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

[Chicomagiko]

Started a laptop thread before I noticed the sticky(RTFM kind of moment lol). Anyways i'll just paste what i wrote there here

I'm currently looking for a new laptop. 16.4 inches or smaller, widescreen, at least 2 gigs of RAM, express card 54/34 slot and an e-sata port(though not really necessary). My current budget is 1100. I've narrowed it down between Sony's FW series and Asus's G1 series but am open to any suggestions. Laptop will be used primarily for some graphics design programs and possibly some gaming in between. What are your thoughts fellow BGians? Sony? Asus? Something else? Thanks for any and all input.

[Bakthi]

Dell keeps changing their available models before I can buy something...currently moving between apartments, so that doesn't help either.

It seems all of the Vostros still available have Intel graphics now except for the 1700. It's kind of strange. The 1700 starts with a 128M nVidia 8400, and you can't seem to change it (though the product comparison table indicates that you should be able to get up to 256M). The 1710 starts with Intel graphics, but you can change it to a 256M nVidia...for $150, which puts it well above the 1700. The 1700 also seems to have some kind of deal going right now on the 320M HDD.

So...I threw together this for $714:

Free Upgrade! Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T5670 (1.8GHz, 2MB L2 Cache, 800MHz FSB
Genuine Windows Vista® Home Basic, Service Pack 1
1 Year Basic Limited Warranty plus 1 Year Mail-in Service
17.0 inch Wide Screen XGA+ LCD Display with TrueLife™
Free Upgrade! 2GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 667MHz, 2 DIMM
8X CD/DVD+RW Read and Burn CD and DVD
128MB NVIDIA® GeForce™ 8400M GS
320GB 5400RPM Hard Drive
Dell Exclusive MediaDirect™ Instant Play Software Application
Dell Wireless 1395 802.11g Wi-Fi Internal Card
No Camera
Integrated High Definition Audio

The only things I care about for this are FFXI and my online job (uses Firefox). I might try WoW some day; probably not interested in many other PC games (I have plenty of consoles). This seems like it should be good enough; is anything better available at anywhere near that price? Anything stick out as terrible? Trying to keep the price as low as possible, but I don't mind making reasonable upgrades if they'll really improve the lifetime/utility of the machine. It's "heavy" for a laptop, but well...I type on a desk, and I'm pretty strong.

Also, Dell wants to charge $200 to go from 2 GB of RAM to 4 GB. Newegg has 4 GB of Corsair (2 DIMMs) that should work in this for $80. I guess if I feel like I need it, I can order from Newegg later and just...keep the Dell DIMMs in an anti-static bag for 2 years in case I need warranty service?

[Isiolia]

Vostros are marketed as small business machines. Since gaming isn't generally a priority for those, the video options are more limited.

You could keep the DIMMs around in case of warranty service (though it'd depend on what for, and if you were sending to depot I suppose).

The only things I care about for this are FFXI and my online job (uses Firefox). I might try WoW some day; probably not interested in many other PC games (I have plenty of consoles). This seems like it should be good enough; is anything better available at anywhere near that price? Anything stick out as terrible? Trying to keep the price as low as possible, but I don't mind making reasonable upgrades if they'll really improve the lifetime/utility of the machine. It's "heavy" for a laptop, but well...I type on a desk, and I'm pretty strong.

Is there a particular reason you're wanting a laptop then? Just something cheap for the between-apartments phase?

[Bakthi]

My online work hours happen in rather odd increments; half an hour every few hours, depending on the day. Sometimes, I like to go places and do stuff; readily available wireless Internet is way more common than readily available Internet-connected computers. Thanks to the move, I'll probably find myself at my brother's house 2 nights per week about half the time, too. Not only do I not want to kick him off WoW to use his computer for work, but he has a Mac, which is fine except it doesn't play FFXI.

So, yeah. I need something portable and relatively cheap that can do those two things well enough. It would be cool if I could 2-box FFXI, even, but that's not vital; I play on the PS2 right now, and I could 2-box that way if necessary. My desktop machine will remain Linux for MythTV/fileserving/being better than Windows purposes.

I'm certainly not tied to Vostro, or Dell, but this looked like it could do what I wanted. If someone has a better suggestion for vaguely near as much money (sub-$1000 ideally), awesome. HDD doesn't have to be huge either, since almost all of my stuff will be on the desktop.

I thought about buying a used one, but it kind of scares the hell out of me.

[Cephius]

My online work hours happen in rather odd increments; half an hour every few hours, depending on the day. Sometimes, I like to go places and do stuff; readily available wireless Internet is way more common than readily available Internet-connected computers. Thanks to the move, I'll probably find myself at my brother's house 2 nights per week about half the time, too. Not only do I not want to kick him off WoW to use his computer for work, but he has a Mac, which is fine except it doesn't play FFXI.

So, yeah. I need something portable and relatively cheap that can do those two things well enough. It would be cool if I could 2-box FFXI, even, but that's not vital; I play on the PS2 right now, and I could 2-box that way if necessary. My desktop machine will remain Linux for MythTV/fileserving/being better than Windows purposes.

I'm certainly not tied to Vostro, or Dell, but this looked like it could do what I wanted. If someone has a better suggestion for vaguely near as much money (sub-$1000 ideally), awesome. HDD doesn't have to be huge either, since almost all of my stuff will be on the desktop.

I thought about buying a used one, but it kind of scares the hell out of me.

Honestly, that Vostro should work out fine for you. FFXI doesn't have high system requirements as you are well aware; just realize you won't be able to play other games on it.

I'd recommend against buying a used laptop unless you know what you're doing. If you go that route, make sure you run diagnostics on the hardware to make sure everything is functioning correctly, check the warranty status on it, and if you're especially paranoid, check the system logs to see what kind of errors it's gone through. Make sure the operating system isn't pirated, then when you get it home copy the CD key and reinstall windows and start from scratch.

[Ailill]

I'm in a similar boat in that all I need out of a laptop is the ability to play ff and some minor web browsing. As such, would this cheapy acer do the trick? I know the game doesn't require much, but I'd feel better with a second opinion. There are better laptops out there certainly, but $399 is a hard deal to pass up.

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Acer-...oductDetail.do

[Cephius]

I'm in a similar boat in that all I need out of a laptop is the ability to play ff and some minor web browsing. As such, would this cheapy acer do the trick? I know the game doesn't require much, but I'd feel better with a second opinion. There are better laptops out there certainly, but $399 is a hard deal to pass up.

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Acer-...oductDetail.do

That's really not that bad. The processor is real slow, but for FFXI and basic web browsing it should be fine. It's a decent deal for the price, just make sure you get rid of the ton of bloatware that thing comes with - Mcafee, the Acer software, ect.

[EternityEnd]

I'm curious how well this would perfom FFXI, any thoughts?

http://www.cdw.com/shop/products/def...iew-_-Main+Tab

[Chicomagiko]

Anyone know if Sager laptops are any good? (Build quality, durability etc.)

[Isiolia]

I'm curious how well this would perfom FFXI, any thoughts?

http://www.cdw.com/shop/products/def...iew-_-Main+Tab

Using Boot Camp, as well as any other laptop with an 8600M GT in it. Should run nicely.

[Tormentormike]

Looking into seriously buying a laptop within the next few days, still wondering if the Vostro 1500 was still a good laptop? Looking for around $1k, decent size HD, able to play FFXI smoothly, and will be taking it to class.

[Mayareira]

I'm curious how well this would perfom FFXI, any thoughts?

http://www.cdw.com/shop/products/def...iew-_-Main+Tab

Almost same specs with mine(I upgraded to 4GB RAM). With bootcamp, Final Fantasy XI runs great. I am able to play at 1440 x 900 resolution with max. details. Only goes down to 20-22 frames at Whitegate Auction House. My friend also plays FFXI on his older MacBook Pro(2.16Mhz, 1600XT) and he is very happy with the performance.
Keep in mind that you'll need to boot XP via bootcamp though. Parallels can't emulate DirectX.

Vostro 1500 are good. I'd assume it'd run FFXI quite nicely with its 8600 GT.

[Bakthi]

Dell doesn't actually sell the 1500 anymore; the 1510 has Intel graphics by default, and it seems that the only nVidia option in Vostros is the 8400M GS, at least online. They also have a new 15" model that's RED LIKE FERRARI and seems to have just come out, but again, that has an 8400M GS (and the customize link doesn't even work yet, so I'm not sure if you can actually buy it).

I ended up going with the 1700, and I should finally get my hands on it tomorrow. The last time I checked eBay, there were a couple of people selling 1500s that were allegedly still under warranty, so you could check there.

[EternityEnd]

Almost same specs with mine(I upgraded to 4GB RAM). With bootcamp, Final Fantasy XI runs great. I am able to play at 1440 x 900 resolution with max. details. Only goes down to 20-22 frames at Whitegate Auction House. My friend also plays FFXI on his older MacBook Pro(2.16Mhz, 1600XT) and he is very happy with the performance.
Keep in mind that you'll need to boot XP via bootcamp though. Parallels can't emulate DirectX.

Vostro 1500 are good. I'd assume it'd run FFXI quite nicely with its 8600 GT.

Thanks, that's exactly what I wanted to know. I just got it in a few day ago, already installed Windows XP via bootcamp; I've been too lazy to install FFXI yet, but I will soon.. Hopefully it'll work as nicely as yours does.

[Kiarax]

Looking to pick up a new laptop. Honestly know next to nothing about what kind of specs I want. Mostly want to just be able to run some older games, this laptop I'm currently using can't even run Half Life 2 or PSX emulators. If I could get something like TF2 and PSX games running at atleast 30 FPS I'd be happy.

Was looking at this one. The specs all look good to someone who doesn't know what the hell they're talking about, the only thing I'm not sure about is the video card.

If anyone has any better suggestions I'm all ears. Don't really want to go any higher than £600~, but if it's worth the extra money I can go for it.

[Shuemue]

That's shit compared to the Dell you can get.

Go to www.dell.co.uk and select Small Business laptops

Vostro range, pick the 1710, but then on the next screen there's a Vostro 1700 special offer, grab that one. It's £399 base price, but you want to customise it, and go for 3gb ram and the 256mb graphics card, makes the total price £562.83 inc VAT and you get a FAR superior laptop. Much faster processor, way better graphics just a slightly smaller HDD.

[Kiarax]

Awesome, that looks great. Thanks alot.

[mootsfox]

Don't buy the 1710 or the 1510. They use a integrated graphics chip that is prone to failure. The 1700 and 1500 use MXM style separate cards which fail quite a bit less.

[Tecora]

Found this on Craigslist, tell me what you guys think. I already have a very very nice desktop which will still serve as my main PC, but I want a laptop to entertain me between classes (I commute and occasionally have 4-6 hour gaps of time between classes), as well as for programming in my visual C# class (Visual studio 2008). I want to use it to play FFXI, maybe WOW, as well as handle VS 2008, tell me what you think:

Dell Studio 1535 Laptop (Black)
Intel Core 2 Duo Processor 2.0GHz, 2 MB L2 Cache)
3GB DDR2, 667MHz
15.4 inch Wide Screen XGA LCD True Life
250B 5400RPM Serial ATA Hard Drive
8X DVD+/-RW Duel Layer Drive
Genuine Windows Vista Home Premium Edition
Integrated 2.0M Pixel Webcam
Dell Wirless 1395 802.11g Mini Card
Graphics: 256MB ATI Mobility RADEON HD 3450
56 WHr 6 Cell Lithium Ion Primary Battery
Dell 1 Year Warranty

Also note it is new in box, and it is selling for 600$ cash.

Thanks in advance!

[mootsfox]

Do it.

I'll trade you CPUs for $50.