Laptops

[RCGecko]

I am going off to college here in the fall. and this raises my question. what laptop should i get? i am a senior in high school and i do school online since a lot of people tried picking fights with me for reasons i dont know why. so i decided to just get away from that school completely and finish up at my own pace. i absolutely hate this pc we have, it sucks. its from 2008 and i can barely get my schooling done and i told my teachers the scanner isnt working after countless driver installation and uninstalling. i will be going into the veterinary field to treat exotics. so what sort of hard drive do i need? how much ram? how much to spend? i also do youtube videos.

 

[AX10wannabe]

i have the samsung NP-R540http://www.samsung.com/us/computer/laptops/NP-R540-JA02US-specs


its nice. i dont have a desktop so my laptop is my main computer. i can use my parents desktop if i need to print something off though. its done me well i got it at futureshop and bought the 2 yr warranty deal.. took my tech geek cousin with me so i made sure i didnt get some POS. it does everything i need it to..:mrgreen: it ran me about 600 bucks, then another 140 bucks for the warranty then plus tax came out to like 796 bucks or something...

has:
-windows 7
-usual windows programs
-cd/dvd player tray thingy
-3 USB ports
-built-in webcam
-cd/dvd burner

etc...

 

[RCGecko]

seems pretty nice. im more of an hp sort of guy and i calculated my work hours and i will be getting around $360 ish give or take a few dollars. plus i will need about $400 from the bank. who knows maybe ill do video game montages.

 

[losikid]

seems pretty nice. im more of an hp sort of guy and i calculated my work hours and i will be getting around $360 ish give or take a few dollars. plus i will need about $400 from the bank. who knows maybe ill do video game montages.

Don't get an HP, they are piles of...

Whats your budget?

If you just going to be surfing the web and doing homework (typing papers) i'd look into a chromebook.

But if you plan on playing software games, running other software (photo editing, video editing, CAD, etc) then you'll need a high end laptop and it'll be price, looking upwards towards a grand

Stay away from HP and Compaq

 

[RCGecko]

never thought of it that way. my budget would be like $700 tops

 

[binaryterror]

Don't get an HP, they are piles of...

Agreed x100000000

If you need it for school, do not buy a Chromebook. They lack the ability to run programs that almost all colleges want you to run. Some schools push PC/Windows only, some push a mix, and some push Mac. You need to find out what the school you are going to is pressing.

Once you know what you need and will work best for school, then we can give proper advice.

 

[JeremyH]

There should be a Microcenter in Chicago....head on down there and test drive a few. "thumbsup"

 

[Charlie-III]

Agreed x100000000

If you need it for school, do not buy a Chromebook. They lack the ability to run programs that almost all colleges want you to run. Some schools push PC/Windows only, some push a mix, and some push Mac. You need to find out what the school you are going to is pressing.

Once you know what you need and will work best for school, then we can give proper advice.

Yep, check to see what your school supports/recommends/requires.....would suck to have to buy 2 laptops.

 

[RCGecko]

i will be going to UW parkside here in Wisconsin. and just a heads up here i hate mac books to death. i hate apple computers in general.

 

[TexasSP]

Dollar for dollar it's hard to beat a Lenovo Thinkpad. They don't have the design pizzazz of other machines but they are solid and come with good components. You can buy a nice model with MS Office Home and Student for well within your budget.

Microcenter usually has a good selection of them as well.

 

[binaryterror]

i will be going to UW parkside here in Wisconsin. and just a heads up here i hate mac books to death. i hate apple computers in general.

Thats fine, your school might not feel the same. You need to do research, give them a call to be safe.

Dollar for dollar it's hard to beat a Lenovo Thinkpad.

One the the best out right now for sure. I wouldn't hesitate to buy a Lenovo.

 

[Charlie-III]

IBM Thinkpads I love....not too sure on a Lenovo....again, make sure you don't run into "non-supported" issues with your school.......;-)

 

[RCGecko]

okay everyone, i just talked to a few of my co-workers since a lot of them go to UW Parkside and they said it doesn't really matter what type of laptop you get. Just as long as it can do word documents and has a good sum of memory. but i usually go based upon reviews online. i have read the lenovos aren't too good and the customer support is quite bad. not trying to bash on the lenovo users here.

 

[Krakker]

Don't get an HP, they are piles of...

Thats funny, I'm typing on my brand new aluminum cased HP and it smells just fine. Just got it yesturday, thing is crazy for gaming and music. Whats the big deal? I got a Toshiba thats not nearly as good as this one. BeatsAudio and all.
I think it boils down to price and function. this one will be my main LPTP for school, very portable (meaning right sized) and plenty of bling for the buck.

I say get what you want, but at least check out some reviews first.

And if you read this Jacob, shut up, I'm not to old to go back to school.

 

[binaryterror]

IBM Thinkpads I love....not too sure on a Lenovo....again, make sure you don't run into "non-supported" issues with your school.......;-)

Lenovo made the IBM Thinkpads for IBM. IBM left the PC world for servers and solutions. Lenovo kept the designs and improved them actually.

Thats funny, I'm typing on my brand new aluminum cased HP and it smells just fine. Just got it yesturday, thing is crazy for gaming and music. Whats the big deal?

Give it a year. When the battery is toast (tip don't buy another HP, look aftermarket). Luckily for you the aluminum case ones seem to have fixed the long known issue with HP's...the screen hinge collapsing.

 

[jetboat]

My company just switched everyone to lenovo's ( i still have my dell). In my little dept we have 6 of the Lenovos, 4 of them have had major problems and 1 persons didnt even work at all. I dont know if its a bad batch or bad IT support but, soured me on them.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk

 

[dkf]

How much porn you going to watching/downloading?

 

[paintballer9876]

Newegg.com - ASUS A53SD-NS51 Notebook Intel Core i5 2450M(2.50GHz) 15.6" 6GB Memory DDR3 750GB HDD 5400rpm DVD±R/RW NVIDIA GeForce GT 610M

While not a terribly attractive laptop its got good bang for the buck and backed up by a fairly reliable brand.

 

[jsowens]

These guys have given you some good advice on laptops, but don't get terribly hung up on something with a massively huge hard drive. Get one with a decent amount of space...a lot come out of the box with around 160-300gb these days or more, but more importantly since you're a student, invest in a good external hard drive instead of saving everything on your internal one. I can't count the times in college that I saw classmates in a panic because their computers crashed and they lost projects.

 

[TexasSP]

These guys have given you some good advice on laptops, but don't get terribly hung up on something with a massively huge hard drive. Get one with a decent amount of space...a lot come out of the box with around 160-300gb these days or more, but more importantly since you're a student, invest in a good external hard drive instead of saving everything on your internal one. I can't count the times in college that I saw classmates in a panic because their computers crashed and they lost projects.

I agree on backing up, but personally would choose carbonite over using an external this day and age. The pricing is reasonable, the space unlimited, and you can access your information from anywhere over the web. You also don't have to worry about connecting and making sure your back ups are done. Whenever you connect to the internet, carbonite is running.