Laptops

[Guest Stefkov]

Cheers for that info.

 

About the one you said I posted earlier, which was one that? The dell one?

Where d you find it, on the dell website or is it another make?

I'm sorry I keep asking loads of questions.

[DCK]

Cheers for that info.

 

About the one you said I posted earlier, which was one that? The dell one?

Where d you find it, on the dell website or is it another make?

I'm sorry I keep asking loads of questions.

Yeah, it's the Dell one. Basically I took the Inspiron 9400, took the middle-priced specifications option, and in the customization process I only changed the graphics card from Radeon X1400 to GeForce 7900GS. The price totals at €1219,40, or some £900 (I'm not sure).

 

The specs are these:

Intel® Core™2 Duo Processor T5500 (1,66 GHz, 2 MB L2-cache, 667 MHz FSB)

Legitieme Windows Vistaâ„¢ Home Premium - Nederlands

Collect & Return-service, slechts 1 jaar

17" Wide Screen WXGA+(1440x900)

Intern toetsenbord - VS Int. (QWERTY)

2.048 MB 533 MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM (2 x 1.024)

120GB (5,400 rpm) SATA Hard Drive

Vast intern 8x DVD+/-RW-combinatiestation met software

256MB NVIDIA® GeForce™Go 7900 GS

6 Cell 53 WHr batterij

 

Which is a good laptop for your needs I'd say. I'm not sure if you can get a similar setup for less (you probably can), but as far I know this is pretty good value for money.

[Jasper]

Jup, looks like one hell of a lappy. De nederlandse termen zullen niet duidelijk zijn voor de Engelsen, but they're not that important anyway.

[Guest Stefkov]

Ah the Inspiron 9400, I was on the 6400, the one next to the 9400. Whats annoying is that the upgrade for RAM ends today.

Cheers for all your help. If I dont get this tonight or soon, then I'll keep that information on my pc, and find another like it.

[DCK]

Ah the Inspiron 9400, I was on the 6400, the one next to the 9400. Whats annoying is that the upgrade for RAM ends today.

Cheers for all your help. If I dont get this tonight or soon, then I'll keep that information on my pc, and find another like it.

Well, if you don't get it, it's probably wiser to forget about those specs, because in a month or two there'll be a lot of different stuff on the market.

 

It's best to remind this:

Get a Core 2 Duo if you can. Clockspeed doesn't really matter, because the price increase isn't in proportion to the performance gain and the slowest ones are already damn fast.

 

If you get Vista, get as much memory as you can, preferably 2 GB.

 

Never get anything that's below the '600' in the series. Also, don't buy any chip that claims to use HyperMemory or or TurboCache. It's a bad thing and means the chip is slow.

 

This is basically what you should do for a regular PC as well.

[Guest Stefkov]

Thanks a lot for the help. I was wondering about the clockspeed, if faster as better.

I made the laptop on dell with the same specs as you posted and it came out to £1200 ish. I can only go as much as £800, maybe I shoud have mentioned that before. But you've helped me enough so thankyou.

[DCK]

Thanks a lot for the help. I was wondering about the clockspeed, if faster as better.

I made the laptop on dell with the same specs as you posted and it came out to £1200 ish. I can only go as much as £800, maybe I shoud have mentioned that before. But you've helped me enough so thankyou.

You sure you got the right one? As in, not in euros/dollars?

 

I'm getting this:

Which equates to £822,22.

 

I can't access the UK site though.

[Guest Stefkov]

Intel® Core™ 2 Duo Processor T5500 (1.66 GHz, 2 MB L2 cache, 667 MHz FSB)

Genuine Windows Vista™ Home Premium

Collect & Return, 1 Year Service only

17" Wide Screen WXGA (1440x900) TFT Display

2048MB 533MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM (2x1024)

160GB (5,400 rpm) Sata Hard Drive

Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive including software

256MB DDR3 nVidia® GeForce™ Go 7900 graphics card

6 Cell, 56Whr Lithium Ion Primary Battery

Exactly the same

 

 

Yours is NO3946, mine is 2946. Did you choose an entertainment laptop or XPS&performance?

[DCK]

Nope, just selected "display all" and then scrolled down to the 9400.

 

Ah, now I see. Dell UK is just ridiculously more expensive than in the rest of the world... Sorry, you won't be able to get that setup for that price from Dell I guess.

[Guest Stefkov]

Oh well thats a load of crap...

The UK is overpriced in everything. I wonder how much would it cost to build my own of these.

Can you actually build your own laptop?

[Caris]

Stefkov i noticed before you were saying you wanted to order today for the Ram offer, dont worry Dell ALLWAYS have offers on, they just luring you in.

[Guest Stefkov]

Hah thanks for the heads up. I'm always worried I'll never get the good deals.

I'm gonna go looking around for a cheapish laptop with around the specs of that Dell.

[DCK]

Can you actually build your own laptop?

It's very difficult because laptops are usually made of strict sets of hardware. Dell gives you quite a lot of options even. Mind you, I've been surfing around and UK prices are terribly high, it seems.

 

Also, Caris is right. They have offers like these all the time.

[Guest Stefkov]

I just quickly read through something I found, that laptops are 'clouded in mystery' if you try to build them but desktop pcs are so easy 'you're dad could make one'.

 

checking the comet website they have an alright laptop

Graphics card is 320 MBGF7300 GOTC, which I'm guessing is a 320MB GeForce7300 but not sure what GOTC means, however I dont think thats right with it being 320.

2 and a half hours battery which is alright. Thats going for £779.99 online.

I see it as the same as that dell one.

Laptop. This one has a bigger hard drive, you can see it has only 28MB of NVidiaGO7300 which is a good one if you say anythign above '...600...'??

[Caris]

if your gonna spend that much get a Dell imho.

[Guest Stefkov]

But thats the problem. The same specs for the Dell is £300 dearer than these 2 laptops.

[DCK]

I just quickly read through something I found, that laptops are 'clouded in mystery' if you try to build them but desktop pcs are so easy 'you're dad could make one'.

 

checking the comet website they have an alright laptop

Graphics card is 320 MBGF7300 GOTC, which I'm guessing is a 320MB GeForce7300 but not sure what GOTC means, however I dont think thats right with it being 320.

2 and a half hours battery which is alright. Thats going for £779.99 online.

I see it as the same as that dell one.

Laptop. This one has a bigger hard drive, you can see it has only 28MB of NVidiaGO7300 which is a good one if you say anythign above '...600...'??

That's decent for the price, but graphics chip still isn't great. The difference with this and the 7900 is night and day, it barely makes a quarter of the 7900GS's performance. If you could wait until the next generation of graphics chips, which will likely be summer, then even low end performance would run World of Warcraft and other midrange games quite well.

[Caris]

Stefkov do you not fancy getting a 15" screen instead of a 17", Half the point in laptops is that there portable and 17" is preety big...and of corse its cheaper.

[Guest Stefkov]

Yeah I'm not bothered about hte screen size. Carrying a laptop with the same size monitor I have on my desk right now is cool, its a 15" and its big enough.

Cheers DCK, I will wait till the summer and see what come out.

[McPhee]

Its called linux my friend.

 

(writing this on 3 year old P4 3.2Ghz, 1024Mb, Radeon 9600M laptop)

 

Linux is hardly the way forward either. Im using it as my main OS at the moment and it doesnt work with my wireless cards (1 pci + 1 usb) so i have to hook it up to my router via ethernet. The software support is hardly glowing either, taken me a while to find a decent, free Firewall and Virus scanner (in Windows i just used Zone Alarm and AVG).

On the plus side though, Beryl 3D desktop looks brilliant and the OS is free and fairly stable (although not quite so good as i found Win XP Pro to be)

 

TBH i think Mac is the way forward as long as you dont mind not playing games on it. The OS is very stable, only has to be compatable with a small amount of hardware and has decent 1st, 2nd and 3rd party software

 

If you value games then go Windows. If you're a cheapskate then go Linux

[Caris]

TBH i think Mac is the way forward as long as you dont mind not playing games on it. The OS is very stable, only has to be compatable with a small amount of hardware and has decent 1st, 2nd and 3rd party software

 

Watch what your saying!

[Jasper]

TBH i think Mac is the way forward as long as you dont mind not playing games on it. The OS is very stable, only has to be compatable with a small amount of hardware and has decent 1st, 2nd and 3rd party software

 

All windows hardware works on Mac lately. Okay, graphic cards and such don't work, but in the end it's pretty good hardware and software conjunction that makes up for that.

 

This guy is probably right here. Windows needs a major innovation (not Vista, but Vienna) to show what it's really worth. But that's my opinion. I like working with windows every now and then and I find it incredibly slow in some places.

[Bogbas]

Linux is hardly the way forward either. Im using it as my main OS at the moment and it doesnt work with my wireless cards (1 pci + 1 usb) so i have to hook it up to my router via ethernet. The software support is hardly glowing either, taken me a while to find a decent, free Firewall and Virus scanner (in Windows i just used Zone Alarm and AVG).

On the plus side though, Beryl 3D desktop looks brilliant and the OS is free and fairly stable (although not quite so good as i found Win XP Pro to be)

 

TBH i think Mac is the way forward as long as you dont mind not playing games on it. The OS is very stable, only has to be compatable with a small amount of hardware and has decent 1st, 2nd and 3rd party software

 

If you value games then go Windows. If you're a cheapskate then go Linux

 

Why do you even need a virus scanner for linux? And firestarter is a nice free firewall for linux.

 

I agree with you on the mac thing. There's little or no reason to stick to windows if you don't play games.

[Jav_NE]

My B-series Sony Vaoi has been incredible. When it arrived i had the problem that it had an EU plug (thanks for telling me laptopsdirect... not), which was a pain. So i got a new UK plugged figure-8 cord to plug into the charge unit that only cost a few quid which makes everything all nice and simple.

 

The battery life on it isnt the greatest, i think the most you can get out of it is 2.5 hours. I dont use it much away from a plug though so its not so bad, but i wouldnt recommend it for people who needed to work long hours without a power source as it will let you down. Other than that, perfromance wise and everything else it's been amazing.