The best sub-£450 laptop?

Dreaded_Cheese · 19 Aug 2008 at 22:35

This weekend I am going to buy a laptop... I don't really know what to get yet, but I am getting one nevertheless. My MAX budget would be £450. I have been looking at the Dell Inspirons, specifically the £469 1720's (a bit over budget), however as I know very little about laptops I would greatly appreciate any help.

Thanks.

Dreaded_Cheese · 20 Aug 2008 at 08:10

The reason I was looking at a 17" sreen was that I want to play games on it and the 15" screen laptops all seem to have intergrated graphics. I don't need the best graphics in the world, but I would like to play stuff like BF2 comfortably. I have seen an inspiron 1720 with a 8600m GS for slightly less than £400, is this good?

Dreaded_Cheese · 20 Aug 2008 at 13:55

Well would a 256MB ATI Mobility RADEON HD 3450 be better, the same, or worse than a 256mb 8600m GS? If better then I may get a Dell Studio 15 instead if an Inspiron 1720 (both around £400).

Dreaded_Cheese · 20 Aug 2008 at 14:47

Herojuana said:
I would think that that ATI card will handle BF2 just fine

Exellent. It's the only game I play, so it NEEDS to be playable.

Dreaded_Cheese · 20 Aug 2008 at 15:26

Tbh I think I will stick with dell- I don't have a large budget, also I need to buy peripherals.
It's hard for me to compare graphics cards- especially graphics cards I don't know anything about.
At the moment, with my current desktop I average 12 FPS in BF2

. This means I die a lot when the FPS drops too low.

Compared to my current desktop:
Intel Celeron D @ 2.9Ghz
760mb ram
and a pathetic x1650pro AGP

What sort of improvement would geting the £400 studio be?

Also with the 8600m problem, is it widespread or just a handful of annoyed people?

Dreaded_Cheese · 20 Aug 2008 at 15:30

Noooooo.... Dell does not include VAT on the products placing the Studio range out of my budget

Back to square 1

Dreaded_Cheese · 20 Aug 2008 at 17:36

I have given up on getting a dell.
Whenever I decide to get something I start with the cheap and cheerful option- in this case an Asus eee, however I kept convincing myself that I needed extras. However after finding all the games (albeit slightly older games) that run on an eee I have changed my mind, deciding it is better to be safe than sorry. So I am buying an eee no matter what anybody says otherwise I will be looking for the 'perfect' laptop forever.
Thanks all for helping me see the error in my ways (otherwise I would have bought a dell).