The Laptop Guide - Post here for questions, deals, etc.

[AlexRuzhyo]

My mother's Dell Inspiron 1546 is having some issues. The battery died from being plugged in 24/7, she's been using it with only the cord, the cord unplugged during a Windows update, Windows explorer now crashes every 15~ seconds, laptop shuts down whenever I try to do a system restore, and the GeekSquad dude said to replace the cord/battery then do the restore. (The laptop didn't shut down when he used his cord over ours.)

The Dell website lists the battery for $155 and the cord for $65. My question is are there cheaper alternatives or outlets for the shit? We want it to function just as long or longer than the official products, even though the official stuff seems quite shitty to our laptop-illiterate selves. We don't want shittier than already shitty shit

If you need to know: PA-3E (90w) Cord and Type X284G (10.8v) battery.

[Brill Weave]

HP Compaq 6735s laptop is not detecting the battery. I have a replacement battery that I slapped in and the same result. Soooo yeah, I'm not sure what the issue. Any help?

[Mikelee0351]

Best Buy running a deal where you get a free 4Gb Xbox 360 with purchase of any Windows laptop $699 and up.

Sell that bitch on Ebay and it's like a ~$150 mail in rebate. I might finally pick myself up a G73 this week... hmmmm

[Mellema]

Best Buy running a deal where you get a free 4Gb Xbox 360 with purchase of any Windows laptop $699 and up.

Sell that bitch on Ebay and it's like a ~$150 mail in rebate. I might finally pick myself up a G73 this week... hmmmm

To get the 360 you have to be a student and if you're over 19 you have to have a .edu email.

I've looked at the G73 at Bestbuy, but have some dislikes. It doesn't have USB 3.0, no Blu-ray, and the resolution is only 1600x900. If I was getting the 360 with it I might consider it, but since I don't qualify I'm looking around some more. I'm leaning more towards a Dell XPS right now.

[*Shinzon*]

Best Buy running a deal where you get a free 4Gb Xbox 360 with purchase of any Windows laptop $699 and up.

Sell that bitch on Ebay and it's like a ~$150 mail in rebate. I might finally pick myself up a G73 this week... hmmmm

Website purchase or at a store? I'm looking for a decent laptop and the xbox, to sell, might be a nice way to go.

[Mikelee0351]

Online, or in-store. It originally said free with any purchase, but they ninja-fixed it later today. They even had the "our ad was wrong" signs up in the store when i went in today. Sucks.



If you buy online though, it says all you need is a .edu email, which I can get since my wife works for a university and has a .edu for work.




But yeah, 1600x900 no blue-ray and no usb 3.0 sucks, but if I get what I really want, I'll end up spending $1800 damn bucks, ugh...

[Daruma]

surprised no one mentioned this here:

http://stores.ebay.com/Fujitsu-Compu...id=p4340.l2563

have bought 2 laptops from the refurb store. One was T5010 tablet pc for about $700 (list price new was 2 grand at the time) and another gaming/multimedia style laptop for about $470 (cant remember exact amt i paid). Both solid deals as far as im concerned. Have had newest one for over a year and other one for about 2 years. If you are willing to watch the bids and be patient you can get awesome deals on there.

[Mikelee0351]

Would anyone actually buy a Dell xps over an Asus g73?

[*Shinzon*]

surprised no one mentioned this here:

http://stores.ebay.com/Fujitsu-Compu...id=p4340.l2563

have bought 2 laptops from the refurb store. One was T5010 tablet pc for about $700 (list price new was 2 grand at the time) and another gaming/multimedia style laptop for about $470 (cant remember exact amt i paid). Both solid deals as far as im concerned. Have had newest one for over a year and other one for about 2 years. If you are willing to watch the bids and be patient you can get awesome deals on there.

Really? Decent machines? Basically I'm in the market for something that can handle heavy word processing and some multimedia stuff. I'm moving for law school and I want a laptop for classrooms. I stilll have my pc for other stuff but I'm looking for good deals on stuff. But refurbished stuff has always kinda irked me. Been through the process twice with my ps3.

[mootsfox]

Fujistu is a solid brand. Their tablet based PCs have lead the market in Japan. They haven't done as well over here, but they are quite good, and very well priced.

[The Stig]

Would anyone actually buy a Dell xps over an Asus g73?

No, unless money is your concern. The recent Asus G73 has looked amazing and I really like it over the generic/average looking Dell XPSs!

Shinzon: Heavy word processing? Do you mean via keyboard or touch screen? Otherwise you just basically need an easy to move laptop with a very decent keyboard with a tiny bit of grunt for your multimedia.

[Isiolia]

Fujistu is a solid brand. Their tablet based PCs have lead the market in Japan. They haven't done as well over here, but they are quite good, and very well priced.

I haven't found them to be particularly durable, and they tend to have a boatload of sensors/etc that all need their own little drivers if you don't want a nice list of unknown devices in Device Manager (assuming you do a clean install and all that).

They're a big manufacturer for tablets because they're one of only a few OEMs that have had much of a focus on them over the years. So there is that.

[Daruma]

If you are worried about refurbished you have to understand that refurb laptops undergo stricter inspection requirements than new out the door lappys. Most of the time they are brought back by either stupid people who have no idea how to use a computer or there are minor things that need to be fixed and whoever brought them back just wanted a new system that works out of the box perfectly. The systems are ok'd when they meet inspection requirements after replacing whatever needs fixing. I have two fujistus and would take them any day over shitbag dell or gateway lappys. But then again its all in what you want and if you are willing to do the research to find what you want in the pcs. But let me ask you this....would you be more pissed if your lappy of 3 years that cost you $500 died just after warranty..or would you be pissed that you bought it for $1500 and it died?

[Mellema]

Went to my local Bestbuy and looked at the Asus G73. Their webpage just lists it with 4 USB2 but the one in store does have 1 USB3 and 3 USB2. If I buy it at the store, my old college ID would be fine to get the free XBox 360 they said. Unfortunately they were out of stock, and if you order online you have to have an .edu e-mail address. Going to keep checking and hopefully they'll get some more in soon.

[fren.]

I plead ignorance when it comes to this so I'll shoot.

I need a laptop (~$600-700) for work that can play games so I was looking at this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834220707

Wise investment?

[Gredival]

I plead ignorance when it comes to this so I'll shoot.

I need a laptop (~$600-700) for work that can play games so I was looking at this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834220707

Wise investment?

Define level of gaming and resolution you want to run them at. I'm fairly sure that would only be able to handle Starcraft at the lowest settings for example.

[fren.]

Don't plan on playing online, but was looking at stuff like Dragon Age 2, Fallout, Oblivion, etc. Resolution doesn't have to be top notch, but I'd be fine with standard quality (on par with the ps3?). Again, I virtually never, ever play PC games so I'm totally out of the loop.

[Jaybar]

Hey guys, I'm researching laptops that will run Autodesk programs (as well as gaming, but primarily Autodesk programs such as Revit, 3dsMax, Maya, etc).

From what I've found, Autodesk recommends workstations (in my case, a mobile workstation due to school requirement of a laptop). Obviously workstation gpus are very pricey (Quadro, FireGL) and I was only able to find a few from Dell and Lenovo which are way out of my price range. I'm trying to stay under $2000.

So I thought I'd try to see how a gaming consumer card would work. I've been eyeing the ASUS G73-XT1 for some time, which runs a GeForce GTX 460M. I was wondering what your opinions are on running a consumer gpu for Autodesk programs. Does anyone have any experience with it? I haven't seen much floating around since it's a relatively new series, and Autodesk is a generation behind on "certifying" gaming cards.

Would a 512mb workstation card outperform a 1.5gb gaming card when it comes to 3D programs such as Maya or Revit?

[Diamicles]

I'm probably going to be purchasing an Asus G74 from best buy pretty soon. Looks like a good rig for the price. Now I'll finally have a computer that I can play some newer games on, my old laptop is still running strong, but it's 5 years old and outdated technology =/

[Toxictaru]

I'm probably going to be purchasing an Asus G74 from best buy pretty soon. Looks like a good rig for the price. Now I'll finally have a computer that I can play some newer games on, my old laptop is still running strong, but it's 5 years old and outdated technology =/

Ew avoid the Best Buy versions. The BB G73s were junk (glad I didn't get mine there), and realistically were a big step down in terms of how much you actually saved. The warranty with BB is equally as bad. The G74 would be best served by going to an actual computer store or somewhere like XoticPC.