my fingers that some black Friday/cyber Monday deal is calling my name, but not holding out for it.


10_How long do you want to keep your laptop?
3-5 years


11_What kind of Optical drive do you need? DVD ROM/Writer,Bluray ROM/Writer,Etc ?
dvd rom/writer would be keen.

12_Please tell us about the brands that you prefer to buy from them and the brands that you Don't like and explain the reasons.
Looking for something with windows 7 only.. not a big compaq/dell fan due to past experience with failing/customer support.


13_What country do you live in?
USA

14_Please tell us any additional information if needed.
Not expecting a miracle for the cost, but something that looks decent in addition to preforming would be nice. Was looking at the lenovo thinkpad, but they look awful.Edit:
 
Well with that budget its almost impossible to find a laptop with a VGA better than
Intel HD 4500M,and that's not really a good VGA,because you have to play games at low settings with a low resolution and sometimes it can't even handle low settings well,so you may wan to raise your budget.
 
OK then this Dell Studio 17 would be good,its got a HD 3650 which can handle those games at medium settings:
http://www.dell.com/content/products/RBIredirect.aspx?rbi=EESJuqJJunKzV5pVrEFOw3wYxiHXb2uK9L/JIV67WOU3UkEJeYpQS9tWl0gNmEwJykZJ1IgJhBUCDSxMBMJJzlY/TxX7wLCITShcEX0RlO5SfkrgP3Y2m8T8Ty2XpoNpWHO3lnLAt7SUmMMCsx+nUDqnt89QPc9DzkQ3Ul05aG0=
 

rodney_ws

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Dec 29, 2005
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Here's a list of $600-$750 laptops on NewEgg with actual GPUs (instead of the cruddy integrated Intel stuff)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=2034940032+4021+1292318470&QksAutoSuggestion=&ShowDeactivatedMark=False&Configurator=&Subcategory=32&description=&Ntk=&CFG=&SpeTabStoreType=&srchInDesc=
 
HP, Dell, etc have their laptops made by an ODM....Skip the middleman and buy from an ODM

http://www.mopo.ca/real-laptop-manufacturers.html
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=91510

You can usually save from 10% on the mass market brands (HP, Dell, etc) to 35% on the custom brands (WidowPC, VoodooPC, Alienware, etc)

I buy mine from a US Clevo distributor at www.pro-star.com

This one has an ATI 4650 for $581

http://www.pro-star.com/index.cfm?mainpage=productdetail&model=KHLB2

Intel® Core 2 Duo Processors
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4650 GT with 512MB GDDR3 Video Memory
15.6" WXGA (1366x768) LED Backlit Glassview Type Screen
2GB DDR3 1066MHz SDRAM Expandable to 8GB
Built-In SATA Hard Drive
8X Super-Multi Drive
6-cell Lithium-Ion Battery
Weight6.06 lbs. with Battery

Customize it with 2 GB RAM, 7200 rpm HD, Win7 Home premium and it gets to $765
 

dragonspyrit

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I made my last post in a bit of haste, since New Egg had just posted their special laptop deals and I was afraid of letting it slip by! Now that the traffic has returned to normal on the site, I see that the HP Pavilion dv6-1362nr was on both of your lists, and I'm glad, as I jumped on it as soon as I could =) So in the end, I wasn't too far off from my original price!

Thank you for all the help, especially Maziar. I learned a lot in the process too!
 
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