Being badgered for PC for schools stuf for Xmas…..she has a kindle already but I guess if the PC has bigger screen / processor it would be better for web browsing too….

Anyone been recently in same position and have any bargains / recommendations?

Cheers

Budget?

There a loads of laptops for £250-£350 on the market – especially at this time of year.

Probably closer to £200 than £300….no idea as not thought about what you get for your money.

Hoping perhaps something recommended might come up on a Black Friday deal…… 🙂

Laptop yeah?

Personally I’d be looking for something i3 (or i5 if possible) based from a known brand.

This looks good to me

http://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/lenovo-b50-80-intel-core-i3-4005u-4gb-128gb-ssd-dvdrw-15.6-windows-8.1-la-80lt0045uk/version.asp

It’s got a fairly good i3 processor and 4GB of RAM, you could upgrade it to 8GB for £30 or so if it proves to be a bit slow later on.

It’s got a Solid State drive which will make a opening programmes and start-up very quick – these are usually the things that make kids impatient and ‘clickly’ (repeatedly clicking the same icon to try to make it open quicker only opening multiple versions and crashing the whole thing). The downside is that it’s not got a huge amount of storage – 128GB that’s still a HUGE amount of Word files and Music, not a lot of videos or heaven forbid games (Minecraft, which is still the game for kids is quiet small however).

Lenovo is a pretty decent brand, we’ve not deployed hundreds of them, but certainly dozens of this brand without any failures that didn’t include dropping it on the floor.

Does it have to be a PC, or could it be a Chromebook?

Lenovo is a pretty decent brand, we’ve not deployed hundreds of them

We have. All other things aside you’d struggle to beat them on build quality. It’d be my first choice for a hostile environment like, y’know, kids or work colleagues.

PJ – thanks for the tips….that helped make some comparisons on Argos and Currys sites…..looks like for all you have to pay extra to get the MS Office Software…

Chromebook is a maybe – if I knew what one was. Basically it needs to have MS Office as kids will use this for School.

If it can then be used for bigger screen web browsing etc then all the better. They are not into gaming other than on their Kindles (two girls – but this is for the older one really, she is 11)

Cheers
Mark

Not even dozens here, but we have deployed several refurbished Lenovos which you can get for even less money than that for a similar or better spec (though that is great value for new). Have never had a problem with them and I’ve been using one as my personal laptop for years – there’s a reason they always get recommended on here.

handybendyhendo – Member

PJ – thanks for the tips….that helped make some comparisons on Argos and Currys sites…..looks like for all you have to pay extra to get the MS Office Software…

Chromebook is a maybe – if I knew what one was. Basically it needs to have MS Office as kids will use this for School.

If it can then be used for bigger screen web browsing etc then all the better. They are not into gaming other than on their Kindles (two girls – but this is for the older one really, she is 11)

Cheers
Mark

Yeah Office is extra, you may be able to get a license via their School for nothing or next to nothing – they’re able to get it free from MS (that’s a handling fee which they may pass on but it’s not much). Failing that you can lease it via Microsoft 365 at about £6 a month.

I personally wouldn’t buy a Chromebook, they’re underpowered compared to PCs and run a Google OS rather than windows – so it might be at odds with the computers they use in school and will be using more and more in high school.

aracer – sounds like you work for someone selling re-furb? Got a link to some deals?

Cheers,
Mark

Chromebook is a maybe – if I knew what one was. Basically it needs to have MS Office as kids will use this for School.

That’s what i thought but after much research and talking to people on here and ‘real’ people as well, I was convinced enough to get a refurb one and give it a go.

So far – I don’t need office; the transferrability back and forward between Office and Google Docs has been virtually seamless and while I’ve had to find out how to do a few things, I haven’t yet found anything that i couldn’t do.

What is a Chromebook? Someone who knows better than me will be along to explain i’m sure, or there’s tonnes online about it, but to me it’s in essence a terminal that connects via the wireless and internet to a big computer in the cloud where all the google programs run. So, you don’t need loads of memory or storage, as the big computer has that in spades. You don’t need the Windows OS, you use Google OS and tabs instead. And for browsing, and doing online homework (I’d assume your kids’ 11y.o. work is going to be pretty similar to mine’s) so far no issues whatsoever.

YMMV

FYI Lenovo installs a rootkit which reinstalls all of their crapware even if you delete it. Lenovo are the same company that installed Superfish adware malware on to their computers until early this year.

No, do a bit of IT support for schools. Not sure off-hand where we’ve got them from, a few places do them (my personal one was £100 for an i3 x121e on ebay).

Cheers

Tier1online
£100 will get you a perfectly decent school pc or laptop.
A lot of schools qualify for office 365 for free.
We’ve had a few pc’s from them now. My 10yr old had a laptop from them. Didn’t want to buy new as worried he’d end up dropping it. He didn’t dissapoint. 🙂

Any reason not to think this is a great deal?

Reason not to buy?

No warning away from this laptop / company?

Owt positive?

That looks as good a laptop as anyone would need, unless into hardcore PC gaming or big graphics/video work. I’d be very happy with that.

Any reason not to think this is a great deal?
Reason not to buy?

3 month warranty.

Im looking for a laptop for one of my kids as well. The lenovo is good but will soon fill up with the OS, web cache and the various crap that gets installed.

This is the best i’ve found for about 250
http://m.cclonline.com/product/178718/VFY-A5140M430CGB/Laptops/Fujitsu-LIFEBOOK-A514-15-6-inch-Notebook-Core-i3-4005U-1-7GHz-4GB-500GB-DVD-RW-DL-WLAN-BT-Webcam-Windows-8-1-Home-Intel-HD-4400-/NOT01595/