Laptop Reccommendations Please...

Adz81 on 26/04/2014 - 10:14

Good morning folks :)

Looking for a little advice regarding upgrading a new laptop… mine's a few years old and is starting to struggle with even the most basic things… Thinking it's time to upgrade and was looking at dear old Gerry's store and found this one:

http://www.harveynorman.com.au/hot-deals/asus-f452ea-vx021h-…

For a sub $400 laptop, I thought it might do… the most intensive thing i will need it to do will be some SketchUp use, not necessarily anything too heavy duty… Web-browsing, media (viewing only, not editing) and maybe some games from GOG.com, so nothing too demanding on that front…

Any thoughts on the Asus or is it a clunker? There was also this guy on sale:

http://www.harveynorman.com.au/hot-deals/acer-nx-mgrsa-001-a…

although it's a little more expensive, it might fit the bill a little better… and finally, this from HP…

http://www.harveynorman.com.au/hot-deals/hp-pavilion-14-d005…

Any thoughts would be appreciated…

Poll Options expired

  • 0
    The Ausus
  • 1
    The Acer
  • 1
    The HP
  • 26
    Don't touch any of these, ya git... And what are you doing looking at HN for a laptop anyhow?
Computing

Comments

  • airzone on 26/04/2014 - 12:59

    The first one only has 2gb of ram and will run like a dog. The other 2 are roughly similar, and I would be inclined to take the Asus over the HP.

    • airzone on 26/04/2014 - 13:02
      +3

      Let me just qualify that these are bottom of the barrel. An i3 CPU would be a definite improvement over the E1 / Celeron class CPU. My cousin just bought a Dell Inspiron from JB..
      https://www.jbhifionline.com.au/computers-laptops/laptops/de… This would shit over the other 3 from HN (and it's $509)

      BTW, I meant acer above :p

      • Adz81 on 26/04/2014 - 13:39

        Go it… cheers… I'm aware they're bottom of the barrel, but I don't do a lot of gaming from my laptop, as I mentioned, if it can run Sketchup (and not intensive Sketchup, just floor plans, not landscapes etc.), I'm a happy camper… Just looking for a good priced unit, the more portable the better… It needs to go in a carry-on bag with my work laptop as well…

        • Tnetennba on 27/04/2014 - 15:20

          Cheap, light, powerful

          Choose 2 :)

          Looks like you've already chosen cheap/light, but I would have to suggest an i3 at minimum, they are leagues ahead of the other options, and your laptop will run way better for longer.

  • Baysew on 26/04/2014 - 13:00

    I've been looking for a 14" laptop.

    Officeworks has HP1000 at $479.

    So the comparison would be HN $477 AMD E1-2100 1Ghz vs OW $479 IntelPentium B960 2.2Ghz.
    The Intel is faster and older chip, the AMD much less power hungry.

    I'm still looking.

    Any help on a 14" ?

    • Adz81 on 26/04/2014 - 13:36

      Of those two? I'd lean towards the HN one, simply because Sketchup advises that it doesn't cooperate so well with intel intergrated graphics cards :/
      But still looking, the smaller the better for me, i was looking some HP 11-12" ones earlier… but no joy… either couldn't ship fast enough or couldn't upgrade ram…

  • Adz81 on 26/04/2014 - 13:45

    Actually, this was the one I was going to pull the trigger on:

    http://shopping.hp.com/en_US/home-office/-/products/Laptops/…

    with the upgrade to 8gb ram, in the hope that would help the graphics, it's still intergrated intel graphics though…

    • scrimshaw on 26/04/2014 - 14:29

      That's an Intel Atom. You'll want to avoid those.

      If you want better graphics, I'd go with an AMD APU series laptop, HP Pavillion 10 with AMD Dual Core A4-1200. The graphics on an AMD laptop that costs $400 is much better than a similarly priced Celeron or Atom.
      The tradeoff is decreased battery life.

      Otherwise if you can afford it look for the Aspire E1-572-54204G50Mn, it has a Core i5 4200U and only costs $499 via MSY. This is the cheapest Core i5 you can get, normally they'd go for $600 minimum. The trade-off is that it's an Acer.

      http://www.msy.com.au/Parts/notebook.pdf

    • cheepwun on 27/04/2014 - 17:50

      Actually, this was the one I was going to pull the trigger on:

      The Pentium N3520 is a great processor with very little power draw.

    • Woodyg22 on 28/04/2014 - 01:03

      In my opinion, upgrading to a hybrid drive would be a much better use of your money than the 8GB of RAM. 4GB is more than enough for most everyday tasks and the SSD part of the hybrid drive would improve your general usage speeds drastically (depending on the hybrid split and the software).

  • Tigi on 26/04/2014 - 13:50

    A bit off topic but JB Hi Fi is doing 15% off HP, Dell, Toshiba , Asus this weekend

    • Adz81 on 26/04/2014 - 14:01

      Thanks Tigi, took a look (is it just me, or is there search function on next to useless?), doesn't seem to cover the whole range going from just clicking from the banner— will keep searching through them.

  • mrmarkau67 on 26/04/2014 - 13:54

    $400 buys you a plastic piece of crap if you buy new. Or a beautifully solid 3 year old business class machine with an i5 processor.

    http://www.lfo.com.au/index.php/clearance.html?page=shop.pro…

    http://www.recompute.com.au/customise.php?pid=2917

    Another alternative to consider is to refresh your existing machine:
    - buy an SSD ($120 or so) and an external case for your existing HDD ($20)
    - re-install Windows fresh on the SSD (use Windows 64 bit)
    - upgrade to 4GB if not already at 4GB

    For most laptops, it is very easy to unscrew the base and insert a new HDD.

    • Adz81 on 26/04/2014 - 15:30

      Thanks, I'll take one last look at my current laptop to see if there's merit in giving it a new lease on life, otherwise, I'll check some of the refurb'd/rebirthed ones too.

    • airzone on 26/04/2014 - 17:45

      Having lots of experience with business laptops, this is a real gamble…

      Some (like mine) are immaculate and well specced. My 3yo Latitude E6520 is in factory condition, has a 240gb SSD, i7 2nd gen, discrete graphics & 1080 screen, and 8gb ram. The battery still lasts a few hours, but not as much as new. If you got that for $400, you'd be laughing.

      However the sales guys 2.5yo E6520 is 6 months past being usable and much lower specs. We're talking scratches, cracked palm rest, worn hinges, it's been banged around, etc. I wouldn't give that one away.

      • mrmarkau67 on 27/04/2014 - 12:31

        Its a big gamble if you just go "second hand" on Ebay. But not so much of a gamble if you go through a refurbisher like the links I provided. Even better if you can go local and touch and see before purchasing.

        For $400 you would be indeed lucky to get a machine like yours. You'd be getting one generation previous, and it would be up to you to add an SSD.

        On the other hand I think you could get a banged up one like your colleague's for less than $200. If you upgrade to 4 or 8GB, reinstall Windows 7 64 bit and add an SSD it would be a great little machine - so long as it hasn't been banged around too much.

  • Marble250 on 27/04/2014 - 14:26

    Buy anything,. but a Medion/Akoya…runs slow (with 4 gb ram) and Medion backup ABSOLUTELY non existant!!!!!

  • j5ive on 27/04/2014 - 16:21
    +1

    Buy a used macbook. Use it for a year and its still worth $400

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