Laptop advice needed

[Pascal]

my laptop i bought a couple of years ago for a few pennies has decided it is time to go to laptop hell so need some advice on a new one

looking for something with a 17" screen, powerful (needs to run 5-6 poker sites) so i guess i5 and 8gb of memory, doesn't need to have great graphics (won't be used for games), decent battery life.

got up to £1k to spend, any advice?

[Circuits]

As a technical user, I always favour the business models from brands like Dell and HP. They're solid, easier to service (unlike the consumer models that are impossible to take apart without breaking something) and will generally cope with anything you could throw at them.

For a budget of up to £1k, I'd recommend looking at the Dell Precision range. HP's equivalent are called Elitebooks. They'll run you from £800ish to well over £2000, but are designed for demanding applications and high performance.

Personally speaking, I probably wouldn't bother looking at other brands like Samsung. Popular though they may be, but in my experience their quality generally lacks when it comes to the higher end of the spectrum.

[swiggidy]

I bought a high end sony 10 years ago that was awesome. Have mostly been recommending Toshiba to friends recently, but that's mostly mid to low level laptops. Dell and HP used to be poor, but one of them has fixed their shit (not sure which).

I guess I don't have any recent experience dropping $1.5k US, but wonder if that's even necessary.

[edit] removed link because was getting weird results, but page through toshiba.com and you can upgrade a 17" 8GB to i5 for ~$800 US

[Pascal]

Thanks for the replies guys. I was looking at this HP Circuits:

http://h20386.www2.hp.com/UKStore/Me...&opt=&sel=PCNB

My friend has a very similar version just with fancy lighting etc and the build quality seemed excellent to me.

Dell have got an Inspiron 17R for £799 (the Special Edition) which is I7, 1TB, 8GB of RAM, weights 3.28kg and 17":

http://www.dell.com/uk/p/inspiron-17r-se-7720/pd

What's the model number of the Toshiba swiggidy?

I'd rather spend extra now and get a laptop which is better than I probably need, than buy something a bit cheaper and then in a year or so want to upgrade. I'll be using this laptop a lot for both everyday and poker so I'm happy to pay what's needed.

[Luco]

SSD! SSD!

[Pascal]

Yea def thinking an SSD if budget left or some time in future

[Luco]

Well both the laptops you mentioned have two hdd bays so you can always get a smallish SSD just for the OS...

Damn, Dell have really nerfed their 'build your dell' section. It's gone from godly to godawful and it makes me sad. 18 months ago you could have tweaked the whole setup through their website but now you'll prolly have to chat to customer service to get what you really want.

I loved that feature

[Pascal]

Everything was always ridic overpriced in my experience, way better to buy the laptop then make the changes yourself

[Luco]

Everything was always ridic overpriced in my experience, way better to buy the laptop then make the changes yourself

True. I admit most of my dell dealings have been on the business side of things, so the 'build your dell' price was like a sticker price and always came down a bit in negotiations. No such luxury for joe public.

[bode]

get a business class lenovo. we've switched to them recently for work (CAD/REVIT/3d rendering) and they crush our old dells in performance. not that you need that stuff, but i'm impressed with the build quality and overall experience.

[swiggidy]

get a business class lenovo. we've switched to them recently for work (CAD/REVIT/3d rendering) and they crush our old dells in performance. not that you need that stuff, but i'm impressed with the build quality and overall experience.

I meant to mention Lenovo. They seem quality, but haven't had any personal experience.

One option, if there is a best buy or something nearby go in and look at the laptops. I'm sure everyone is good now, but 5+ years ago there were drastic differences in screen quality. It gives you a chance to pickup and look at the different brands, which is the best comparison.

As for toshiba, I wasn't recommending a specific model per se. Go to toshiba.com and there is a link for 17" laptops on the front page. I didn't notice an SSD option, but didn't look too hard either.

[swiggidy]

Just checked my email, I get their offer newsletter.

L870-ST4NX1 is 17" i3 with 8GB RAM for $580 right now. (just an example)

Note: nothing you buy now will need to be upgraded in 2 years.

This is the only deal thing I ever pay attention too, sometimes they have good deals, you would have to check everyday to see what's up
http://gizmodo.com/tag/dealzmodo