Laptop buying tips!

[tomshardwarerocks]

I have been planning to buy a new laptop for a while now. It's been 1445 days since I bought my current Dell, that's over 4 years! which translates into around $165 a year, so my goal is to keep up that number with my next laptop, i.e, if i spend $330, i will try to use it for 2 years.

I learned a lot through shopping around and reading these forums, for example,

-you can use this website and this website to compare CPUs and GPUs.

-there is basically no major difference between 1333mhz and 1600mhz when it comes to gaming.

-the Trinity APUs are very competitive when it comes to gaming if you are comfortable with 30 FPS. the new intel HD is not bad either. but the highest tier, HD4000 is only on par with 7520G which is one of the lowest tiers of Trinity APUs. So for gaming you are better off with AMD laptops.

-if you like a laptop's integrated graphic card (AMD trinity or intel HD4000), then CPU is pretty much irrelevant at this point: because if it's a computer sold by bestbuy or futureshop or some other store, then it means the CPU supports the integrated graphic card and is good enough for whatever game that integrated graphic card can handle. so again, for gaming you are better off with AMD laptops,

-some refurbished laptops can become dirt cheap when the vendor is just trying to get rid of it because they are running out of space and have a new shipment coming in, so you'd rather buy two of those and they will last you way longer than if you bought a 600 regular-priced laptop.

-it's always a good idea to buy cheap laptops. if you buy a 1000 laptop, you need to use it for 5 years to reach $200 per year. But guess what? you could just buy a 400 laptop, use it for 2 years, sell it for $100 or give it to your little brother, and then buy a $600 laptop (which will be way better than the 1000 dollar one because it will be two years from now) and use it for 3 years.

feel free to discuss and add points if you want to!

 

[hpfreak]

Some of the stuff you've posted can actually be useful... there are a few points though that don't make much sense.

I haven't met anyone yet who "likes" integrated graphics, although battery life is better on PCs that don't have dedicated graphics, if you're looking for good battery life, you won't be basing your decision on whether or not it has integrated graphics or not. It's also a matter of price, the main reason why integrated graphics are provided is to make manufacturing cheaper, and to provide a basic display out for content- not for gaming. Although some of AMDs integrated GPUs are borderline dedicated, they're more of a gimmick than a true GPU.


You don't need to purchase 2 refurbished laptops for "reliability".

There are just a few things that you need to fix- the way you worded things made it confusing. For a lot of people, $1000 for a laptop isn't considered a high price. The idea of getting by on cheap laptops isn't necessarily bad- but if you're not in the group looking for a cheap laptop for office applications and youtube, the other categories of consumers need to be mentioned.


Just food for thought,

Thanks,

 

[Estbarul]

It's interesting what you point out, and very true really, but only for non gaming laptops, once you get in the dedicated graphic cards it's another story, of more price.

You spent 1000 now, but in 2 years from now, probably that laptop will not be useful to run newest games, so you buy a better one, selling that old laptop, at the end the principle is similiar, you just need to pay more for better performance. You can't just pay a small price for a laptop to be used in gaming.

 

[tomshardwarerocks]

well I guess I based those on the assumption that you use low or medium settings.

For example, AMD7660 supports most of today's games on medium or low settings

 

[tomshardwarerocks]

ok, right now there is a refurbished i5 on sale for 399, true, it isn't nearly as good as the 299 refurbished one i linked in the OP. but that one was sold out almost immediately.

i would say it is the first good deal this year and it is from futureshop! (usually the good deals of the lowest tier are from bestbuy)

and let's be honest, at $400 you can't really go wrong with an i5.

http://i.imgur.com/FK9hOa0.jpg

link is not provided because you can find it easily if you tried.