Please help on buying laptop

[MisterJedi]

I'm a college student, and I would like to buy a new and my very first laptop. I did some research and I am still confused of what to buy..

Basically, I am looking for laptop that has long battery life, so it is probably Intel Centrino based. I would be using it for a little bit of programming, and of course word editor, a little bit of graphic editing (Adobe for photo editing), a little bit of web development using Flash, internet browsing, and I also like to be able to play video games, probably like SimCity, or max payne (Because I think the requirement for max payne is not too high..if i wanna play it on medium or low settings)...also hopefully the wireless internet can be 54g or 11g. Um..the last thing is, since I will be using it a lot during classes and other places than home, I will be carrying it on my backpack, so I'd like it to be kinda light, and preferably thin also...

Now I have for Dell Inspiron 600m for sometimes now. It has decent graphic card, configurable wireless card, also centrino and it is not that expensive...Also some guys here mentioned about Gateway and also Emachines. Well if any of you have reviews, suggestions, and advices, I would be very happy to hear them. My budget is $1200, but I am willing to up my budget to 1500-1600 if needed. Hm..512 MB of RAM would be great too!..Anyway thanks a lot for your help!

 

[BargainSeeker]

I responded to another college student recently here. My response to him may help you as well. Since your graphics requirements are more modest, I think that the Dell 600m you mention or an HP zt3000 would also be good candidates. You should be aware though of the short battery life of the 600m. You can find reviews and comments about the 600m here and reviews and comments about the HP zt3000 here. Please note that the HP zt3000 is a somewhat more configurable version of the Compaq x1000.

I can think of several laptops that are thin and light with good graphics performance and long battery life. Unfortunately, all of them exceed your budget. If you want to know about them anyway, then see my response in this thread.

 

[jpeyton]

HP ZT3000 w/ WSXGA, 54G, Mobility 9200, 3+hour battery...

 

[MisterJedi]

I've looked at HP zt3000 and also Gateway 505X..they both looks really good, but I just have more questions..hope you guys can help. Both laptop and also Dell looks good, but HP and Gateway are both 15.4 widescreen...I want to use it to watch DVD sometimes, but I am looking for a light laptop, probably around 5-6 lbs. If i can look another option for 14.1 laptop, that would be good too...also, anyone have any idea how good Radeon 9000 or 9200, and 9600 compared for playing games? Thanks..

 

[Heinrich]

 

[Heinrich]

I would seriously consider the eMachines 6805 at best buy. With rebate this week at best buy of $250 and rewardzone the price is around $1200 for 802.11g, 9600 Graphics, 64 bit processor, 512mb RAM. There is nothing that compares to this machine right now. The only thing that does not qualify is the battery life which is reported to be 3-3.5 hours by users. You could get around that with a second battery.

 

[BargainSeeker]

Originally posted by: MisterJedi
I've looked at HP zt3000 and also Gateway 505X..they both looks really good, but I just have more questions..hope you guys can help. Both laptop and also Dell looks good, but HP and Gateway are both 15.4 widescreen...I want to use it to watch DVD sometimes, but I am looking for a light laptop, probably around 5-6 lbs. If i can look another option for 14.1 laptop, that would be good too...also, anyone have any idea how good Radeon 9000 or 9200, and 9600 compared for playing games? Thanks..

The ATI 9000 and 9200 perform the same since they are virtually the same. In fact, the HP zt3000 is actually equipped with a 9000 and not a 9200 as advertised. In DirectX version 8 games, you can expect a 9600 to perform about twice as fast as a 9000/9200. In DirectX version 9 games, you can expect a 9600 to be about three times as fast.

Another laptop you may want to consider is the AOpen 1557G.

 

[MisterJedi]

As of now, I can tolerate weight above 6 lbs, but not over 7 lbs. Its just too heavy for me to carry around classes. Also, with the wide screen (aka 15.4) it will probably not necessary because I wont be watching DVD or movies during classes.

Bargain seeker, thank you very much for your help. I've looked at Aopen, and it looks like it is gonna be my laptop. One questions, though..probably have been asked. I am really an amateur in the laptop industries, but I just wanna know how the power usage works. I want a laptop that have a battery life of up to 4-6 hours. That if I am using it for simple applications like microsoft words, browsing internet, and instant messaging. I know that if I want to play games, that probably will reduce the battery life to around 2-3 hours..are all the centrino processors are like this, or no? I've seen your thread for the review of Aopen 1557G, and battery life of 4+ hours with normal usage sounds good to me. Oh, just one more question, do you know if the Aopen 1557G is configurable so that I can put 54G instead of 11b in it, and probably configure other stuff too..Thanks a lot

 

[MisterJedi]

Oh one more thing...will adding a battery pack in 2nd bay or whatever be a good thing? How long does the additional battery last?

 

[BargainSeeker]

There are several people at Notebook Forums who can answer your specific questions about the AOpen 1557G better than I can because they have bought this notebook themselves. Look for threads with 1557G or F2 in the title (ABS sells the 1557G as their zForce F2).