PeteC2
Ballad Of A Thin Man
Premium,MVM
join:2002-01-20
Bristol, CT
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| There are a wide number of choices, only one real "weak spot": For $1K or less, you can get discrete graphics, but will not get a strong gaming machine. At that price point, you are going to mostly find Nvidia 8400M and one or two with the Nvidia 8600 GPUs...not bad, mind you, but not real gaming laptops.
Now, if not for serious gaming, no problems, but you mentioned a "real" video card, and outside of gaming, there is not much of a reason otherwise for that specification. In fact, for a notebook, integrated graphics can be a real advantage, outside of gaming, as battery run time will be better, and the notebook should run cooler.
With the budget specified, I would consider Acer, and Gateway, for the most "bang" for the buck, but on the other hand, there is a lot to be said for Sony and Dell, but generally a few bucks higher for a given configuration. Lenovo and ASUS are also possibilities to consider.
I have HP/Compaq notebooks, both for my personal notebook and work notebook, and have no problems at all with them, but everybody's got their preferences!
In terms of "quality", I am not at all convinced that there is a great deal of difference in this price range (good "budget" notebook, from around $700 - $1K), asthetics, keyboard feel and layout, position of ports, and added stuff, such as firewire/web cam, etc., might be deciding factors. Frankly, the "innards" of almost all notebooks in a given price range will be for all purpose, literally the same...although you see plenty of posts and reviews hyping one brand or another, that's pretty bogus. Price, configuration, "look & feel", and additional features...that should be your main guide. Truth is that a $1500 Acer will be "better" than a $700 Dell...even across brand names, you get what you pay for!
Plenty of models with Core Duo CPUs to pick from!
I personally would go with either 2gb, or 4gb of ram, don't see much advantage with the 3gb configuration. Even though all 4gb won't be used with a 32 bit OS, you still gain some advantage with dual channel (not huge, but it is there). If you do not need every bit of ram possible, then 2gb will do just as well.
A 15.4" screen generally gets you the best deals from a cost/configuration viewpoint. Again, at $1k or less, you are talking about a 1280x800 res panel, not a higher res 1400x900 or better 15.4" screen.
Customer Service is sketchy across the board...you might luck out and get a good CS rep, but the actual level of service has not been great, and as costs have been more and more competitive, CS has suffered, you'll hear both praise and condemnation about all brands.
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...something is happening here but you don't know what it is...do you, Mr. Jones? |
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