Laptop Purchasing Help

I have had a Sony Vaio Desktop for 10 years, and it has been great. Not sure how their laptops are though.
 
I have about 50 GB of Music, that is about it, and some personal finance software.

They are 500 GB usually with a free upgrade to 640 or 1TB online with HP

HP laptops have been problems for me...my duaghter' was rebuilt 3 times in two years. Mine had three trip to the repair depot in the first 6 months. Cheap...you get what you pay for.

Fixed it. They have been problems for you not the other 500 million people. What models did you buy?

500GB is plenty for on-board storage. You could always buy an external if you need it.

You got it.

My HP is still working great *knock on wood*, but I've only had it for about four months.

Which model did you get?
 
When it comes to laptops, I think price range is generally a more important indicator of reliability than brand name. The cheap ones are cheap because they were made from inferior parts - that's how (using an extreme example) places like Walmart and Best Buy are able to sell $200 laptops the day after Thanksgiving. Combine the inferior parts with the added abuse a laptop is going to sustain from being moved around a lot, and the generally poor ventilation that nearly all laptops have (heat + computer = bad) and you have a recipe for failure.
 
When it comes to laptops, I think price range is generally a more important indicator of reliability than brand name. The cheap ones are cheap because they were made from inferior parts - that's how (using an extreme example) places like Walmart and Best Buy are able to sell $200 laptops the day after Thanksgiving. Combine the inferior parts with the added abuse a laptop is going to sustain from being moved around a lot, and the generally poor ventilation that nearly all laptops have (heat + computer = bad) and you have a recipe for failure.

I would change that and say 'price range within a company's lineup is generally an indicator of reliability'. There are pricing differences purely different on brand... but you'll get more reliability from a $600 HP than you will a $300 one, generally. Same with anything else you buy.That doesnt mean you'll have more reliability just because you pay $1200 instead of $600 though across brands.
 
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They are 500 GB usually with a free upgrade to 640 or 1TB online with HP



Fixed it. They have been problems for you not the other 500 million people. What models did you buy?



You got it.



Which model did you get?

DV6 Quad
 
Cy4Pat...

DV5 and DV6 are the two with problems for me. Screen, mother board and wireless were bad/intermitent bad. The HP folks said it was normal:twitcy:.
 
The HP I owned was an outright piece of junk. GPU burned out. Okay, that was an industry-wide problem, but unlike the rest of the computer companies in the industry that fixed the problem outside of warranty, HP required you to extend your warranty or pay the full price in getting it fixed. Junk laptops with even worse customer service and repair policies are not a way to run a company (I owned a dv7000t).

I've owned this Toshiba Qosmio for about 2 months, but I'm already a big fan of it. This thing is a beast - Intel i7, NVIDIA 460m, 6GB of RAM (that I do plan on upgrading to 8GB eventually). Cost $1200. Toshiba tends to have a wide variety of laptops and almost always rates higher on consumer reviews that I have seen than HP.

But the biggest thing - this Toshiba does not get hot. I mean, not at all. Where my HP left scorch marks on my left leg from the exhaust (before I knew to keep it on a cooling pad), there isn't a single area on this Toshiba that gets too hot to touch.
 
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Is 4GB RAM enough to stream things shows/movies from the internet? What type of Video Card should I look at?
 
1. Don't bu an HP
2. Don't but an HP
3.If you buy an HP get the mega deluxe service program.


I've had 3 HP laptops in past 5 years. All were terrible. Poor batteries, they run hot, two had fan issues, one had issues with wireless switch. They may have a good processor but the rest is crap.

This.
 
Is 4GB RAM enough to stream things shows/movies from the internet? What type of Video Card should I look at?
You don't need anything fancy to do that. 4GB RAM and the cheapest dedicated video cards on the market are more than capable of streaming video. Before getting an Xbox, I used to stream Netflix to my TV from a laptop with 2GB RAM and Intel integrated graphics.


I would change that and say 'price range within a company's lineup is generally an indicator of reliability'. There are pricing differences purely different on brand... but you'll get more reliability from a $600 HP than you will a $300 one, generally. Same with anything else you buy.That doesnt mean you'll have more reliability just because you pay $1200 instead of $600 though across brands.
That's what I meant, I just didn't state it properly.
 
Sorry folks but I cannot help but giggle as I read this thread. It might be because I am using my antique Compaq Armada M700 that runs flawlessly on Ubuntu 9.10. The price was right too as the computer was given to me because the Windows 98 2nd edition that was installed at the factory was corrupted. I have no idea how old this engineering marvel is and do not care as she just keeps running and running and running.
 

You apparently haven't owned your HP long enough to know just how much it sucks. Once your warranty expires it will crap out on you. And once that happens, good luck getting customer support to help you without first either spending a fortune to extend your warranty or pay full price for reconditioned parts that will only fail months later...♦
 
I just bought a Dell 14z last week. I got the $699 version for $599 on their website. I like it so far. It's super light, the video streaming seems good and it seems studier than my other, bigger, heavier laptop.
 
You apparently haven't owned your HP long enough to know just how much it sucks. Once your warranty expires it will crap out on you. And once that happens, good luck getting customer support to help you without first either spending a fortune to extend your warranty or pay full price for reconditioned parts that will only fail months later...♦

Please, you just need to know how to talk and get someone that can do something about it. I had my last HP for 5 years. The one I have now is going on 3. Oh and I paid 1500 dollars for mine, probably why it has held up. You get what you pay for. You spend 400 bucks what do you expect?
 
Speaking of new computers, I have a situation. I ordered my computer a few weeks ago and it arrived last week. Fed Ex tried delivering it, but after I wasn't home that day they held it at the store and I picked it up a week ago. The box was addressed to me, but after opening it, I noticed that there was no packing slip and there wasn't any sort of paperwork in the box (invoice, etc). I didn't think a whole lot of it, but I ran into a minor problem with the battery (which I figured out) so I went on the Dell website and logged into my account. My account still showed my computer 'in production' and estimated delivery date of November 5. Still didn't think a whole lot of it and figured there was some lag time. And I couldn't enter in computer number into the website. However, I just checked my credit card statement and I haven't been charged for the computer yet (the computer I am currently posting on) and it still shows my computer hasn't shipped yet and is in production.

So now I am thinking that maybe I will be getting another computer in the next few days. And the lack of any documentation on the one I am currently using might make the situation a little more complicated.
 
Please, you just need to know how to talk and get someone that can do something about it. I had my last HP for 5 years. The one I have now is going on 3. Oh and I paid 1500 dollars for mine, probably why it has held up. You get what you pay for. You spend 400 bucks what do you expect?

I paid $1200+ for mine, so don't break out that "you get what you pay for" bull**** with me. Go look at the HP message board sometime - nothing but unresolved problems.

And yeah, my GPU burned out (actually it fried my motherboard), and it was an industry-wide problem. But HP was the only manufacturer in the entire industry that refused to fix the problem outside of warranty. And when someone would submit to the purchasing the extended warranty scam just to get HP to work with you, it was with refurbished parts that also burned out 3 months later.

HP= the worst customer support in the entire industry. After trying to deal with them I will never buy another HP product again.
 

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