Budget Laptop Advice

[Gredival]

Looking to get the S/O a cheap laptop before she starts college (non-traditional student entering late at 26). She doesn't really play PC games except for very minimal indie games off my Steam, so integrated video is fine. Ruled out tablets or a Chromebook because she will need standard word processing with a printer. Blu-ray video playback a plus, but can/will be jettisoned for price.

Looking 250-350 range.

She has been using a suuuuuper old Toshiba up to this point (DDR1 era) so virtually anything is sure to be a huge upgrade.

[Sonomaa]

250-350 is completely doable until you said blu ray playback which is pretty much a nogo
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834314007
has a nice CPU, I dont recommend anything less than a corei3 for a laptop, even in budget, you just get too slow and have no reliability for length of use, better to spend a little more and get much better quality.
newegg has some decent deals on some refurb units as well as some new ones, dell is running a sale atm as well

[hey]

Ruled out tablets or a Chromebook because she will need standard word processing with a printer.

Why exactly does that rule out a chomebook?

[Gredival]

Why exactly does that rule out a chomebook?

As I understand it, Chromebooks require either a wireless enabled printer or you need to install a program on regular computer that directly connected with the printer and use it as a relay to print because they do not support native printing with a standard printers.

As far as word processing, she has previously expressed distaste for Google docs. I'm a much bigger fan of the platform, but I can understand the suite is limited when compared to having regular office, especially with regards to formatting.

I've personally played around with a Chromebook, and while I personally like it, I live much more connected than she does. I ultimately think her needs would be better served with a standard Windows machine than with a Chromebook. It's just a bigger step towards being always connected, even with the newer models offline versions, and that's not really what she needs.

[hey]

Installing ubuntu or something should allow her to do pretty much anything she needs with a chromebook. Of course there's still down sides, but I wouldn't rule it out just yet. They can be really nice for lightweight computing.

[Onizuka]

I would Check out Tiger Direct, they are always having super deals on laptops on a weekly basis just be sure to go from sun(when the sale starts) to tue/wed by thurday all the super deals are out of stock. I bought an i7 for my mom for $550(overkill for her but 550 couldn't pass it up) For you Daughter you could get an i3 for $349-399 or Pentium for $299, sometimes they have a laptops for $269. If you have a store in your area you just check them out, if not you can always try their website.

PS: They also have refurbished laptops online from $199+