Quick comparison/value check-up

ZingZhang

ZingZhang

ZingZhang

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Joined
1 Mar 2011
Posts
4
[x] Tl;dr,

Hey guys, appreciate that I'm new here but I'd appreciate it if I could get some help here. I've been browsing the forum this week as I badly need a new laptop and have kinda fallen out of touch with what's current in terms of laptop technology and though I've picked up a couple of tips, not enough that I'm happy spending a few hundred £'s almost 'blind'.

Weird, cause this was all second nature a couple of years ago!

I essentially need something which is quick and capable of handling large database's and all that goes with that without any trouble, decent quality.... decent HDD speed is prob important here I suppose.

I'd like something solid but realise compromises may have to be made to get something sub-£500 ish. I won't be playing any graphic intensive games at all so we can kinda disregard that. A 17 in screen would be a huge bonus but not essential.

Any input on which of these represents the best value/best for my needs or other suggestions would be fantastic and really welcomed, cheers!

Around £400, this is by far the cheapest i5 I've found, I can't really spot where the compromises have been made though, other than HDD size and poss quality?


Processor Intel® Core™ i5 Dual Core (450M, 3MB Cache, 2.4GHz, with Intel Turbo Boost up to 2.66GHz)
Screen 15.6" (Acer CineCrystal, 1366x768 HD, High Brightness)
Operating System Windows 7 Home Premium Edition 64-bit
RAM 3GB (DDR3 1066MHZ)
Hard Drive 320GB
Optical Drive DVD Rewriter (Records DVDs 8x & CDs 24x & Dual Layer Super Multi)
Graphics Integrated (Intel® GMA X4500 3D Graphics with up to 384MB Shared Memory)
Wireless (802.11b/g/n Wireless)
Network Card 10/100/1000 Gigabit Fast Ethernet
Integrated Webcam Integrated Webcam
Card Reader 5-in-1 card reader (SD//MS/MS-Pro/MMC/xD-Picture card™)
USB Ports 4x USB 2.0 Ports
Intergrated Stereo Speakers
Modem 56.6K Modem
VGA Port 1 External VGA Port
Kensington Lock Kensington lock slot
Charge Time 2.5 Hours
1x HDMI Port
Warranty 12 Months Acer Collect & Return
Battery Life 3-4 Hours (This Specific Model 3.5-hours)


This is £50 more but does seem well spec'd too.

Brand: ASUS
Screen size: 15.6 inches
Processor: Intel Core i5
Processor model number: i5-460
Processor speed: 2.53 GHz
Processor cache: 3 MB
Memory (RAM): 4 GB
Storage (hard drive): 500 GB
Storage (hard drive) Type: SATA
Operating system: Windows 7 Home Premium
Wireless networking standard: 802.11b/g
Optical drive: Plays & records CDs and DVDs
Speakers: Stereo (Altec Lansing I believe)
Battery life: 3.5 hours
Laptop weight (kg): 2.62 kg
Supports Double layer & Dual Format +/- recording
Premium Wireless N
Intel Centrino Duo Processor Technology
GPU: Intel GMA X4500MHD

Or: Available with an i3 @429 or an Athalon processor @ £344 with code PCS5 .....is it that much worse than the above :confused:

Processor AMD Athlon™ II X2 P340 Processor
- 2.2 GHz
- 1.8 GHz HT (3600 MT/s)
- 2 x 512 KB L2 Cache
- Dual-core
Operating System Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64-bit
RAM - 4GB installed DDR3 RAM
- Supports up to 4GB maximum RAM
Graphics card Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator 4500M
- up to 1695 MB total available graphics memory
Screen type LCD widescreen
Screen resolution - WXGA
- 1366 x 768
Screen size 15.6"
Screen features - LED backlight
- HP BrightView display
Hard drive 500GB SATA hard drive
 
Last edited:
Yep, that sounds like a good solution and is something that others have suggested too. If I can't do it as an option when purchasing, I'll def do that once it arrives. Thanks for your help. Any opinions on which of these is the best all round package?
 
I would lean towards the middle one you listed; the extra RAM will surely help more than a few extra Mhz on the processor... to be fair though they all look incredibly similar.

Depending on what work you're doing with databases, you could look at setting up a server somewhere (such as, say, Rackspace or Amazon EC2), have that do your dirty work and speak to it only with SSH. I've no idea if that idea would suit you or not - I guess you could give it a go for a month and see how the performance goes.
 
Thanks, the second one is pretty much what I'm going for, still doing some last minute scouting though. Unfortunately your idea wouldn't be so practical for me but it's something I'll keep in mind for the future if anything changes.

Again, this is kinda similar but it's just the top of the range for my budget I guess. A Dell Inspiron N5010 for £400, is this an auto buy....I feel like I might be over-rating Dell here...... :confused: Refurb, obviously.

i5 430 M 2.26GHZ Processor
4096 (2x2048) 1333Mhz DDR3 Dual Channel
320GB 5400RPM Seagate Harddrive
15.6" HD (1366x768) WLED with True Life
Optical Drive 8x DVD+/-RW
Built in Webcam
Dell Bluetooth 365 Card
LCD Back Cover: Mars Black
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium (64 BIT)
 
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