tough time deciding on which laptop brand to go with

[aconrad86]

I'm still trying to find a laptop, mostly trying to save the money lol, and I can't decide on what brand to go with. Not really interested in Dell and it's really come down between HP and Asus. I love the look and feel of the Asus laptops plus the facial recoginition thing is pretty cool and I can't really find many bad things about them. I have a lot of experience with HP laptops and although I'm not a huge fan of the look some of the deals that they have seem almost to good to pass up. Anyone with any thoughts or opinions? I'm open to other brands this is just what I've primarily looked at so far.

 

[Martimus]

From a support standpoint you can typically find a HP-certified repair facility in most major cities. The same, unfortunately, can't be said of ASUS. If I owned an ASUS laptop here in Arid-zona I'd have to pack it up and ship it to California, Utah, or Colorado for repair.

 

[SoulTerror]

I love my Toshiba laptop. HP makes some good laptops, but some of their models are hit and miss.

 

[Martimus]

I love my Toshiba laptop. HP makes some good laptops, but some of their models are hit and miss.

I have both a Toshiba and HP laptop. I love the Toshiba but it's a Windows XP laptop and finding newer device drivers for it is almost impossible. It's my only criticism of the laptop...

 

[GrdLock]

Take it from someone who's worked in IT for a while and had to support lots of users with laptops... if you want a quality laptop, look at Lenevo's, or business-class Dell laptops such as the Latitude.

 

[nyydynasty]

The Lenovo's aren't bad. We use the T410 and X201 models at my company and they're pretty good, outside of the HUGE battery issue. They need to do something about these crappy @ss batteries.

 

[shatterpoints]

Take it from someone who's worked in IT for a while and had to support lots of users with laptops... if you want a quality laptop, look at Lenevo's, or business-class Dell laptops such as the Latitude.

If you get dell you need their warranty to make them worth while. Lenovo is great, but are streamlined for business only. Almost no multimedia/ avg home user hardware that they come with.


I like Toshiba, HP, Asus, Sony, and Dell

 

[GrdLock]

If you get dell you need their warranty to make them worth while. Lenovo is great, but are streamlined for business only. Almost no multimedia/ avg home user hardware that they come with.


I like Toshiba, HP, Asus, Sony, and Dell

Exactly. All that flashy multimedia junk is worthless. What benefit does it really offer? Latitudes and Lenevo's still have basic multimedia keys on them anyways. All that extra junk doesn't do anyone any good and is just another thing to break. Home users laptops are flimsy, junky, cheap, etc. Business laptops are built with a lot more quality hardware, and are a lot more durable.

 

[johnlgalt]

Rather than trying to decide upon a brand, you should be looking first and foremost at what you plan on doing with the laptop and thus what you need for the laptop to have in it.

Also, be advised that if you plan on paying less than $500 you better plan on getting a laptop that has been skimped on in some way- RAM, older processor, etc. - if you don't mind upgrading in a year or so when it starts to run slow as molasses (and I don't mean b/c of installed programs / the need for spring cleaning, I mean b/c it simply cannot keep pace with the current processors out there) then by all means buy a cheaper laptop. If you want it to last without you screaming bloody murder in about a year b/c of the fact that it is just slow, consider investing (wisely!) in a decently priced laptop with some power behind it.

Lenovo is great for the average business user - but if you want all of those bells and whistles on it, for example, to make / edit video clips for, say, a school project, then you might consider avoiding a business line of products. After all, not everyone is a business person. And, yes, school projects do, nowadays, involve more and more video editing and creation than ever before. To dismiss such functions as flashy multimedia and worthless is taking a very narrow view of the use of a laptop - not everyone has the same needs as GrdLock.

 

[Vihzel]

I've never had a bad instance with HP support. First figure out your price range and then go from there.

 

[saps]

Blanket statements about brands are tough because certain models are better or worse than others from within the same brand. Frankly, even within the same model number you might find a gremlin in one laptop that is not in the other.
Much easier for the OP or anyone to find a laptop that meets his/her needs and then say Im thinking about this one and then others can comment based on the specifics of the model.

 

[GrdLock]

Rather than trying to decide upon a brand, you should be looking first and foremost at what you plan on doing with the laptop and thus what you need for the laptop to have in it.

Also, be advised that if you plan on paying less than $500 you better plan on getting a laptop that has been skimped on in some way- RAM, older processor, etc. - if you don't mind upgrading in a year or so when it starts to run slow as molasses (and I don't mean b/c of installed programs / the need for spring cleaning, I mean b/c it simply cannot keep pace with the current processors out there) then by all means buy a cheaper laptop. If you want it to last without you screaming bloody murder in about a year b/c of the fact that it is just slow, consider investing (wisely!) in a decently priced laptop with some power behind it.

Lenovo is great for the average business user - but if you want all of those bells and whistles on it, for example, to make / edit video clips for, say, a school project, then you might consider avoiding a business line of products. After all, not everyone is a business person. And, yes, school projects do, nowadays, involve more and more video editing and creation than ever before. To dismiss such functions as flashy multimedia and worthless is taking a very narrow view of the use of a laptop - not everyone has the same needs as GrdLock.

I was talking about from a hardware standpoint. All the pretty little buttons all over the place, all that junk. The flimsy plastic. Just the overall cheap hardware used in every consumer-grade laptop. What would a flashy laptop really be able to do that a quality built Lenevo or Latitude couldn't do? Absolutely nothing, except maybe a shortcut button on the keyboard to popup some program you'll never use maybe.

A Lenevo can do video editing just as well as a Pavilion can. That's all software. A Lenevo will run the same software as any other laptop. All you have to do is install it.

My main point is simply that consumer-grade laptops are CHEAPLY made. Plain and simple fact. Business-grade laptops are made much higher quality. The only thing you lose by buying a business-grade laptop is the "pretty" appearance. Yeah, you can't get some cool flower design printed on the laptop from the factory. Yeah you don't have a button your keyboard to launch your webcam app. That's about it.

So if you don't care if your laptop looks pretty, then there's really no reason not to buy a product that's higher quality. The chances of you running into hardware problems with a business laptop are much lower than if you buy a cheap consumer-grade one.

 

[johnlgalt]

Ahh, on that I can agree with you. from a hardware aspect those bells and whistles can cause more problems than they are worth.

However, you still get what you pay for. High end laptops, even with 'bells and whistles" are constructed much better than laptops selling for $400.

 

[aconrad86]

Thanks for all the advice everyone! The more I'm looking at it I think Lenovo might end up winning out. I like the idea of the business geared laptop because since I am a student I dont want to spend the extra money on all the bells and whistles that come with a more mutimedia geared laptop, plus I have copies of all the multimedia software that I use so as things are needed I can install them. As far as numbers go I would like something with 4GB of ram and a 500GB hard drive and looking at newegg I can get one with both of those and 1GBVDRAM for 650. On top of that from what I've read Lenovo makes a really solid laptop as far as build quality goes and reliability

 

[aconrad86]

So I think I have settled on Lenovo's IdeaPad Z565(4311-3EU). Any thoughts/comments or suggestions for it. I have found it new for $650 and for casual gaming/school/ potentially my first work laptop I think it would be a really good fit. But I havent bought it yet so I'm not locked in if something better comes up.

 

[Martimus]

When you purchase, get a service contract (extended warranty)!

Only other thing I'm gonna suggest is that you check your local community to make sure that an authorized Lenovo repair station is nearby. Laptops, all laptops, are at higher risk of getting damaged than desktop computers. In the event of an issue it's always preferable to have a good local repair station as opposed to having to ship the laptop halfway across the country.

 

[mikedt]

I wouldn't get a cheaper consumer grade HP. From experience they last just about a year, then fall apart. Go for a business grade laptop, sure they cost more, but the build quality is so much better.

 

[NOLA_Droid]

Whichever brand you choose, right out of the box, I would install a fresh OS, and the OS only. New machines come with wayyyyy tooooo much crapware. Windows 7 does a good job of making everything work. Don't have to find many drivers, if any.

 

[SoulTerror]

That's what I did. Laptop came with 7 64-bit home, I installed 7 64-bit pro as soon as I got it.

 

[ElasticNinja]

I was planning to wip and re-install W7, but wanted to keep the Lenovo recovery.
Then I repartition my HDD, booted into W7 aaannnndddd
The partitions had deleted themselves

 

[aconrad86]

I wish i could reinstall just the os unfortunatly i dont have a spare copy of windows lying around. Normally I would go online and find a copy but a friend of a friend just got busted doing just that and i really dont need that kind of heat. it shouldnt be to much of a hassel to delete it all anyway

 

[ElasticNinja]

I wish i could reinstall just the os unfortunatly i dont have a spare copy of windows lying around. Normally I would go online and find a copy but a friend of a friend just got busted doing just that and i really dont need that kind of heat. it shouldnt be to much of a hassel to delete it all anyway

There are places you can download them (untouched)
They are legit and you can use your license key (sticker on laptop)
Your friend didnt get busted for doing this did he?

 

[Rota]

Asus has accidental damage warranties on almost all of their new laptops for absolutely no charge. I bought one a while back, and stupidly let it slip out of my hand onto a table as I was putting it back in its case and ended up breaking the LCD. I called in, got an RMA number, and had it back on my doorstep with a brand new LCD installed in a week, no questions asked, and no charge.

Asus is also going to have WAY more bang for the buck than HP. The hardware you'll get in an Asus laptop compared to a similar priced HP laptop is going to be heavily in favor of the Asus.


EDIT: However, I just saw this on one of Newegg's daily deals:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...146808&cm_sp=DailyDeal-_-34-146-808-_-Product

Looks like a great laptop for the price.

 

[aconrad86]

Sort of i dont know all of the details, he's been in custody since it happened, but i know he used a lot of torrents for movies software and games and from what i've heard from his sister they hit him for the everything. i would love an asus but this deal i've found for the lenovo seems like the best bang for my buck. hopefully it's still there when i have the money together

 

[aconrad86]

I'm sure yall are getting tired of helping me but any advice on brands or places to get the best deal on a case? I would prefer a messenger bag and it will need to fit at most a 16" laptop