Alright, I think my lack of knowledge when it comes to things you have to plug in is pretty well known around here! But my wife has an HP laptop that is only a year and a half and we were just told the motherboard is shot on it. She is in real estate and does some marketing stuff on the side and used the Microsoft Publisher a lot. I tried to get a Mac for her and everything she does is PC related. She does NO video editing or gaming or even use the DVD/CD drive on it. I need to pick her up a new one ASAP and was wondering what you geek........ errrrrr........ smart guys recommend.
Toshiba from Fry's. Get the extended warranty. Fry's actually has a good warranty. Fry's actually had a nice 3 gig Toshiba laptop for $350 last week. Look in today's ad in the Friday Oregonian.
What about these NetBooks? I'm looking on BestBuy's website. Do they run Microsoft office? Are they just small PC laptops?
I own a Netbook for travel - and it's decent for email and stuff- would not want to do much more with it. Not enough memory/speed, honestly (and I have one of the fancier kinds with a very fast SSD drive). Personally, I am partial to Dell computers, especially if you go for the "small business" models instead of the consumer models. As such, I would seriously look at a Dell Vostro of some sort - (the models change mostly based on screen size). As for the HP being crap shortly after purchase... not a big surprise for me. This was my company's experience as well and why we went to Dell.
I'm off to BestBuy. WIsh me luck and I know you guys know those computer geek guys, tell 'em I'm on my way!
Toshiba or Acer or Asus in your price point. I've had issues in the past few years with Dell, especially with motherboard and powersupplies...same with sonys. Lenovos are good but are more for biz shit. Don't buy at frys..they suck balls. the actually put shit that was returned back onto the floor with a sticker on it. there's a version of MS Office that's cheaper and has 3 licneses....try looking at costco I think its a little cheaper there. Or use open office or something. Publisher is kind of crappy. I used that for a while, now I just lay things out using powerpoint.
If you are a knowledgeable consumer Fry's is great. Yes they put returns back on the shelf but like you said with a sticker on it and after they test the item. Their extended service warranties are great. They fix it on site instead of shipping it out and if the item is too out of date they just give you a comparable new one. Bestbuy is the one that will bend you over and f' you. Watch HCP buy his wife a netbook with the $50 Geek Squid "Optimization package".
I'm a very knowledgeable consumer and would rather run naked in Antarctica before buying a computer from frys. The story is dreary, the employees are condescending assholes and/or lazy as fuck and the people who shop there are fucking losers. I live 10 minutes from Frys and go in there maybe once or twice a year, I fucking hate that store. It just seems like they're shady over there, its a warehouse of crappy, defective old shit.
Dell Studio 15 with the display upgrade (FULL HD) and 6G of RAM for about $1K. Gotta buy it online from http://dell.com and wait for it to be shipped...
I happen to think the studio 15 is an excellent value for the money. I am big on high resolution for my displays, and the 15 has a 15.6" 1920x1080 resolution screen. The CPU is dual core with hyperthreading, so it acts like 4 cores (it's quick, too). It gets a windows 7 rating of 4.9 due to the graphics (it's not a gaming machine), but the rest of the system rates at near 7.
... and that's why I suggested getting a small-business model instead of a consumer version. We have had Vostros for all the employees here for quite some time - and they never fail...
our last order was about 10 inspirons a few years back, about 1/2 of them got the blinking amber power button of death. had dell support come in and replace the motherboard and the power supply, some of the fixed ones still did it and we gave up...had the extended (3 year?) warranties on them. also happened to a few optiplexes we had...was a pain in the ass to deal with them. http://www.techimo.com/forum/technical-support/185730-dell-blinking-amber-light-no-boot.html
