spec me a shiny new laptop

tom_e · 26 Feb 2008 at 20:14

Well my laptop has just given up the ghost and by the time ive sourced the parts and spent time fitting them its a better idea just to get a nice new one.

Ive been looking at a Vostro 1500 with this spec:-

OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows Vista® Business - English
SUPPORT SERVICES 1Yr Basic Warranty - Next Business Day Included - No Upgrade Selected
LCD 15.4" Wide Screen WXGA+ (1440 x 900) Display with TrueLife™
INTEGRATED WEBCAM Matte Jet Black without Camera
MEMORY 2048MB 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM (2x1024)
HARD DRIVE 120GB (5400rpm) SATA Hard Drive
GRAPHICS CARD 128MB nVidia® GeForce® 8400M GS
OPTICAL DRIVE Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive
PRIMARY BATTERY Primary 6-cell Lithium-Ion Battery (56 WHr)

Which comes in at £433

Is there anything else that will give me a similar spec for the cash? Ive got a top budget of around £500

fish99 · 26 Feb 2008 at 21:47

Looks good, the Vostro 1500s are good value IMO. If you're going to be gaming on it at all might want to go for the 8600M GT. CPU spec is missing btw. What are the intended uses?

radderfire · 26 Feb 2008 at 21:54

What processor does it have?

Dell's are difficult to beat on price. Other manufacturers will be more expensive but HP and Toshiba might be worth a look.

tom_e · 26 Feb 2008 at 22:05

That was with the 1.6 c2d, I use my laptop for pretty much everything from web browsing, video watching, encoding, programing and light gaming.
The spec of my last one was a 1.7 pentium m centrino with 1gb of ram and a nvidia 5200go so anything will be a good improvement.
Ive just had another play and using the same spec as above but adding a 2.0 c2d and the 8600m, do you think its worth the extra £100 bringing the total price to £533.
Im considering grabbing an extended 9 cell battery from an online retalier as dell dont seem to offer it when customising

fish99 · 26 Feb 2008 at 22:59

Depends on the games TBH. If it's WOW or Sims 2 then the 8400 will be fine, if it's EP2, Oblivion, COD4 etc then go for the 8600, it'll even run Crysis on modest settings.

Worth thinking about XP too.