Hi all, thinking of ditching a 4-5 year old PC for a new computer.
First question is if I don't need the mobility, should I still go laptop, or stick with a PC?
Second thing is I would like to run a secondary display for TV & films, but not be tied to a massive screen for normal computing, third thing is a blu-ray player, I just don't see why you wouldn't…

So does this spec seem sensible for £970, or over the top?

Your configuration
Processor: Intel® CoreTM i5-450M, 2.40GHz
Operating system: Genuine Windows® 7 Professional
Finishes: Black Black
Hard drive: 320 GB Serial ATA (7200 rpm)
Memory: 4 GB 1066MHz DDR3-SDRAM
Optical Drive: Blu-ray Disc(TM) writer
Display: 41.6 cm LCD, 1920×1080+ webcam
Graphics: NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 330M 1GB
Microsoft 2010 & Adobe Acrobat: Office 2010 Starter
Internet security: No protection
Adobe Creation: No Adobe® Creation
Adobe® Lightroom®: No Adobe® Photoshop® Lightroom
Also Included
Keyboard: English QWERTY keyboard
Battery: Battery life up to 3 hours
Wireless LAN: Wireless LAN + Bluetooth
AC Adapter: 1 AC Adapter
HDMI(TM) output: HDMI(TM) output
Memory cards reader: SD and MS card slot
VAIO software: No VAIO software
Documentation: English documentation
Operating system: English operating system

Thanks for any input.

I presume that is a laptop ? (if not it's a lot for a desktop)

That sounds a little expensive to me – perhaps you are paying a lot of money for that Blu-Ray drive. Quick look on Dell suggests a Studio 15 costs £649 for same processor ('only' 15 inch screen) and comes with a much bigger hard drive (320GB on yours sounds mean for such a high cost) – no Blu Ray though.

Do you really want your Blu-Ray in your PC – do you already have a stand-alone player ? (perhaps a cheaper way of doing it)

or this with Blu Ray £799

…and I wouldn't be too worried about dropping to a lower spec processor (e.g. to a lower i5 or i3)

Depends on lots of things but mainly what you want.

Recently bought an ebay store PC (in Aus) for Au$470 (that's cheap in pounds).

AMD 2.9Ghz dual core.
4Gb RAM
500Gb SATA II Drive.
Nice case (amazingly) – front ports etc, blue led fan, quiet, etc.
DVD drive (SATA too).

Upped the spec with a $110 delivered pci express graphics card, and a $20 card reader for the 3.5" drive bay. Well chuffed as it's pretty nifty and runs a whole heap of more recent games without issue.
Have put ubuntu and windows 7 on it too and both fine.

Paid via paypal and had it within 48 hours.

Marvellous.

+1 for Fubar. Another illustration, I bought a Dell Inspiron laptop in February this year. 17" screen, Intel Core i3 processor, 1GB graphics card, 4gb RAM, 500gb hard disk for £700.