£350 budget for a small/light laptop

philstanbridge · 9 Apr 2016 at 19:14

I've got a few requirements for my travel companion.

- I'd like it to run Football Manager 2016 (2d match engine) if possible.

- I'd like to be able to run very basic photo editing, whether it be Gimp or Light Room or something along those lines. But this isn't essential by any means.

- I'd like to be able to watch Bluray/DVD whether it be from an internal/external reader.

Is this possible within the budget?

hartgeh3 · 9 Apr 2016 at 23:48

good deal on a HP 250 G4 for 290

Intel Core i5-5200U Dual Core Processor
15.6" Screen
Microsoft Windows 10 Home 64-bit
4GB RAM
500GB HDD
DVD Rewriter
Integrated Graphics
USB3 | HDMI | Bluetooth |
N1A92EA#ABU

richthomuk · 11 Apr 2016 at 03:47

Not very much on the light side but I recently brought an 14 inch Elitebook 8470p with a 3rd gen core i5 3360m for under £200, not new but certified refurbished and grade A. Upgraded it to 12gb ram, 240gb ssd for less than £100 on top.

Football Manager 2016 with 3D match engine flies on it as does the latest photoshop, illustrator, krita etc.

Granted its not brand new but for a £350 or less budget I would always look for refurbished 1st.

philstanbridge · 11 Apr 2016 at 17:28

richthomuk said:
Not very much on the light side but I recently brought an 14 inch Elitebook 8470p with a 3rd gen core i5 3360m for under £200, not new but certified refurbished and grade A. Upgraded it to 12gb ram, 240gb ssd for less than £100 on top.

Football Manager 2016 with 3D match engine flies on it as does the latest photoshop, illustrator, krita etc.

Granted its not brand new but for a £350 or less budget I would always look for refurbished 1st.

That's interesting. I don't mind if it's not brand spanking. But I was hoping for something slightly smaller than 15" so maybe the 14" is the way to go. I did see a 13" in a supermarket that appeared to be running Win 10 and some kind of media file, but I didn't give it much of a glance. I did notice the price however and it was £290. So the spec couldn't have been great.

I'll take a look at your system.

Cheers.

ultralaser · 11 Apr 2016 at 22:13

richthomuk said:
Not very much on the light side but I recently brought an 14 inch Elitebook 8470p with a 3rd gen core i5 3360m for under £200, not new but certified refurbished and grade A. Upgraded it to 12gb ram, 240gb ssd for less than £100 on top.

Football Manager 2016 with 3D match engine flies on it as does the latest photoshop, illustrator, krita etc.

Granted its not brand new but for a £350 or less budget I would always look for refurbished 1st.

Very smart move Sir.

linktoinsanity · 12 Apr 2016 at 15:03

philstanbridge said:
That's interesting. I don't mind if it's not brand spanking. But I was hoping for something slightly smaller than 15" so maybe the 14" is the way to go. I did see a 13" in a supermarket that appeared to be running Win 10 and some kind of media file, but I didn't give it much of a glance. I did notice the price however and it was £290. So the spec couldn't have been great.

I'll take a look at your system.

Cheers.

That system looks good.

Also take a look at second hand Lenovo X230 and T430 machines, they may fit your bill too (at 12.5 and 14 inch sizes respectfully).

Gooner Leroy · 12 Apr 2016 at 17:30

I'm looking for a similar spec laptop at a similar price. I've just started looking at the refurb models but its taking me an age to get familiar with all the laptops out there. Are the any brands in particular that I should be avoiding or eyeing up?

I'll have a butchers at the laptops already mentioned in this post, cheers.

Sorry for hijacking your thread philstanbridge

Gooner Leroy · 12 Apr 2016 at 19:33

You can't argue with those prices. Brilliant!

philstanbridge · 12 Apr 2016 at 20:03

They are cracking prices. But I think I'm going to hold our for a 12.5". I will be using it quite a lot on the move and taking it abroad so portability is a must. I want something I can comfortably slip into my hand luggage.

linktoinsanity · 13 Apr 2016 at 15:03

philstanbridge said:
They are cracking prices. But I think I'm going to hold our for a 12.5". I will be using it quite a lot on the move and taking it abroad so portability is a must. I want something I can comfortably slip into my hand luggage.

I'm very happy with my Lenovo X230, it may be worth looking at those.

(I got mine from a certain auction site, obviously check the sellers feedback etc before you buy and remember the associated risks with auction sites.)

JamesT83 · 22 Apr 2016 at 13:50

Can you keep the HDD and the SDD or do you just replace the HDD for the SSD?

richthomuk · 22 Apr 2016 at 16:34

JamesT83 said:
Can you keep the HDD and the SDD or do you just replace the HDD for the SSD?

as long as it comes with a DVD Drive (or has space for one) then you can swap out the drive tray, place in a HDD/SSD caddie and connect up a 2nd drive. In the Elitebook I posted earlier I have a 250GB Crucial bx100 as the main drive and then a in the hard drive caddie I have a 256GB Micron C400

Gooner Leroy · 22 Apr 2016 at 18:27

Just to say I have ordered that HP elitebook this morning with the additional 8gb ram. I've left the SSD as I thought there is only space for a SSD or HDD. I suppose I can get SSD at a later date if required.

Thanks richthomuk for the recommendations.

richthomuk · 22 Apr 2016 at 22:51

Gooner Leroy said:
Just to say I have ordered that HP elitebook this morning with the additional 8gb ram. I've left the SSD as I thought there is only space for a SSD or HDD. I suppose I can get SSD at a later date if required.

Thanks richthomuk for the recommendations.

Nice, which did you go for the 8470p? I think I paid something like £12 or so for the HDD caddie so its a pretty cheap upgrade if you did it at a later date.

Gooner Leroy · 23 Apr 2016 at 13:19

richthomuk said:
Nice, which did you go for the 8470p? I think I paid something like £12 or so for the HDD caddie so its a pretty cheap upgrade if you did it at a later date.

Yeah, the 8470p. Reading around and it seems to be perfect for what I'm looking for, general web usage, streaming and light gaming.

Good to hear that the caddie is cheap. I no doubt upgrade to a SSD when my patience runs out with the slower loading times

richthomuk · 23 Apr 2016 at 19:07

Gooner Leroy said:
Yeah, the 8470p. Reading around and it seems to be perfect for what I'm looking for, general web usage, streaming and light gaming.

Good to hear that the caddie is cheap. I no doubt upgrade to a SSD when my patience runs out with the slower loading times

let me know what you think once it arrives.

Stealthploit · 24 Apr 2016 at 10:11

For budgets laptops i like the lenovo ones

Their thin and with nice specs... if you like to game every now and then.. go for an amd version this is what i did

philstanbridge · 24 Apr 2016 at 11:22

It's my birthday in June and I hope to be able to have something by then. So what are these Lenovo ones then worth looking at?

Gooner Leroy · 27 Apr 2016 at 11:38

richthomuk said:
let me know what you think once it arrives.

Arrived yesterday and have tested it out with fm16 and can fault it so far. Build quality is excellent and with the added 8gb ram everything so far runs nice and quickly, even without a SSD.

An absolute steal for £210 inc the extra ram.

richthomuk · 27 Apr 2016 at 12:19

Gooner Leroy said:
Arrived yesterday and have tested it out with fm16 and can fault it so far. Build quality is excellent and with the added 8gb ram everything so far runs nice and quickly, even without a SSD.

An absolute steal for £210 inc the extra ram.

Glad you like it. With the SSD im running FM with pretty much 3 quarters of the leagues in Europe, maybe more, plus all the south american leagues and it still flies. The drive it came with was still pretty decent though, think it was a 500gb 7200rpm HDD.

Was yours from that Designer Laptop place?