Laptop is DOA; suggestions?

I have an older Dell laptop unit that until last week did everything I ever needed. My son bought it when he went to college, he got a BFA 3 years ago. Yeah my neighbor/computer guru calls it a dinosaur but I can live with that.

Photobucket and some other sites I use are being blocked at work, luckily they think the G in GRM is something government but it puts more responsibility on my home unit.

So whadda ya think? Pig in a poke, site unseen buy a used one? I'm not computer literate enough to know if I'm getting boned and I don't use it enough to justify a brandy new one. We remodeled a room upstairs and the whole "computer desk" with a big tower unit and monitor has moved down the road; a laptop sits nicely on the coffee table and does it all for me.

Dan

http://albany.craigslist.org/sys/1194395673.html

http://albany.craigslist.org/sys/1192687898.html

well.... $400 will buy a brand new compaq from wally world.

$300 will buy a brand new netbook.

with warranties.

I'm not a fan of buying used laptops.

Somewhat the same dilemma here. I'm going for a new lappy. The notebooks I've seen are too small-I need the really big large font edition. I've seen decent laptops for $325-400 that will do everything I need and then some. I watch DVDs on the 55" TV or at the theater, music on the mp3 or satellite radio. The computer is basically some work documents, househol stuff, surfin' and mailing. But then I'm a simple man with simple needs.

This should be a big weekend for laptops to be advertised what with Highschool grads having some gift money they are looking to spend.
This Sunday morning, get up early and get the paper. Look over the ads and find the best deal then plan on being at the store when they open because the good deals will be in limited quantity.

Aside from the obvious (and somewhat evil), Best Buy, also check into Staples and OfficeDepot.

If the newspaper is not your thing, all of these retailers place there ads on their website Sunday morning as well.

Sure, some people have their favorite brands but I suspect that any of these new models will serve your needs very well and perform no worse (likely better) than used equipment while costing just lightly more (and likely presenting a better value.)

Netbooks are this new type of Mini-Laptop. They are positioned as the price leaders but they are often very small (read too small for a lot of use) and have no CD/DVD drive. Typical screen size of 7-10"

True Laptops can typically be found for just $100 more than netbooks and provide better screen and keyboard sizes as well as CD/DVD drives. True Laptops typically have a 14.1" screen or larger.

A true laptop typically serves much better for a person who wants desktop capabilities in a smaller size. A netbook typically serves well a person who wants to travel a lot with their computer and finds a laptop too balky for moving around.

Acer netbook with XP $260 EDLP (Every Day Low Price) at Wally World. For home use, plug in a USB keyboard and a monitor if you want and you're set.

Of the two the first one looks like a great deal. You will not be able to find anything with those specs for close to that price, if it really has a warrenty I snap that one up.

When looking at laptops I would try and get one that has NVIDIA or ATI graphics, the machine will perform better. But of course that is my opinion and your money.

These computer prices make me sick. When I was i college, I had to sell my car so I could afford a computer. With the printer and other stuff, I paid over $2500. In 1995.

I'm with GRTechGuy... laptops are built to be small and light, which means they're relatively fragile. Then they get bumped around way more than a desktop. No way would I buy a used one, unless it was some factory refurb deal, with a really good warranty.

Honestly, for what you're describing the cheapy Acer at Wally World would probably work fine.

I'd recommend one with XP rather than Vista, if possible, and downloading and using Firefox or Chrome rather than Internet Explorer. Grab OpenOffice for your office needs (free) and you're more or less set.

+1 wally world special sounds like a good deal

Get one of those Dell mini9 netbooks and put mac osx on it. You won't regret it.

Brust wrote: Get one of those Dell mini9 netbooks and put mac osx on it. You won't regret it.

That's what I currently use, and I love it.

For more "mainstream" notebooks, WallyWorld either has now or will have this weekend a 17" screen laptop for under $400. Look around slickdeals.net, techbargains.com and fatwallet.com's deal forum for a broad look at what's currently the best deals in computers (any anything else, frankly).

I just ordered an MSI Wind netbook yesterday, $300. I love the idea of a netbook and they came around at the right time for me, it will be used for tuning/datalogging in the car and surfing, email, youtube when I am away from home. It's replacing an ancient win98 Pentium 166 NEC versa laptop with 48mb of ram and 3 gig hard drive that I couldn't get .NET to install on to be able to use with the JAW kit I finally got around to building. That was the last straw, it was pretty painful to use anyway. It was already outdated when I bought it cheap 8 years ago on e-bay so I guess it doesn't owe me anything.

Brust wrote: Get one of those Dell mini9 netbooks and put mac osx on it. You won't regret it.

I barely touch my Macbook Pro now after getting my hackintosh. I sort of feel bad for the MBP, it's a great computer but not nearly as couch-friendly as the Mini9 :).

My wife has a 10" netbook for an email/surfing celebrity gossip/Amazon/iTunes machine. She loves it because of the size. One nice thing about the netbooks is that they come with XP instead of Vista.

When buying a laptop, I'd recommend going with a laptop specialty maker like Toshiba. I've seen too many troublesome Dells, while my Toshiba is bombproof. Of course, now that I've said that, it's probably going to set my crotch on fire tonight. No wait, that's the Mac...

Keith wrote: My wife has a 10" ... it's probably going to set my crotch on fire tonight.

Is this what "quoting out of context" means?

I recently had to replace my laptop. Most of the stuff in the 300-500 range feels like it is made out of cardboard. I was not impressed. They have more chassis flex than a fox body mustang and the keyboards feel like they are mounted in jello. I ended up with a Sony Vaio in the 800 range. It was the only one I could find that I thought would last. The wife has an Acer that is less than a year old and she has already cracked the screen. The only structure in the top is the glass. Got mine from Best Buy. It's been a great machine so far.

My Acer Aspire One is nice, and I bought it used. The price was right, and more importantly, the timing was too.

It's a bit thick, and the fan is LOUD AS E36 M3.

I'm replacing it with whatever Lenovo or Toshiba have come out with by December.

Lenovo and Toshiba are the end all of laptops.

Keith wrote: My wife has a 10" netbook for an email/surfing celebrity gossip/Amazon/iTunes machine. She loves it because of the size. One nice thing about the netbooks is that they come with XP instead of Vista. When buying a laptop, I'd recommend going with a laptop specialty maker like Toshiba. I've seen too many troublesome Dells, while my Toshiba is bombproof. Of course, now that I've said that, it's probably going to set my crotch on fire tonight. No wait, that's the Mac...

What toshiba do you have? cause the F50-q551 I have kind of blows, it's tempermental like if I grab it the wrong way it'll shut itself down. It's a great machine otherwise, kind of a 15.4 desktop replacement.

My wifes compaq is pretty nice though, not the fastest machine but near bullet proof for 500 beans.

I bought my wife a Lenovo S10 netbook and she loves it. It's not spec'd as high as the Acer and Asus at the same pricepoint, but it had a matte screen, which was a dealbreaker for her. We've taken that thing everywhere with us. It gets tossed in her purse with her cell phone and whatever else she decides to bring. I've dropped it a few times, she's dropped it a few times, and it still runs fine. If you're looking for a netbook, I'd take a look at that model. If you're looking for a full notebook, try an off-lease Lenovo ThinkPad from Tigerdirect. That's what I'd replace this laptop with if I needed to get one tomorrow.

Osterkraut wrote: Lenovo and Toshiba are the end all of laptops.

Yes, +1. My old Toshiba Satellite is still soldering on after about 4 years of solid use. I've also got a 'Durabook', which has a special, rugged, shock-proof case. It's neither small nor light, but I reckon it would probably survive a volcanic eruption, or at least a coffee spill.

My laptop is a Toshiba Satellite A 105 S4084 alphabet soup model that's about three years old, I think. I don't think laptop makers sell more than two copies before they change the model number. It's a solid piece of kit. My only complaint is that it's time for a new battery, but that's easy enough to sort out.

Depending on the computer, it might be an easy fix. I've rebuilt my laptop a few times because its a good platform. It has 2g memory, a 250g HD, and a good pentium mobile processor. When something dies I just find a cheap replacement on ebay or CL. I found a guy selling 320g IDE drives for $25 each, and I bought a 20g laptop IDE drive for $4.95 at the goodwill computer center with a warranty. I spilled soda on it once and fried the keyboard, but brand new ones can be found on Ebay for $15.

Eventually it will be so outclassed that upgrading will be required, but if it works well, keep it and fix it. I view computers like cars... I don't sell my E30 every time it needs spark plugs. Something breaks, fix it until it becomes too much of a money pit or you want to upgrade to something else.

And now my BRAND new toshiba bites the dust again. Freaking thing is like the Alfa Romeo of the computer world. Since this is a huge issue with this computer, do yuo think I should insist on a replacement of equal specs? They stopped producing this laptop after a VERY short while, makes me wonder.

Best Buy just sent me this...Toshiba laptops starting at $349.00

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?_dyncharset=ISO-8859-1&id=pcmcat138500050001&type=category&usc=abcat0500000&cp=1&sp=%2Bcurrentprice+skuid&nrp=15&qp=crootcategoryid%23%23-1%23%23-1~~q2a~~cabcat0500000%23%23d%23%231i8~~ncabcat0502000%23%234%23%2328&p&ref=36&loc=40