Laptop for college student.

Stumper

Stumper

Treehouser
Joined
Mar 6, 2005
Messages
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Location
Colorado
Help! I need to buy a laptop computer for a student. It doesn't have to be a dualcore with some super graphics card at this point- but I need to find something suitable for a freshman to get started with. Economy is important but it needs to be adequate. I have really no idea what kind of specs I should be looking fo beyond WiFi. Some of you tech savvy housers please bestow some wisdom upon me.
 
Which one? Mine is going on 3 years old; and it's still pretty up to date.

It has a DVD burner, SD slot, built-in bluetooth and WLAN, etc etc.
 
Ahhh. I have the 5050; 4 gigs ram, 80 gig hard drive. Came with Vista.

$600 new.
 
I stay away from Vista... Acer is pretty bullet proof and basic..
Seeing they had XP home on board was nice.. but it should be upgraded to pro.
You would have to have more processor to run Vista than that Acer anyway.. Along with more memory...
I also stay away from AMD processors, ALL HP units.. (something that requires me set into their software)
All depends on a budget :D Sky's the limit.. Like we said in racing.. Speed is money .. how fast do you want to go ?
 
I'n not a huge Vista fan, but I've been pretty happy with this one.

Not bad for a laptop I picked up on a moment's notice to fly to Germany with.
 
Vista works great if you don't diversify your software much.. People like the graphics quality... I have heard good and bad...
I do believe though if you really want the graphics look at Apple.. If that's your focus...

Some on the chipset on the ACER.. will only go up to 2 gig ram and at 667mhz speed, no speed demon .. but not bad..
Has couple of sata ports and pci express... so that's a good feature.. Looks like that is the processor and you can't upgrade that...
So we have an entry level machine for a laptop, expandable only through adding one more gig of ram and some peripherals.. Not great but a good starter for a student...
 
I have a dell and love it. It is a couple years old and running fine. I would look for windows, but I am not sure you can find that these days!
 
My Dell is the one with XP. Great machine- a little older than the acer, so it's not quite so tricked-out.

There's quite a few choices out there that'd be fine for the po' student.
 
I'm kinda in the same boat. I'm going to need a laptop soon but I have no idea what all the tech words or numbers mean on the description tags. I can't tell the difference between the $699 model at Sam's versus the $2000 model at Office Depot except the price tag. It's like trying to determine a car's horsepower by looking at the paint job. I'm completely lost without being able to run the thing for a couple days to see how it works.

I need something for web surfing, email and accessing my stock trading. I'm going to run Windows, period. I prefer the largest screen possible for the price. I'd like to keep it below $1000 and hopefully below $900. I need somebody to pick something out for me.

On my home computer I use the printer about 1x-2x per year and about the same with the DVD player. I've never used the DVD burner. The DVD player has been broken for the last 6 months so at some point I may replace it (if I don't smash the damn thing with a hammer first).
 
My Dell came from Dell at about $1,600.... the Acer came from WalMart at $600. I like the Acer better, and it's been more reliable overall.

Brand doesn't mean shit... they all use the same foreign components, anyways.
 
Now come on now you can't fix a computer with a hammer .:lol:

My buddy at work picked up a very nice laptop for his daughter by going to Dell's web site I believe . It's my understanding they run specials that may only last a few days on line .

I'll get more info Monday when I see him next .
 
NeTree said:
Brand doesn't mean shit... they all use the same foreign components, anyways.
Click to expand...
Very true .The machine I'm typing this on is a custom made job done with components .

I have around 500 in it but had it been purchased as a completed unit from some company it likely would have been 15-16 hundred .
 
:lol: No ,a guy by the name of Kenny built this one and for wifey dear .

He know's his stuff but is a tad bit eccentric .About as out of round as a football .:/:
 
I'm a little late in the discussion, but when I left for college, I bought a laptop from Costco. If you go on their website, you can customize any of their base model computers and get a great deal. I bought this Compac computer I'm on right now in 2003. The base model had a fancy screen, video card, etc... I wanted memory and speed for school, and the customizing allowed me to remove things I don't want for a discount that I could then use toward things I do want.

I think the original price was 1400, but after removing all the video game crap, etc... and upgrading the speed, etc... the computer was only 1100. :)
 
i'd ask the school and or teacher for spec requirements, see if any are bought in bulk and or svc'd by college dept. when there are simple ills.. Ask about network access, wireless(?) type (A,B,G,N), to make sure that is what sys has (especially if buying used etc.).

i'd stick with XP, they will probably keep selling it until the next os comes out. It is more generally supported than Vista. 64bit is better performance, but; not everything works with it, so i'd stay clear of that too.

i'd consider new with warranty and also damage insurance for non-warranty failures like cracked screen, drink spills etc. (that are accidental damage and not manufacutered failures).

Some systems maid for buisness, don't have the best music playback. i'm sure that is important to a college student. Dell Latitudes and Optiplexes are biz orientated models, and have Lifetime, Transferable, Phone Support, even after hardware warranty fades.
 
I got a HP/Compaq NX7010
not latest hightech i know but it works very well and i use it to edit photos when not at home and it does it with good speed :)
it's a "sturdy" built machine that has taken some beating and still runs !!
Go with XP-pro it is alot easier to "run" for laptop then Vista that need alot of memory and cpu power just to run !!
 
So, there ya go Justin. I guess it's pretty obvious which one you should get. Right? :roll:
 
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