Need laptop ~$450

[LREM]

I'm on a pretty tight budget, and I need a laptop for school and casual browsing. Can't be more than $450.
Any suggestions are appreciated, thank you in advance.

 

[EliteRetard]

So easy to find a decent 400$ laptop. Best Buy just had 2 at 350$ that were pretty good. An HP and an Asus. 14 or 15" both with 3GB RAM Win7 Premium and I think a 320GB HDD. One had and AMD AthlonII X2 2.2GHz and the other was an Intel P6100 dual core 2GHz (current generation, same chip as i3's). In the 400$ range I see 2.5GHz AMD chips and around 500$ you get into the actual i series CPUs from intel starting at like 2.4GHz. The Intel CPUs are usually a little faster clock for clock compared to AMD and also get a little better battery life, but usually cost a bit more.

Pretty much stick with the Athlon 2/Turion2 (not the first generation) and the newest Intel i series chips or their derivitives (like the P6100). You can google the CPU model number if you dont know what it is and it should tell you if its one of those three. You should easily be able to get 3GB RAM and a 320GB HDD as well, even 4GB RAM and a 500GB drive. If you can, go for a 7200rpm hard drive over a slower 5400 rpm drive (not the end of the world either way though).

Or go browse some local adds from ofice depot, best buy, staples, frys etc. and anything that catches your eye post on here and we could say yay or nay. One advantage to shopping with local stores is you can go in and try the laptop and make sure the screen and keyboard work for you and the thing doesnt bend like a wet noodle.

 

[JeffreyLebowski]

LOTS of choices nowadays for good sub $500 laptops.
All the major brands make them and they are all pretty well built now.

 

[Muse]

So easy to find a decent 400$ laptop. Best Buy just had 2 at 350$ that were pretty good. An HP and an Asus.

Between an HP and an Asus it would be Asus hands down. Studies of failure rates of laptops have HP at the bottom of the list for reliability and Asus just about at the top.

Laptop reliability survey: ASUS and Toshiba win, HP fails

http://www.engadget.com/2009/11/17/laptop-reliability-survey-asus-and-toshiba-win-hp-fails/

 

[EliteRetard]

Thats interesting...Ive had a few Asus laptops and have liked them all so far. Actually anything Ive ever gotten from Asus is still working, even 10-15 year old MOBOs.

Though I did just see an HP that caught my eye at the 450$ level. Its got an anti glare screen an i3 a faster HDD and an aluminum exterior...only 2GB RAM but thats easy to fix.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834157531

 

[yhelothar]

If you don't mind getting used, I'd get a Lenovo Thinkpad X61 Tablet off ebay for less than $400.
http://shop.ebay.com/?_from=R40&_trksid=p5197.m570.l1313&_nkw=x61+tablet&_sacat=See-All-Categories

They're built like tanks and I bet a used one would outlast a new crappy budget HP one.

Tablets are awesome to annotate slides and other lecture material in one note.
I never had to print anything out throughout college.

 

[Muse]

If you don't mind getting used, I'd get a Lenovo Thinkpad X61 Tablet off ebay for less than $400.
http://shop.ebay.com/?_from=R40&_trksid=p5197.m570.l1313&_nkw=x61+tablet&_sacat=See-All-Categories

They're built like tanks and I bet a used one would outlast a new crappy budget HP one.

Tablets are awesome to annotate slides and other lecture material in one note.
I never had to print anything out throughout college.

I'm right now typing on a Lenovo T60 I bought used off eBay about 2 months ago, cost me around $250. It too is built tough, it's around 5 lb, has 14.1 inch high res 1450x1050 SXGA+ screen. I saw someone with a 12" T60 recently. I had an Acer Aspire 16" die on me a few months ago, bought in August 2009, so I'm skittish. My other Lenovo T60 bought in Nov. 2006 is still going strong.