Seeking Some PC Purchasing Advice

13 years ago

It depends what you're going to use the PC for...if its just a internet appliance (surf, fb, twitter, webmail) then you should consider something easy. Personally I would do ubuntu (linux) if that's all I was going to do.

However, in your case I would just buy a scaled down laptop around $600. I wouldn't really spend any more than this until something else comes out. With windows, you'll probably have to toast the hard drive eventually. I'm running with Win7 and although fast...I need a cleanout...that won't happen with mac or linux though...so keep that in mind.

Andy

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Zanti 13 years ago

Thanks Andy,

It would be used for general purposes. The daughter will use it for high-school.
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- JhonMoney 13 years ago
  
  A dell branded computer with
  2 GB RAM
  3.8 Processor
  80 GB HDD
  
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Cyberkntsean

13 years ago

There is 2 classes of Laptops: Cheap and Business the Business class lasts longer (in theory) $700 and above starts heading toward the Business class.

Do not skimp on the warranty, you are so screwed without it, you need 2 yrs minimum especially with kids.

2 GB of memory minimum

HP and Dell customer service are decent ... I prefer HP's customer Service .. why? 10 years dealing with both of them.

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Zanti 13 years ago

Thanks Jhon and Cyber,

Yes, I would say business class. Of the one's she's looked at, would one of the hp's be the right direction. She's planning on purchasing this weekend.

Open to any and all suggestions, just give me a little something to go on so when I talk to her I can say, "well the reason people like this one is because of..."

Thanks, Z
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- edlewis 13 years ago
  
  Hey Brian,
  
  I have had very good luck with my HP. Don't know much about the customer service as the only time I called, it was some fluke problem with my charger and not the laptop as I suspected.
  
  Now I am a bit "old school" even though I'm not that "old"...but if I were buying a laptop for a 13-year old, I don't think I'd spend quite that much.
  
  Best Buy always has these types of laptops on weekly sales. For $600 or so, you can get a quality laptop. Not the top of the line, but very good. Heck, the HP I am using right now is 1 1/2 old and I have had zero problems with it....paid about $600 for it - and that was 18 months ago.
  
  A laptop at that price now gets you way more power and hard drive storage than what I have.
  
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- Cyberkntsean 13 years ago
  
  A side note -
  
  My niece and her 2 cousins are in K12-dot-com home schooling program and they gave them a HP laptops to use.
  
  I would also go with the faster Hard drive 120 or 160 GB - it's not that she may never use the Hard Drive space, you want the Drive with the faster Hard Drive chips, the newer the Hard Drive the faster the chips will be, the faster the data access time will be, the more pleasant the experience will be.
  
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Zanti

13 years ago

Hey Ed, Thanks for the info. Sounds like the HP is moving ahead. I should say that I'm sure mom is going to also be using the computer also. So it won't just be for the 13 year old.

So at a price range between $600 - 1K she should be able to find something.

Thanks,

Brian

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Bradley J Anderson

13 years ago

Originally Posted by JhonMoney

A dell branded computer with
2 GB RAM
3.8 Processor
80 GB HDD

Personally, I would go with a bigger hard drive, but I always recommend Dell. I've never known anyone to be disappointed with them. No cheap, 3rd party parts like most other brands. Service is top-notch.

Between myself, family and friends, I deal with about 20 of them on a regular basis. (I'm the goto guy when someone needs an update or to install something or whatever). The only time I've ever seen one crash is when infected with a virus, or if the operator did something weird, but I've always got them running again.

The only parts I've ever had to replace is a fan on one, and a power supply on the other, but that's the 2 parts that are always most replaced on any brand.

The computer I'm typing this on is a 6 yr old Dell desktop. The only time I've reinstalled Windows is when I upgraded to Windows 7, and it still runs just as fast as the day I got it. I still get very high benchmarking scores with it even compared to today's models. In fact, I'm usually faster/better than 80-90% of the newer ones.

Ask any techie or repair person and I'm sure they would agree.

Originally Posted by edlewis

Hey Brian,

I have had very good luck with my HP. Don't know much about the customer service as the only time I called, it was some fluke problem with my charger and not the laptop as I suspected.

Cost vs. features makes HP a great buy, but they have a serious issue with frying motherboards. And support is non-existent with HP's.

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carlos123 13 years ago

Just a couple of other suggestions...

In my opinion there is no sense paying anything upward of $600 for a laptop for your described use.

Better yet...get on craigslist and look for a used laptop. There are all kinds of incredible deals there. I got my laptop (Compaq CQ60) for a measly $150. I probably could have talked him down to a $100.

In my case the screen had a couple of pixel cracks (that I personally can live with just fine).

But...there were all kinds of other deals there when I was looking.

I've been running Ubuntu Linux for years. Much better than Windows in my opinion. Virtually virus free due mainly to it's security policy out the starting gate in that a user never runs as root (i.e. the administrator) so that even if viruses get through there isn't a whole lot they can do to attach themselves to the computer and cause havoc.

Very stable operating system and it's free.

But then again I am a web developer. For games and such Windows is the way to go.

I'd forgot about warranties if you buy a used laptop. Just use it till it fails (and they all do) and then buy another one. Cheaper than a new laptop with a fancy warranty tacked on.

And they don't fail that greatly all that often. So you may end up with a used one that will last a very long time.

Always ask why they are selling, whether they have done any of their own repairs, and check everything on any used laptop.

Ubuntu doesn't run as well on all laptops so if you decide on Ubuntu get yourself a Knoppix copy (search online), burn it to CD, and take the CD with you to boot up the laptop with a temporary Linux (i.e. Knoppix) to make sure your peripherals run well on Linux.

Also...very important! Ask whether the hard disk has the original operating system as it came from the factory. Check and double check for a restore partition!! If the os has been reinstalled and wrongly so...you may be missing the recovery partition and when (not if) you need to reinstall it yourself...you will be left with a nice paper weight if there is no way to recover the original OS.

Recovery CD's are even better but rare these days.

Even with a new one...ask and make sure you can restore the operating system in case you have to replace the hard disk or Windows registry gets corrupted or otherwise.

Carlos
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luca6899

13 years ago

I would say build your own, but if she just needs it for school... The average laptop for 500-600$ is more than enough!!

She should get 4GB of Ram, a nice processor, fair enough graphics card built-in, and more. I assume she will be studying, using messenger, skype, word, excel and all that. So don't spend more money than needed. She will be very happy with a laptop costing 600$ I bought 1 yesterday for my dad for 440 euros (550$ more or less) and it is perfect, for business needs, also working with excel, word, and all kinds of working software. Works like a charm! Good luck

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doorkicker13

13 years ago

I have a Dell Inspiron 1525 that I purchased while in Afghanistan in 2008.. This thing is pretty rugged as I've dragged it along pretty much everywhere I've gone. I've never had a problem with it. It came with 2GB ram and I upgraded to 4GB. I actually paid $450 for it when best buy was having a back to school sale.. just food for thought.

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JamesGw

13 years ago

I'd recommend a Dell laptop like everyone else has. I've also had good experiences with HP. If you're doing a desktop, IMO it's always better to build your own, but that's just me. If you can't offer support on it, though, then go for Dell or HP again.

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Bradley J Anderson

13 years ago

Google 'hp tech support reviews' and check out all the horror stories.

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Zanti

13 years ago

Thanks so much for the information. She just called me and I told her that I have a lot of really good information. Yes, she's going to buy something tomorrow. Looks like btw. Dell and HP now.

I don't think mom is going to go for a used one. So it will be a new laptop. From what it looks like, the 2 yr. warranty and security installs alone will cost about $300 from micro center. She was told that micro center was a better place to buy than best buy.

Like I said in the op, I'm a mac guy so I'm not much help in pc matters but I'm learning a lot from you guys.

Thanks so much.

Brian

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Bradley J Anderson

13 years ago

Originally Posted by Zanti

Thanks so much for the information. She just called me and I told her that I have a lot of really good information. Yes, she's going to buy something tomorrow. Looks like btw. Dell and HP now.

I don't think mom is going to go for a used one. So it will be a new laptop. From what it looks like, the 2 yr. warranty and security installs alone will cost about $300 from micro center. She was told that micro center was a better place to buy than best buy.

Like I said in the op, I'm a mac guy so I'm not much help in pc matters but I'm learning a lot from you guys.

Thanks so much.

Brian

Buy it online directly from Dell. It's cheaper, they always have sales going on to save even more, and you can get 3 years of support (from Dell) for just a little extra.

Depending on the model, you can also pick colors or pictures for the case, lighted keyboards, that sort of thing.

This model starts at $399, and it's a work horse:

http://www.dell.com/us/p/inspiron-15r/pd

The 2 year warranty and 'security installs' from Micro Center cost well over half of this model already, and directly from Dell it comes with a warranty and security software already on it (for the first year, at least)

If you buy it tomorrow, and it's not a big custom job, you can probably have it at your door by Tuesday. And saved at least $200 in process, probably more.

I'm a big fan of Micro Center, myself, but they overcharge immensely. They charged a buddy of mine $120 to take his external hard drive and move it from one case to another (his power supply had fried). He could have spent $15 for the same case at Micro Center and I could have switched it in 2 minutes for him for free.

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Zanti

13 years ago

Thank you Sniffer, err, I mean Brad

I think she will like this idea. I actually think my last pc before switching over to the darkside of mac was either a dell or a gateway.

Yes, the warranty and software protection seemed very high to me also. I also like micro center but I've only used them for small stuff, routers etc.

Thanks again all of you, for contributing to my ongoing learning.

Brian

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Bradley J Anderson

13 years ago

Originally Posted by Zanti

Thank you Sniffer, err, I mean Brad

I think she will like this idea. I actually think my last pc before switching over to the darkside of mac was either a dell or a gateway.

Yes, the warranty and software protection seemed very high to me also. I also like micro center but I've only used them for small stuff, routers etc.

Thanks again all of you, for contributing to my ongoing learning.

Brian

Gateways are very nice, as well, but way too expensive. Hard to find local people to work on them, too.

A bit off-point, but actually that guy in my avatar is just doing a common bodybuilding pose. When I came up with the idea for the name, I found this pic, cropped it so the armpit was more or less in the center, and now everyone seems to think he's sniffing his underarm.

It was actually quite unintentional, but I think it's funny. I've even had a fellow Warrior PM me saying she wouldn't even read my posts because she found it so 'terribly disgusting'.

But anyway...

We now return to our regularly scheduled programming...

Thanks

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bnwebm

13 years ago

Hi Brian,

It may be a bit late to be useful but I figured i'd throw my two cents in. I still have my working Gateway desktop that I purchased in 1999 (I have the receipt). The only thing that ever went awry on it was the fan about five years ago, causing the drive to overheat. I went to the local PC store with fan in hand, along with it's three wires attached. The tech wanted $100 just to "check" the PC and I wanted to tell him to stuff it, lol. I asked a rookie tech what the extra wire was (there were only two in the proprietary replacement fan) and it turned out to be an unnecessary tachometer. I bought a $10 fan off the shelf and put it in and it still runs fine. It's a 2.2Ghz, so it's a decent PC if I need to run any Windows programs. I'm all about Mac now though, but if I had to choose, i'd go Gateway. I've had HP and Dell too, but never have purchased a warranty nor needed one. Hard drives are fairly impossible to fry and take two minutes to replace. Yes, the "techs" will tell you it's fried, but doesn't mean it is. Back everything up on a $50 external and you wouldn't have to worry about a warranty if you're handy with a screwdriver.

Originally Posted by Zanti

Thank you Sniffer, err, I mean Brad

I think she will like this idea. I actually think my last pc before switching over to the darkside of mac was either a dell or a gateway.

Yes, the warranty and software protection seemed very high to me also. I also like micro center but I've only used them for small stuff, routers etc.

Thanks again all of you, for contributing to my ongoing learning.

Brian

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Zanti

13 years ago

Hi bnwebm, it's never to late to share, thanks. No decision has been made so I'm definitely open and seeking more information.

I really appreciate you sharing your story. I don't think she's going to be going under the hood to fix anything though. Which is why the warranty/tech support is very important to her.

This information will help in making a decision.

Thanks,

Brian

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bnwebm

13 years ago

No problem, I understand why people get warranties, I just hate to see people get ripped off. Hope it helped.

Originally Posted by Zanti

Hi bnwebm, it's never to late to share, thanks. No decision has been made so I'm definitely open and seeking more information.

I really appreciate you sharing your story. I don't think she's going to be going under the hood to fix anything though. Which is why the warranty/tech support is very important to her.

This information will help in making a decision.

Thanks,

Brian

Thanks

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Zanti

13 years ago

lol, disgusting huh. I could tell right away it was a bodybuilding pose, very unique with the name. Sometimes the unintentional makes for the best results.

Brian

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Zanti

13 years ago

Most definitely helped, thanks for sharing. I don't care much for warranties either but I do get apple care on my products.

Brian

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Seeking Some PC Purchasing Advice

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