New laptop?

[Ferret]

I'm looking for a new laptop for when I go off to university (Bath, Physics and computing...just to save the questions I keep getting ). It needs to run Half-Life 2 (and the further episodes...), and DVDs for me to watch. That's about the only thing it needs to do...

So someone suggested the Inspiron 1521 from Dell, it does look right for me. But is it likely that'll find a better deal? The Inspiron will cost £579 last time I checked, which is a bit steep for me... But I dunno what else I can find.

Anyone?

 

[Mycanid]

Hmm ... "deals" wise it would be hard to find better stuff than Dell.

But if you DO get a Dell (or whatever) be sure and get the extended warranties. It will save SO much trouble in the long run for you....

Prolly the only requirements system wise would be to run Half Life 2. Dvd's can run (albeit slowly) on a Pentium 2 running at 350mhz. So ... you may want a system with a half way decent video card....

If that Dell does the job and the price is right, why not?

P.S. Did you get my email by the way? :\

 

[kyloss]

As far as dell goes the key thing with them is timing, they like to rotate out there deals so depending on how much time you have, just wait for a deal usually between 15 -30% off and also check between home and small business prices, and second on the warranty. also if getting vista consider 2 gb memory and for gaming you will save your self hassel by looking for a video card with dedicated memory, not shared or hypermemory or anything like that.

 

[ssampier]

In the US, I would advise purchasing any computer from the small business section. You will receive a MUCH better warranty that way (Dell prioritizes support for businesses not individuals).

Although, I don't know if this holds true overseas.

 

[Mycanid]

In the US, I would advise purchasing any computer from the small business section. You will receive a MUCH better warranty that way (Dell prioritizes support for businesses not individuals).

Although, I don't know if this holds true overseas.

Got that quoted for truth.... :\

 

[Ferret]

Hmm ... "deals" wise it would be hard to find better stuff than Dell.

But if you DO get a Dell (or whatever) be sure and get the extended warranties. It will save SO much trouble in the long run for you....

Prolly the only requirements system wise would be to run Half Life 2. Dvd's can run (albeit slowly) on a Pentium 2 running at 350mhz. So ... you may want a system with a half way decent video card....

If that Dell does the job and the price is right, why not?

P.S. Did you get my email by the way? :\

Extended warranties = more money though? I'll play with the settings on the website. I don't remember, exactly, what the inspiron had in terms or processor and video card but it sounded like enough. This is the sort of thing which is a bit murky to me....(Yeah I just replied to the email.)

As far as dell goes the key thing with them is timing, they like to rotate out there deals so depending on how much time you have, just wait for a deal usually between 15 -30% off and also check between home and small business prices, and second on the warranty. also if getting vista consider 2 gb memory and for gaming you will save your self hassel by looking for a video card with dedicated memory, not shared or hypermemory or anything like that.

I think it is under an offer now till august. Do I need so much memory for vista? It's adding alot to the price! About £110.

And I dunno if I can afford any machines with The Nvidia card, which I think is the only one dell do with integrated memory.... But I do do more than the 'Help me choose' on says the ATI Raedon says. I do light gaming and some Graphics manipulation. But nothing too intensive.

It's things like that I don't know about, because the processors and Graphics cards don't have a speed or capacity to they? Because I don't know much about them it makes it hard for me to choose.

 

[Rl'Halsinor]

I absolutely second Myconid's suggestion of extended warrenties. To replace the screen on a laptop costs between $600 to $800. So if you ever drop it...


HP makes some fine laptops as well.

 

[drothgery]

I think it is under an offer now till august. Do I need so much memory for vista? It's adding alot to the price! About £110.

You definitely want 2GB for Vista. Heck, if I did more work at home, I'd be upgrading my Lattitude D620 (Delll business notebook w/ a 2 GHz Core 2 Duo) to 4 GB now that notebook memory prices (at least for DDR2 667) have dropped to less than double desktop memory prices.

FWIW, You can buy 2 GB of notebook DDR2-667 from crucial.com for ~£57 (including VAT, but not shipping), and might be able to resell the 1 GB it would come with.

 

[Ferret]

What will happen if I only have the recommended amount of memory (dell says I only need 1gb)? Although if its not much more I might grab that extra memory and do it myself...

I don't think I'll be moving it about enough to need to worry about breaking the screen etc.

Also my dad suggested Ebay shops. Is this a good idea? I'm finding some fairly good deals on there.

edit: I've been playing with Ebay and I've found what looks like some good deals....But I don't know which brands of processor are 'best' for my needs. Intel? AMD? Also graphics cards....I heard that if it uses shared memory some games won't recognise it and not run...how do I know which graphics card to get?

 

[drothgery]

What will happen if I only have the recommended amount of memory (dell says I only need 1gb)? Although if its not much more I might grab that extra memory and do it myself...

It'll just run noticeably slower (disclaimer: I've never tried to run Vista with only 1 GB, but reviewers are pretty consistent on this). It's about the equivalent of running XP (and Office 2000) with 256 MB; this will actually work, but it's not an enjoyable experience.

I don't think I'll be moving it about enough to need to worry about breaking the screen etc.

But I don't know which brands of processor are 'best' for my needs. Intel? AMD? Also graphics cards....I heard that if it uses shared memory some games won't recognise it and not run...how do I know which graphics card to get?

For nobebooks, here's the CPUs in relatively recent systems from best to worst...

(best) Intel Core 2 Duo
AMD Turion 64 X2
Intel Pentium Dual Core 2050/2060*
Intel Core Duo*
AMD Turion 64
(worst) Intel Celeron M

If it has a CPU that's not on this list, then it's too old or very underpowered and you don't want it.

* These are actually the same thing with a different brand name

Almost all notebooks either have integrated graphics (and shared memory) or (relatively) low-end graphics cards. Reasonably current gaming graphics cards use too much power for anything you want to use unplugged for more than a few minutes.