Buying a laptop

[gigksrc]

This will be a no brainer for any of you who have any speckle of a computer nerd brain but ...........
Where I am living I have survived so far with an old style TV that only picks up 3 stations
& no computer
Well almost no computer. I have an old laptop that I watch DVDs on but it takes forever to fire up & plays up all through the movie (maybe that's me).
Anyway I am contemplating buying a new flash laptop & get internet access that doesn't cost gazillions of $ (the internet access not the laptop).
So what do I buy?
I know you are all computer geeks so give me some useful advice.

[mick_dundee]

Buy the Green Guide (in the Melbourne Age) next Thursday and do some research, in the end I bought my laptop from a joint in Burgundy rd Heidelberg. As for the internet, how fast and how much of it do you want? http://www.broadbandchoice.com.au might be your best bet gig. I run ADSL 2 at home for $50 a month and mobile broadband for the laptop at $15 a month, both considered broadband but vastly different products, kinda like comparing Kawasaki to a Honda really, no comparison at all.

[gigksrc]

I dont have a home phone connected so will just be internet through the laptop whatevery ..........
Dont need to access too much on the internet as I am not working from home any more.
Joined the slave trade in the city.

[MrWasabi]

You don't need to have a home phone to have Internet. You can either get cable or naked adsl and your standard wireless broadband.

As far as laptop goes the entry model laptops from any big manufacturer being sold recently will meet your demands quite well. Don't let the blood sucking salesman talk you into some flashy shit that you won't ever use. Sticking to entry models will save you money and give you what you are after: a pc to watch DVDs and browse websites.

[Smitty]

.

As far as laptop goes the entry model laptops from any big manufacturer being sold recently will meet your demands quite well. Don't let the blood sucking salesman talk you into some flashy shit that you won't ever use. Sticking to entry models will save you money and give you what you are after: a pc to watch DVDs and browse websites.

+1...spot on

both the missus (who Gig knows) and I did that...around about $800 (before cashback)
gave us a Compaq (her) and HP (me) notebook....decent size hard disk, 2 gb ram, reasonable processor
can burn/read DVDs, plenty of USB ports (and the salesman thru in a outside backup USB drive for nix)
browse the net (easy peasy) and run Office apps...sweet

The only extra (which I argued for and got free also) is ...a USB mouse
(I am all thumbs and elbows with them shitty little notebook touchpads)


hth

[seiko1]

Don't go buying any software, I got loads
Extra ram cheap as chips, flashdrives, mouses etc

[Neilp]

Gig before you commit to buy a way to save some money is decide what you want, then look at buying online. Dell, HP can be bought directly saving you quite a lot as they often have specials etc. I suggest a brand name laptop,as the quality is nearly always better, and they can offer support. Windows 7 is prefferable to Vista.


Neil

[seiko1]

Gig before you commit to buy a way to save some money is decide what you want, then look at buying online. Dell, HP can be bought directly saving you quite a lot as they often have specials etc. I suggest a brand name laptop,as the quality is nearly always better, and they can offer support. Windows 7 is prefferable to Vista.


Neil

Windows 98 is also preferable to Vista

[Neilp]

Gig before you commit to buy a way to save some money is decide what you want, then look at buying online. Dell, HP can be bought directly saving you quite a lot as they often have specials etc. I suggest a brand name laptop,as the quality is nearly always better, and they can offer support. Windows 7 is prefferable to Vista.


Neil

Windows 98 is also preferable to Vista

Maybe but you cant run many of todays apps on it!!!!!!!!!!!

[wullieb1]

Gig before you commit to buy a way to save some money is decide what you want, then look at buying online. Dell, HP can be bought directly saving you quite a lot as they often have specials etc. I suggest a brand name laptop,as the quality is nearly always better, and they can offer support. Windows 7 is prefferable to Vista.


Neil

Windows 98 is also preferable to Vista

Christ ME is preferable to Vista lol.

Buy the best laptop you can afford with the budget you have.

Just as an add-in have a look through the Dell Outlet for some bargains.

I picked up a top of the range laptop last year for a third less than i could buy it from the main store.

[Jonno]

dont listen to these geeks

[B-Ry]

In the defence of Vista. I hate to disagree with everyone (well ok so honestly I love to disagree with everyong but...) Vista was a very good operating system, it shat all over XP, if you knew what you were doing. With Vista my computers ran much quicker, more stable and the look and feel of the operating system was great. I like Windows 7 now that it has been released, however for the non initiated Microsoft decided to copy Mac with the Task bar. That took me about 5 minutes to literally hack the system to look the same way as Vista.

[seiko1]

The entire Planet disagrees with you about Vista............it wouldn't be History otherwise! Vista SUX

[B-Ry]

Funny that. I have this conversation with a number of people, including my old GM of IT. For months I kept on telling him that the thing that made Vista crap was its forced user security. If you have a brain you can disable all the stuff that was bad. He decides to give Vista a go. First day his response was "Vista's crap" second day "Nothing great about this" then on the third day "Vista's great, once you get rid of the crap its great!". So having said that, the fact that it is only good if you understand what its doing would suggest yes it is a crap operating system, and I agree with that. But as far as the operating systems itself very much a better setup.

[Stereo]

The reason why vista is crap is because the industry never really supported it...
How many printers/scanners/etc still dont have drivers. There is still loads of software out that that has not had a patch made for VIsta.

I work for an IT company and the reason we dont deploy it normally is because of bad industry support.

All in all it is not a bad operating system by itself, after SP1 came out it was fairly stable. Windows7 is just Vista in a prettier package with all the user security off by default