Buying new Laptop and pulling my hair Out..HELP!

I would think that almost any decent make would be fine for you. I use an Acer, which I bought the day Windows 7 came out last year. Overall I've been happy with its performance, although I had to send it back after 2 weeks when one of the keys fell of the keyboard.

For UK buyers - I bought it in Comet. Never again! The spotty, speechless youth who took it from me when I returned it spent 20 minutes trying to replace the key. He hadn't spoken to me at all - just taken it from me. Finally he uttered the immortal words - "it's broken".

Long story short - I had to return it to Acer myself. No problems there, they collected it, fixed it and returned it.

Whatever you buy, make sure you have an external harddrive and/or online backup service in case the worst happens.

I must say I went from windows to apple and I've never looked back

yikes!

Check out DELL, they have many coupons and quality stuff, not some 15.6" "tiny screen" overpriced ***p from QVC. Acer/Asus is all good too.

Look for Lenovos. They are pretty stable.

I've recently bought 2 identical laptops for my kids at Costco, HP Pavilion dv6-2173cl with Windows 7 & 500 Gigs hard drive for $699 each. They seem to love their laptops and so far have no problem.

Actually, I'm writing to say make sure the warranty is long enough. I just sent back my desktop bought in 2008 for hard drive problem and because warranty is still there, manufacturer will replace or fix it free. I didn't buy extended warranty, just utilize the 2-year concierge service offered through Costco electronics program.

Good luck

Tiffany

well, based on my experience, I will not use Dell any more. In the passing 10 years, I used so many dell laptops (in my department), most of them will break in 3 years. The worst part of the dell is the power supply. for unknown reason, the laptop will fail to recognize it and can not be used to charge the battery any more which is a pain.

just my experience.


david

Can I ask an couple of extremely dumb questions.

1. If you're buying a separate camera capable of video, why do you care so much about the built in camera for?

2. What do you plan to do with 1080p video anyhow? Unless you're planning on selling Blu-Ray DVD's, wouldn't 720p do just fine?

Love my 17" widescreen Dell laptop from the Dell Outlet - there's some seriously good deals in there!

HI everyone,
thank you all so much for your help and advise. I actually did get all my shopping done today and so far im feeling pretty good about it.
First off i ended up buying a 15"6 HP DV6-2150us from the local office depot. There price was the cheapest even beating out walmart. They did however try to upsell me on a store warranty that would have costed me $200. I passed because it came with a 1year manufacturing warranty.
Then they tried to push another service on to me for $80-$100. They basically were going to set the computer up for me and take out alot of the software the computer comes with. They also would set it up so that the history and cookies would delete at a certain time. And then last they would install an antivirus program on it. I passed on all because once you add it all up i could have bought a whole other new computer. I do have 14 days to go back to the store and purchase these items so any advise would be much appreciated!? And one other thing they told me was that new computers dont come with a restore disk anymore so if you have a problem you have to bring it in to have them fix it. Is this something new and whats the reason for this??

Now, as far as the camera goes, i ended up getting a nikon D3000 dslr kit which included the lens,bag, slr photography school guide booklet and a 2gb sd card and batteries. I looked all over the place for cameras and ended up buying this one from walmart. My only dissapointments are that it doesnt have a hd video option but rather just a no sound basic video. Also the lcd screen is set in place and cant be moved around. And then the "automatic fire" mode will capture 3 pics a second which sounds awesome and im happy with that, however most all other cameras with that option could take alot more(one point and shoot camera could take over 200pics per second)and some of them were even cheaper.
I could have just gotten the next step up nikon with the extra options but it would have been an extra $300. Plus i already have an older sony handycam that uses those tiny cd's that i still need to learn to use. Also after getting back home i jumped on amazon and bhphoto to read all the reviews and im feeling alot better about my purchase. plus i have 30 days to try it out and see how much i like it!
Oh yea, another thing i noticed about the camera is that it said its compatible with windows xp and vista. Well i just bought a new laptop with win. 7. does that just mean the software it came with will only work on those OP systems and i can just purchase other software like photoshop and it will work or not?

ThinkPad - typing on one, own several of them.

My preference is the X-series. Also own some T-series.

They just work...and work...and work. Nothing but love from me for this brand.

Oh, and here's what you hear when you call for support when you call 800-IBM-PERSonal "Your call is being routed to IBM remote technical support center in Atlanta, GA". Well, now it says Lenovo support center in Altanta, GA, but it's not Mumbai or Chennai or Bangalore .

They cost more. They are worth the premium price.

17" weighs a ton. Get something thin and light.

Put this on auto-notify. Should be back in stock in a few days. Best bang for your buck.
Newegg.com - Acer Aspire AS5740G-6979 NoteBook Intel Core i5 430M(2.26GHz) 15.6" 4GB Memory DDR3 1066 500GB HDD 5400rpm DVD Super Multi ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5650

Nobody mentioned Toshiba.
Laptops, that's all they make.
Toshiba has never sold desktops
they have done one thing and one thing only
since they started.
As you may guess I am very happy with mine.

I'd never get a laptop from Best Buy or Office Depot. A previous poster mentioned Costco, and they can give you a lot of computer for your buck.

Personally, I tend to get a lot of computer stuff from Techbargains.com (a site that aggregates the best tech discounts). They list of a lot of laptops that are all great bargains. I'm in the habit of checking Techbargains at least once daily. Whenever I'm in the market for something, I set an "alert" that will automatically email me if it shows up discounted somewhere.

I'm using an Acer laptop and so for its performance is really good but mine's just 14.1". I hear Dell's good also but it is more expensive.

I have a HP laptop and have been really happy with it. The only thing that I don't like about it is I can't see the screen outside. So if anyone knows of a laptop that you can use outside I would be grateful.

Well so far its day 2 and im really enjoying my new HP. Also, From what ive seen and used, windows 7 is pretty cool. Alot better then the vista version i have on my desktop!
I havent done much yet with the camera. Im having to charge the battery. Another function i just realized about it that im not so happy about is that when taking a picture you have to look through the eye piece rather then being able to see with the 3inch monitor. Not sure the reason for that.

HP is alright, and don't shop at office depot because you're not getting the best bang for your bucks -- learn from my mistake ...

If you want a laptop with your price range, either go to neweggs or tigerdirect, bother offering good price and the best bang for your bucks.

Worst place to go is office depot, futureshop and best buy is so-so for your money.

IMO, the best "value" for your money is Acer if you're looking for a budget laptop, I have mine for 3 years and it's running fine.