How much would I be looking at for a decent quality but relatively straightforward laptop?

Would need to have MS Office software, but beyond that nothing else specific I suppose. It would be for my wife to use for work and uni stuff – so she wouldn’t do more than internet, email and essay writing stuff on it.

I’ve looked on the Dell website which would suggest I’m looking at about £400. About right? Any other places to look?

Somewhere that would be good if things went wrong would be preferable (I’m a get my TV from John Lewis kind of person for that reason).

Thanks

Lots of deals around places like comet currys etc. Acer laptops are OK for what you want and I would have no qualms getting one of those.
Dell are a step up in terms of quality but also price.

I think some places are doing a 50pds trade in for old laptops so if you are near the Wirral I’ve got a very old one you can have.

>> Dell are a step up in terms of quality

Really?

Of the 4 Dell laptops I have had, 3 have gone back to the manufacturer after repeated failures (one of which had 4 new Motherboards within 18 months) and the current one randomly suffers hardware failures.

Dell are the lowest common denominator – utter cr@p.

Cheap rubbish = false economy IME.

got an acer foraround £400 – thought it was going to be cr4p

cant fault it……would recommend

Dell are the lowest common denominator – utter cr@p.

Sounds like you have had a bad experience. Why did you buy two more if the first one was rubbish.

of the 2000+ Dell laptops/servers/desktops I have purchased my experience has been quite good.

Dell are the lowest common denominator – utter cr@p.

I’d say totally the opposite to be fair. If you’ve got to have a budget laptop, I’d definitely say you’re safest with a Dell…

On the software front, you CAN go out and buy Microsoft Office for her to use, or you can save a few quid, and download Sun’s OpenOffice for free. It used to be a poor pastiche of MS Office, but these days, unless you’re a very advanced Excel user, you’ll really not notice the difference. 3 years ago I wouldn’t entertain using it, but it’s got that much better than it used to be, I haven’t bothered buying and installing Office on my latest PC.

Back to the laptop anyway… Whatever you buy, look for a Core i3 processor minimum. DO NOT buy an old Pentium Dual Core, or a Celeron etc. They may be cheap, but they’re cheap for a reason, the performance will be a lot lower and not last as long. A Quick look around reveals the Dell Inspiron 15R for £429 with a core i3 processor, 250gig HD, 3Gig RAM, Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit. I’ve had a quick look on ebuyer, and there’s nothing on there that comes close to the spec for the money at the moment…

+1 Acer – good spec HD & RAM for £300

As Mboy says go for a model with at least 3gb of Ram in daily use this will make a big difference to performance. 4gb if it is on offer.

first thing to do is google the pcpro a-list for good reviews and recommended lapdogs. Then go to ebuyer.com and get a decent deal.

Nowhere near the Wirral surfer, but thanks for the offer.

So are PC World ok for customer service, or not. I’ll have to buy mail order if I do.

pcworld are kind of the halfords of computer shops. some branches have real techies, some don’t.

STEER CLEAR of PC World IMO

Anybody with any technical knowledge will be earning more than £6 per hour somewhere else…

PC World are usually overpriced too, compared to buying off the internet, and they will give you the hard sell on loads of other things that you don’t need, such as overpriced internet security etc. (there are brilliant ones you can download for free off the internet).

Buy direct from Dell, or buy from ebuyer, that’s my recommendation.

‘m a get my TV from John Lewis kind of person

I’d go to John Lewis, spend about £400 and take the extra years warranty they offer (that dell etc would charge you extra for).

John Lewis do a few Toshiba ones. Are they an ok brand?

Not huge experience with Toshiba but I think they are as good as most.

Toshiba are pretty well made. Recent Acers are way better built than their previous offerings, which were chasing spec at the expense of solidity.

Bit of a bargin

http://direct.asda.com/Compaq-15.6ins-Laptop—2gb-RAM—250gb-storage—Windows-7-Premium/000503406,default,pd.html

On the software front, you CAN go out and buy Microsoft Office for her to use, or you can save a few quid, and download Sun’s OpenOffice for free. It used to be a poor pastiche of MS Office, but these days, unless you’re a very advanced Excel user, you’ll really not notice the difference. 3 years ago I wouldn’t entertain using it, but it’s got that much better than it used to be, I haven’t bothered buying and installing Office on my latest PC.

Open Office is good enough for most stuff, but it’s still nothing like as good as the real thing – once you’ve learned how to use the MS Office ribbon, going back to the crude interface that Open Office gives you hurts!

Open Office is good enough for most stuff, but it’s still nothing like as good as the real thing – once you’ve learned how to use the MS Office ribbon, going back to the crude interface that Open Office gives you hurts!

Ditch Windows and you can use K-Office.

Got a dell inspiron from tescos direct for my daughter. They delivered it a day later than promised, which I wasn’t even bothered about, they rang me, grovelled, and knocked me a fiver off without me even asking.

Dell are a sound brand at the price.