Have been looking at laptops now and considering what I should get. I've considered about 3 choices:
- Netbook (screen must be ≥ 10in)
These seem to be around AU$500-$600
- Core 2 Duo based laptop
Cheapest I can get is about AU$740, which is over my budget
- Older Pentium-M based notebook
Can get 2nd hand off eBay for like AU$200-$400. CPU speed around 1.4-2.0GHz.
Will probably upgrade RAM & HDD: 1GB DDR RAM is around AU$75, 2GB DDR2 around AU$39, 250GB 2.5in IDE HDD around AU$128
The last option looks the most interesting to me. It's about the same cost, or cheaper, than a netbook (after apply upgrades), the CPU is faster, screen & keyboard is larger, and has an optical drive. The downsides would be less portable, more battery drain than the Atom CPU, and the risk of 2nd hand from eBay.
I don't really need CPU power that much. Optical drive and larger screen are nice though.
Any real issues with these older laptops in comparison to netbooks? They just seem to be much cheaper than netbooks on eBay, even though they have a better processor.
I prob go for the duo-core lappy!,. simply for decent win7 suport hardware,. but you prob stick with winXP,. then i would buy a netbook(portableish),. won't recommend a 2nd lappy spec 1 with specs like that,.
Well, really depends on what your purposes are for getting a laptop... care to share?
Vegetano1 Wrote:won't recommend a 2nd lappy spec 1 with specs like that,.
Why not?
Assassinator Wrote:Well, really depends on what your purposes are for getting a laptop... care to share?
Going on a vacation - gives me something to do. Not really going to be moved around much, so bigger screen is nice.
ZiNgA BuRgA Wrote:Vegetano1 Wrote:won't recommend a 2nd lappy spec 1 with specs like that,.
Why not?
yeah,. you'r right,. why not,. ;p
I had guess you can get some nice 2nd hand lappy's,.
ZiNgA BuRgA Wrote:Assassinator Wrote:Well, really depends on what your purposes are for getting a laptop... care to share?
Going on a vacation - gives me something to do. Not really going to be moved around much, so bigger screen is nice.
What are you mainly going to be doing with it? If you want to play games, you'd need probably the core2 class minimum (and that's probably still not enough). If you want to watch videos, the netbook might have trouble with the higher res vids like 720p, but everything lower should be fine.
The smaller laptops also have the advantage of being much easier to carry around.
Heh, you probably knew all that though :(
My brother for bought a netbook. Since he mainly only surfs the internet and does word processing on it, it's enough power. He seems pretty happy with it. Small enough to take to school and take notes, while my moms laptop which I tried taking to school for a period was a bit to chunky and heavy, so it has to be seperately carried in a laptop bag, rather than sticking in school bag.
Ofcourse, you should also consider for after you come back from the vacation.
Take a look at this:
Samsung NC-10
This fulfills all criteria except for the optical drive.
Spoon. Just saw the price in Australia: $829 a little expensive I would say...
ZiNgA BuRgA Wrote:Will probably upgrade RAM & HDD: 1GB DDR RAM is around AU$75, 2GB DDR2 around AU$39, 250GB 2.5in IDE HDD around AU$128
Bear in mind that most laptops these days, even older ones use SATA drives. There's a laptop I'm working on at the moment, made in 2005 and that uses SATA drives... The only IDE driven laptop I've personally worked on is my mum's which is about 6 years old now.
SATA drives may be a little more expensive...
PSPkiller Wrote:Take a look at this:
Samsung NC-10
This fulfills all criteria except for the optical drive.
Spoon. Just saw the price in Australia: $829 a little expensive I would say...
Seems like the standard 10in netbook... Atom N270 CPU, 1GB RAM, 80-160GB HDD, webcam, wireless etc.
PSPkiller Wrote:Bear in mind that most laptops these days, even older ones use SATA drives. There's a laptop I'm working on at the moment, made in 2005 and that uses SATA drives... The only IDE driven laptop I've personally worked on is my mum's which is about 6 years old now.
SATA drives may be a little more expensive...
Actually, SATA is cheaper than IDE.
http://umart.com.au/pro/products_listnew...=2&id2=132
And no, this isn't for games (gaming laptops = expensive + suck battery).
CPU: Doesn't matter too much
RAM: Easily upgraded
HDD: Easily upgraded
GPU: no games, so meh
Screen size: ≥ 10in
Battery: IDK really, I guess >2.5 hours of standard usage (ie not really using the CPU)
Preferable extras: optical drive, wireless
My main question was whether older laptops really have any issues I guess.
No not really. Have you considered second hand? Most people look after their laptops pretty well. A clean install of XP, maybe a new battery and you're away...
PSPkiller Wrote:No not really. Have you considered second hand? Most people look after their laptops pretty well. A clean install of XP, maybe a new battery and you're away...
eBay is mostly second hand...
Buying a new battery might be a bit of a problem. They're a bit costly, and I'd imagine hard to find, especially if the manufacturer doesn't use the same battery type for all their models...