14.1" Laptop Advice

mcfee03 · 5th April 2009, 9:13 PM

Hi, I'm getting a new laptop and got a couple of requirements/preferences:

14.1" Screen
Longish batter (3-4hrs min)
Reasonably light
<$1200 (only reason I've gone that high is the gfx cards, i initially thought i could get away with <$1000- can I?)

It'll be used for:
Word documents, browsing, Skype, multimedia, video Editing, photo shop

Where's the best place to get laptops? Are there any good websites? Is MSY etc any cheaper than the big stores (especially when there on sale)?

What kind of GFX should I be looking at?

Basically this is what I've narrowed down to:
r# means card rank according to this
Red= bad points
Green= good points

Joseph · 5th April 2009, 10:55 PM

I'm in a similar situation to you. Looking for a 13.3-14.1" notebook around $1000.

Is the 7 hour battery life with the Vostro the 6 cell that comes with it? I'm pretty sure you need to pay extra for the 9 cell battery.

Slugoid · 6th April 2009, 3:08 AM

Lenovo Y430a : http://www-07.ibm.com/lenovoinfo/hk/ideaPad/ySeries/

Pity you can't get this in Aus (with the 9300M GS card), or else it would be perfect for you. I'm using this right now and it's great.

As for graphics card, the 9300M GS in the Y430 is ranked 103 and it can barely play games like GRID, but it's enough to play older games (like Warcraft 3) and play any HD movies smoothly. So if you want to play any new games, you'd need at least something like a 9500M/9600M or Radeon HD 3650.

MSY is cheap, but they don't sell a large range of laptops. I guess just find the model you want and hunt around.

Mr. Bump! · 6th April 2009, 10:53 AM

Out of that lot the Benq will be the only one that will be able to play any games.

DiGiTaL MoNkEY · 6th April 2009, 10:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mr. Bump!

Out of that lot the Benq will be the only one that will be able to play any games.

Yep, with the 8400M at minimum.

Otherwise any of those will do if you aren't gaming.

Mr. Bump! · 6th April 2009, 11:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DiGiTaL MoNkEY

Yep, with the 8400M.

If you want to pay less then $1000... I'd have gone for the 9600M GT if you want to play current games... an 8400M probably wont handle anything newer then Doom 3/CSS/BF2/Warcraft 3/WoW but then if you're only playing older games occasionally then it's not a particularly bad card. It should give you Aero support under vista and be able to handle HD movies

DiGiTaL MoNkEY · 6th April 2009, 11:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mr. Bump!

If you want to pay less then $1000... I'd have gone for the 9600M GT if you want to play current games... an 8400M probably wont handle anything newer then Doom 3/CSS/BF2/Warcraft 3/WoW but then if you're only playing older games occasionally then it's not a particularly bad card. It should give you Aero support under vista and be able to handle HD movies

Yah the 8400M is quite low on the scale, while it is better than anything Intel would give you. I've found that most intel graphics i've used actually handle vista aero quite well and have low power consumption.

For those interesting in how mobile graphics cards stack up, this site is quite handy: http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-...ist.844.0.html

Based on their benchmarks its capable of playing Doom 3, but it depends on the quality level.

As for which notebook i would choose out of the list if i didn't play games...whatever have at least 2gb of ram and a faster processor.

Cranky · 6th April 2009, 11:43 AM

Graysonline

I got an E6400 from this place and am very happy with it. I haven't tried playing games on it yet, but it seems to run stuff pretty well (mines got 4GB of memory, but otherwise almost identical I think)

There's this for example:

Quote:

PC, LAPTOP 14`` WIDE XGA+, DELL, LATITUDE E6400, BLACK INTEL CORE ( TM ) 2 DUO 2.4GHZ, 2048MB DDR2 RAM, 160GB SATA HDD, 256MB NVIDIA QUADRO NVS 160M, ONBOARD SOUND CARD, DVD+/-RW, INTERNAL MODEM, MODEM SPEED 56KBPS, ONBOARD NETWORK CARD, 5 IN 1 MEDIA MEMORY CARD READER SLOT ONBOARD, VIDEO CAM ONBOARD, MULTIMODE DISPLAY PORT, E SATA / USB CONNECTOR AND SMART CARD READER SLOT ONBOARD, GENUINE WINDOWS VISTA(R) BUSINESS 32 BIT SP1 (ENGLISH) DVD MEDIA INCLUDED, GENUINE WINDOWS(R) XP PROFESSIONAL SP3 EDITION (ENGLISH) CD MEDIA INCLUDED, GENUINE WINDOWS(R) XP PROFESSIONAL SP3 (ENG) -DOWNGRADE VISTA BUSINESS PREMIUM, HDD FORMATTED, 90W SPARE AC ADAPTER, 3 USB PORTS, 1 FIREWIRE PORTS, AC ADAPTOR, FAULT(S) NOT FULLY DIAGNOSED ( WARRANTY PURCHASE NOT AVAILABLE THIS ITEM) (SERIAL NO: 6493Z1S) (114537-153)

Currently for $459 ending today I think...

http://www.graysonline.com.au/lot.asp?LOT_ID=3498575

EDIT: sorry, didn't see this was faulty... they do sell non-faulty ones on the same website.. it's worth a look anyway

mcfee03 · 6th April 2009, 3:47 PM

Thanks for all your replies everyone. Not keen on the greysonline ones, need it to have warranty. Will having a lower-end video card (ie 8400m) affect me besides in gaming? Video editing? Photoshoping?

DiGiTaL MoNkEY · 6th April 2009, 3:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mcfee03

Thanks for all your replies everyone. Not keen on the greysonline ones, need it to have warranty. Will having a lower-end video card (ie 8400m) affect me besides in gaming? Video editing? Photoshoping?

Nah it wouldn't affect you in much else.

kingyubbo · 6th April 2009, 9:04 PM

How'd you get those specs for the Dell 1310? It's not on the website at all.

The BenQ S42 is clearly the best buy at the moment and the F6A would come second (price clearly matters).

luxtin · 6th April 2009, 10:52 PM

In my opinion worth spending the extra couple hundred bucks for the 9600. If you want to sell it in a year or 2 it will still be considered a laptop that can handle games and at the moment thats a bargain for a laptop that has a mid range gfx card in it.

Hyo-Ri · 7th April 2009, 3:21 PM

where would be the cheapest place to buy the benq s42 im interested but static ice only has cheap prices for NSW does staticice list all shops?

inexistence · 7th April 2009, 7:44 PM

Get the s42.

I think atm they got an extra yr of extended warranty if you register online.

its great. wled, vista business (you probably need extra 2gb of ram if you intend to stick with it) and the beastly 9600 for under 1300.

Only thing i wished it had was an esata port.

I recommend splurging the bit more for the s42, its really good value for money.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hyo-Ri

where would be the cheapest place to buy the benq s42 im interested but static ice only has cheap prices for NSW does staticice list all shops?

try CPL. when i got mine CPL was cheapest in Victoria.

linverson · 7th April 2009, 7:54 PM

don't get benq. it is the crapes brand ever. I've had 4 motherboards changed in a two year span (funnily enought the laptop died again 6 months after my fourth change. I had it changed once here and 3 times at Benq headquaters in Taiwan.

Tech. support in Australia is horible (it's in sydney); i had to wait an average of 20 minutes to speak to a techie/recption.

5th April 2009, 9:13 PM	#1
mcfee03 Member Join Date: Jan 2007 Posts: 101	14.1" Laptop Advice Hi, I'm getting a new laptop and got a couple of requirements/preferences: 14.1" Screen Longish batter (3-4hrs min) Reasonably light <$1200 (only reason I've gone that high is the gfx cards, i initially thought i could get away with <$1000- can I?) It'll be used for: Word documents, browsing, Skype, multimedia, video Editing, photo shop Where's the best place to get laptops? Are there any good websites? Is MSY etc any cheaper than the big stores (especially when there on sale)? What kind of GFX should I be looking at? Basically this is what I've narrowed down to: r# means card rank according to this Red= bad points Green= good points __________________ Q6600 (G0) @ 3.06Ghz 1.32v \| Stock cooling \| Asus P5E \| 4GB Transcend DDR2 80Mhz + 2GB Rambo DDR2 800Mhz\| Radeon 512MB 4870 (GPU clock 770Mhz, Mem clock 930Mhz) \|1x 500GB Samsung SATA (Boot) \| 1x 300GB WD IDE \| BenQ IDE DVD-RW DW1620 \| Corsair HX620W \| Acer P241W 24" LCD \| Vista Ultimate x64 [Primary OS]/ Windows 7 x64 RC1 FOR SALE: Nokia N82 Black (8GB w/Voice nav forever) - Palit 512MB 8600GT WTB: Car

5th April 2009, 10:55 PM	#2
Joseph Member Join Date: Feb 2002 Location: Melbourne Posts: 1,799	I'm in a similar situation to you. Looking for a 13.3-14.1" notebook around $1000. Is the 7 hour battery life with the Vostro the 6 cell that comes with it? I'm pretty sure you need to pay extra for the 9 cell battery. __________________ Successful trades: Do a search!

6th April 2009, 3:08 AM	#3
Slugoid Member Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: Hong Kong SAR Posts: 2,265	Lenovo Y430a : http://www-07.ibm.com/lenovoinfo/hk/ideaPad/ySeries/ Pity you can't get this in Aus (with the 9300M GS card), or else it would be perfect for you. I'm using this right now and it's great. As for graphics card, the 9300M GS in the Y430 is ranked 103 and it can barely play games like GRID, but it's enough to play older games (like Warcraft 3) and play any HD movies smoothly. So if you want to play any new games, you'd need at least something like a 9500M/9600M or Radeon HD 3650. MSY is cheap, but they don't sell a large range of laptops. I guess just find the model you want and hunt around. __________________ Nintendo Owners Club Member #5 For sale: None Folding@Home 12000 Club\|Folding@Home 70000 Points Milestone

6th April 2009, 3:47 PM	#9
mcfee03 Member Join Date: Jan 2007 Posts: 101	Thanks for all your replies everyone. Not keen on the greysonline ones, need it to have warranty. Will having a lower-end video card (ie 8400m) affect me besides in gaming? Video editing? Photoshoping? __________________ Q6600 (G0) @ 3.06Ghz 1.32v \| Stock cooling \| Asus P5E \| 4GB Transcend DDR2 80Mhz + 2GB Rambo DDR2 800Mhz\| Radeon 512MB 4870 (GPU clock 770Mhz, Mem clock 930Mhz) \|1x 500GB Samsung SATA (Boot) \| 1x 300GB WD IDE \| BenQ IDE DVD-RW DW1620 \| Corsair HX620W \| Acer P241W 24" LCD \| Vista Ultimate x64 [Primary OS]/ Windows 7 x64 RC1 FOR SALE: Nokia N82 Black (8GB w/Voice nav forever) - Palit 512MB 8600GT WTB: Car

6th April 2009, 10:53 AM	#4
Mr. Bump! (Banned or Deleted) Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: QLD Posts: 3,645	Out of that lot the Benq will be the only one that will be able to play any games.

6th April 2009, 10:52 PM	#12
luxtin Member Join Date: Aug 2003 Posts: 1,148	In my opinion worth spending the extra couple hundred bucks for the 9600. If you want to sell it in a year or 2 it will still be considered a laptop that can handle games and at the moment thats a bargain for a laptop that has a mid range gfx card in it.

7th April 2009, 3:21 PM	#13
Hyo-Ri Member Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: Melbourne Posts: 125	where would be the cheapest place to buy the benq s42 im interested but static ice only has cheap prices for NSW does staticice list all shops?

7th April 2009, 7:54 PM	#15
linverson Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Posts: 103	don't get benq. it is the crapes brand ever. I've had 4 motherboards changed in a two year span (funnily enought the laptop died again 6 months after my fourth change. I had it changed once here and 3 times at Benq headquaters in Taiwan. Tech. support in Australia is horible (it's in sydney); i had to wait an average of 20 minutes to speak to a techie/recption.