a list of laptops, which one would you pick?

the_r_sole

the_r_sole

the_r_sole

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right, fairly straight forward - have identified some similar spec machines can you help me find the best one?!

Samsung RV511 15.6 inch notebook (Intel Core i5-480M Processor, 3M Cache, 2.66 GHz, 4GB RAM, 500GB HD, DVDSMDL, WLAN, BT, Webcam, Win 7 Home Premium 64 bit) Graphics
Graphics Card Description: Intel GMA X4500 DVMT
Graphics Card Ram Size: 1 GB

Toshiba Satellite P750-113 15.6 inch (Intel Core i5-2410M Processor, 2.3 GHz, RAM 6GB, HDD 640GB, Windows7 Home Premium, Harman Kardon speakers, Bluetooth, Blu-ray, Graphics Card) Graphics Card Description: NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 540M
Graphics RAM Type: DDR3 SDRAM
Graphics Card Ram Size: 1 GB

HP DV6-3119SA 15.6" Notebook (Intel Core i5 2.53Ghz, 4GB Ram, 500GB HDD, Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit) Graphics Card Description: ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5470
Graphics RAM Type: DDR3 SDRAM
Graphics Card Ram Size: 512 MB

HP Pavilion dv6-6153ea Notebook PC (Intel Core i5-2410M 2.3 GHz, RAM 4GB, HDD 750GB, Windows 7 Home Premium) Graphics Card Description: AMD Radeon HD 6490M
Graphics RAM Type: DDR3 SDRAM
Graphics Card Ram Size: 1 GB

Sony Vaio VPCCB2M0E/B.CEK C-Series 15.5 Inch Notebook (Intel Core i5 2.3GHz Processor, RAM 6GB, HDD 640GB) Graphics Card Description: AMD Radeon HD6470M
Graphics RAM Type: DDR3 SDRAM
Graphics Card Ram Size: 512 MB

Acer Aspire 5750G 15.6 inch Notebook (Intel Core i5-2410M Processor, 6 GB RAM, 750 GB HDD, nVIDIA GeForce GT 540M, Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit) Graphics Card Description: NVIDIA GeForce GT 540M
Graphics RAM Type: Unknown
Graphics Card Ram Size: 1 GB

Samsung RC520 15.6 inch Notebook (Intel Core i5 2410M 2.3GHz, RAM 6GB, HDD 750GB, DVD SuperMulti DL, WLAN, BT, Webcam, Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit Graphics Card Description: NVIDIA GeForce GT 520M (Optimus)
Graphics RAM Type: DDR3 SDRAM
Graphics Card Ram Size: 1 GB

Samsung RV511 15.6 inch notebook (Intel Core i5 480M 2.66GHz, 6Gb, 640Gb, DVDRW, WLAN, Win 7 Home Premium) Graphics Card Description: NVIDIA GeForce 315M

thanks to anyone that looks through this - too many decisions here!
 
Well i suppose the important question is what do you want it for? If it is just to browse porn on the move then get the cheapest if you want it for games then..................
 
need it for things like autocad/little 3d work, no games as such - i had another thread asking for recommendations for the uses but no one came up with a suggestion so figured putting a list of things i've found might get some more input
 
The Satellite or the Aspire because they have the best graphics cards.

Choose between them based on the screen resolution and the built quality, and price of course.
 
budget is somewhere between 600-800 quid, don't really want to go over that - i've not bought a laptop for a while, so wasn't sure of graphics were decent, i think with my needs a dedicated graphics card is a good idea, just a shame i can't actually find any laptops i actually like the looks of!

just found this:
Acer Aspire Ethos 5943G
Intel® Core™ i7-740QM Quad Core Processor, 15.6" HD Screen, Windows 7 Home Premium Edition 64-bit, 8GB DDR3 RAM, 640GB HDD, Blu-Ray Writer, Dedicated 2GB ATI 5850 Graphics
(only 20 quid over budget, might be worth a punt?)
 
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One piece of advice that I forgot earlier is to be sure not to get lumbered with a 13** x 768 because they are rubbish.

The DELL outlet is also fast becoming a standard recommendation, this is for a reason: they have some fantastically good deals. I am typing this from my bargain high-spec laptop ;) There are numerous threads around to learn how it works.

and to see which laptop graphics are best:
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark-List.844.0.html
 
yeah, i've seen that site before for comparing the graphics, i'm just unsure what benchmark is the one i should be paying attention to!
it's annoying having to do this all on the internet and not being able to actually see them or poke about at them, maybe i'll just have to organise a trip to the big smoke and have a gander!
 
Unless you're right out in the sticks there's likely to be a well known "planet of computers" near you where you can have a poke at a few.
 
the_r_sole said:
yeah, i've seen that site before for comparing the graphics, i'm just unsure what benchmark is the one i should be paying attention to!
it's annoying having to do this all on the internet and not being able to actually see them or poke about at them, maybe i'll just have to organise a trip to the big smoke and have a gander!
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Toshiba Satellite P750-113 15.6 inch (Intel Core i5-2410M Processor, 2.3 GHz, RAM 6GB, HDD 640GB, Windows7 Home Premium, Harman Kardon speakers, Bluetooth, Blu-ray, Graphics Card) Graphics Card Description: NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 540M
Graphics RAM Type: DDR3 SDRAM
Graphics Card Ram Size: 1 GB

Best one on the list and you can get the 3 year warranty direct from toshiba uk for circa £50 if they still have the offer on. 5-6hr battery life iirc.

Is this laptop business critical, i.e. if it goes down you are in trouble or do you have a spare machine?

Most of those machines in the list are home laptops esp the HP Pavilions and I wouldn't want to run one as a business machine. I would not buy an acer either for business use either no matter how goood the specs seem to be.

For work based productivity, you should look at the HP ProBooks etc or Lenovo Thinkpads. Certainly with the HP business machines, their business support is much better than home support.

I have just got an HP ProBook 4320s. The build quality is better than any of the alternatives I looked at in sub £600 bracket as you get a metal lid, palm rest and a host of HP business tools. The ProBook 4530 (i5 + dedicated ati 6470 graphics) looks good for the money as this is the latest model albeit in a 15” (mines a 13”). You can get the 3 year warranty off ebay for £13-£16 at the moment. Otherwise you could look at a Lenovo Thinkpad Edge E520 (i5 + dedicated ati 6330 graphics which isn’t bad for gaming). Both of these are sub £600 and if you need a rock solid laptop for business use then my money would be going here.

If you want a more powerful gaming machine, buy the Toshiba but it comes in at circa £750 afaik.

I wouldn't worry about screen res despite what disco boy says, as a much better option is just to buy a 22" monitor as an external esp if doing cad / graphics as a 15" whatever the res is small for this, unless you are never going to be at your desk
 
As mrk1@1 says, the Toshiba P750-113 here is the best bet.

Just an FYI, you get the same tools on the ProBook as you would with any other HP branded laptop. There is no specific HP business software on the laptops they produce. Also, buy any laptop from a reseller, even HP themselves, and unless you buy business support or are a corporate customer, you'll end up with standard home user support, which isn't that bad, just don't use their forums. :)
 
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cheers for the replies - the laptop needs to be reasonably solid, it's going to be used for going out to meetings etc, i have a good desktop in the office, so it will definitelty be a secondary machine, don't want a rubbish one tho!!

tbh, the first thing i'm likely to do is do a fresh install of windows, any branded laptop i've owned has been full of rubbish software, so the hardware is priority here
 
Lucero said:
As mrk1@1 says, the Toshiba P750-113 here is the best bet.

Just an FYI, you get the same tools on the ProBook as you would with any other HP branded laptop. There is no specific HP business software on the laptops they produce. Also, buy any laptop from a reseller, even HP themselves, and unless you buy business support or are a corporate customer, you'll end up with standard home user support, which isn't that bad, just don't use their forums. :)
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Different contact details for home and business, albeit it may go through to the same call centre? http://www8.hp.com/uk/en/contact-hp/phone-assist.html. I have had to deal with support a couple of times already and its been pretty rapid. Also the HP security tools on this pro-book don't come on the home HP Pavilion DV6 notebooks etc which I have tried in the shops and I have had a look on their site and don't see the downloads for them.

Dell business and home are different too and from experience, their business support is much improved over home, esp if you have the extended next day warranties.

The one thing that puts me off the dell XPS systems are the cost of the warranties esp compared to the business systems.

the_r_sole said:
cheers for the replies - the laptop needs to be reasonably solid, it's going to be used for going out to meetings etc, i have a good desktop in the office, so it will definitelty be a secondary machine, don't want a rubbish one tho!!

tbh, the first thing i'm likely to do is do a fresh install of windows, any branded laptop i've owned has been full of rubbish software, so the hardware is priority here
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Please please please, do not turn up to client meetings with a nice glossy, curvey, fluffy home laptop, you want to look proper pro;):D:p Dell Latitude, HP Probook, Lenovo Thinkpad are where its at. This means angular lines, slim profiles and matt screens and lids.

Meaker said:
If you want it to do any real CAD then you really need to pony up for a propper mobile workstation.
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I could manage the full AutoCAD Civil 3D suite on my older Lenovo G555, anything with an i3 above and intel HD 3000 grpahics or better will do the job just fine. As long as you have 6-8GB memory you will be fine.
 
yeah, i do prefer the looks of the business laptops, just thought a multimedia home one would give me more bang for buck with graphics/screens etc- although in meetings i think the look if the laptop won't be thing that gives the impression of not looking like a pro!!
 
mrk1@1 said:
Different contact details for home and business, albeit it may go through to the same call centre? http://www8.hp.com/uk/en/contact-hp/phone-assist.html. I have had to deal with support a couple of times already and its been pretty rapid. Also the HP security tools on this pro-book don't come on the home HP Pavilion DV6 notebooks etc which I have tried in the shops and I have had a look on their site and don't see the downloads for them.
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Yeah, it's the same place. Also, the Hp Protect tools are available for all laptops, not just ProBooks. They aren't hardware linked. There is even a page dedicated to just the HP security tools which all can download for if you need them. They are just part of the ProBook core image, but in reality, are more often than not just junk, LOL :p
 
can anyone tell me what the difference is between the pro book 4530s and the 6560b is?
having a look at these in detail, but there's little info on the screens etc, so i can match up the prcessors and ram, the 4530 has 640hd @ 5400 and the 6560b has 500gb at 7200 - 4530 has AMD Radeon HD 6490M with 1 GB dedicated GDDR5 video memory and 6560 has AMD Radeon HD 6470M with 512 MB dedicated DDR3 video memory - it's a minefield here!! the 4350 is 180 quid cheaper so where is the money?
 
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