New Laptop

sansnom · 11 Oct 2008 at 12:39

Hey guys

My brother in-law has asked me to find a laptop for him, but I don't know jack about them to be honest. I figured I'd ask here and see what you chaps are going for right now.

He's looking to spend a max of around £800-£1000.

It's mainly for office, web browsing and the occassional multimedia. Maybe the odd game here and there, probably something like C&C so it doesn't need to have a high end GPU.

4GB Ram would be good, also 300+GB HDD, and needs to be rock solid for work. Very reliable etc.

Any suggestions?

Thanks

Shadows1990 · 11 Oct 2008 at 12:57

Definitely take a look at the OCUK Custom Range.
If that doesn't take your fancy, try other custom laptop resellers in the UK; Kobalt, Rock, ******** to name a few.

bigredshark · 11 Oct 2008 at 13:07

I'd say thats bad advice if you're looking for something very reliable. Stick with the big names..Dell, HP etc. Their failure rates are pretty low and if you do have a problem then it'll get replaced in a reasonable timeframe. You never quite know what you're getting with the cheap custom resellers whereas the big names sell huge numbers or each model and problems get noticed pretty quick.

Dell Studio might be worth a look...

sansnom · 11 Oct 2008 at 13:10

bigredshark said:
I'd say thats bad advice if you're looking for something very reliable. Stick with the big names..Dell, HP etc. Their failure rates are pretty low and if you do have a problem then it'll get replaced in a reasonable timeframe. You never quite know what you're getting with the cheap custom resellers whereas the big names sell huge numbers or each model and problems get noticed pretty quick.

Dell Studio might be worth a look...

I agree, he'd be more inclined to go for a big name than a custom maker.

What's generally considered the best of the best right now? It used to be the IBM Thinkpads but as everyone knew you were paying a little more for reliability and your specs always lagged the market a little.

bigredshark · 11 Oct 2008 at 17:50

God knows, read a few reviews of the new Dell Latitude, they look good for the money...

We tend to use HP, good machines and reliable but aside from the expensive ultraportables, they're not very light and maybe a bit plasticy (solid build though, just not that appealing)

Lenovo are still solid as IBM always were, still as deeply unfasionable and still have great keyboards.

Thats the big three really, samsung might be worth a look these days. Toshiba definately aren't any more (except maybe the R500/R600 which I still like a lot despite the worrying flex on the screen...)