New Laptop?

[The Jogger]

I'm thinking of getting one of these today as the desktop has long had it's day
http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/hp-pa...102541-pdt.html?intcmpid=display~RR~~12102541

Hopefully in black, if they have it. I just need it for surfing the net and home office stuff , pics etc not into gaming. It looks good for the price and I get a free additional 2 yr warranty if I get it with my credit card. Will this be a reasonably good laptop for my needs.

 

[Leedsbusdriver]

Have a look round Amazon's warehouse deals,you can get some good bargains if you don't mind the odd packaging imperfection or odd scratch here and there.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-li...77F756P&qid=1331388637&sr=1-42&condition=used

 

[phil_hg_uk]

Have a look at samsung they are very nice laptops good spec and a good price. I have sold dozens of them and never had any problems with any of them, and I have never had any in for repair unlike some other makes I could mention

 

[I like Skol]

I was about to start an identical thread to this and the HP model mentioned in the OP was one of the ones I also have on the possible list (but I'll stick with the red I think, fancy a change).

I also spotted THESE at my local Sainsbury's and at only £329 plus I get another 5% disc through work so at about £315 hard to ignore. I only do basic stuff at home so no fancy gaming or movie manipulation required. The biggest requirement is surfing followed by some Word and Excel stuff and photo storage.

I have owned 2 Dell Inspiron laptops, the first bought way back in early 2004 which has just packed in completely so not bad service at 8 years old. The current one was bought in 2007 and although getting a bit temperamental (hence looking for a replacement) I am sure it will limp on for another couple of years as the back up machine. So on the whole I am happy with Dell laptops unless someone knows there are far better machines out there?

I have never had any in for repair unlike some other makes I could mention

Care to elaborate on that? (PM will do if you don't want to sound off in public )

I also spotted THIS heavily discounted Toshiba which seems comparable. How do the Toshiba machines fare in the real world?

 

[Red Light]

So on the whole I am happy with Dell laptops unless someone knows there are far better machines out there?

There are far better machines out there. I used to be a Dellboy but they went downhill badly IMO and the last Dell laptops I bought fell apart and the battery failed pretty quickly. Compare that with Sonys or Macs or Samsungs and there are a lot better laptops out there than Dells.

 

[The Jogger]

Ok, I went into pc world but the attitude of the spotty yoof, sales team totally put me off buying in that shop. I will purchase on line. I am looking at two

http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/samsung-series-3-300e5a-15-6-laptop-silver-11884734-pdt.html

http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/hp-pa...102541-pdt.html?intcmpid=display~RR~~12102541

Please advise ..........

 

[The Jogger]

Sorry to be a real pain, I intend to order one of these within the next hour, someone please make a recommendation.

http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/samsung-series-3-np300e5a-a01dx-15-6-laptop-silver-11296544-pdt.html



http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/samsung-series-3-300e5a-15-6-laptop-silver-11884730-pdt.html

 

[marinyork]

Trying to work out what the np means jogger. They are essentially the same laptop but with the other numbers standing for some variant of it.

 

[The Jogger]

Thanks MY, one thing I noticed if I read it right the other on e has a seperate graphics card while the NP is a shared one but that means nout to me. Then the NP is 1.3 mp and the other is .3mp I think.

 

[marinyork]

Thanks MY, one thing I noticed if I read it right the other on e has a seperate graphics card while the NP is a shared one but that means nout to me.

Well spotted. The B950 chip has the HD Graphics and the Core 2330 has the 3000. They are however both built into the chip (which is the same architecture). They are both integrated, but the 3000 is better than the original HD Graphics.

What is the difference between Intel® HD Graphics, Intel® HD Graphics 2000, and Intel® HD Graphics 3000?

Intel HD Graphics is the initial implementation of the graphics introduced with the Intel® Core™ i5-6xx processor series and the Intel® Core™ i3-5xx processor series. Intel HD Graphics 2000 and Intel HD Graphics 3000 are the second generation of processor graphics and perform much higher than the original version. The Intel HD Graphics 2000 and Intel HD Graphics 3000 were introduced with the Intel® Core™ i7-2xxx, Intel® Core™ i5-2xxx, and Intel® Core™ i3-2xxx processor series.

Actually PC world have made a typo. They say two completely different chips on the same page. Hmmm.

For the 300E5A they say the processor is a i3-2350 mobile and further down the page they say it is an Pentium B950. Although they are the same architecture, they have different graphics. A B950 would have the older non-3000 and a 2330 and 2350 would have a Intel HD Graphics 3000.

 

[marinyork]

See the NP one may be this although there are a lot of variants of it. Notice the similar code except the DX on the end. I'm really not distrusting the discrepencies between PC world and what Intel and Samsung themselves say. I think there are some typos on PC world's site, you can't work out what is what.

 

[The Jogger]

I think then maybe the other one as opposed to the NP, that will then be a second generation processor?

 

[marinyork]

Really not sure mate. If one is a 2330 and one is a 2350 then they should both have the same graphics - an Intel HD graphics 3000. But the one that may be the NP code on the samsung site actually says the chip is a 2350 rather than 2330. On the other hand PC world say that it has Intel HD Graphics, which should be wrong if it is the chip they say it is. On the 300E5A on PCWorld's site it does say that it has the 3000 graphics rather than the original, but is unsure which chip it is - it says both the B950 and i3-2350M. If it was the B950 it would be the standard rather than the 3000. Do you see what I mean?

 

[The Jogger]

Sort of, if it was you which one would you get?

 

[marinyork]

Sort of, if it was you which one would you get?

I'd get whichever one had the better graphics, the 3000. Or maybe both of them have it if one is a 2350 and one a 2330. But unless I'm going mad there are some typos on those pages. I just can't be sure which is which graphics card. I'd trust intel and samsung to be right more than PC world. They got any of these as display models where you could go into the shop and try and find out which graphics unit is in them?