In the search for a Laptop...

[Maggot6]

Who - This laptop will be for me...
What - Hopefully a pretty inexspensive laptop, that will get the job done.
Where - Germany,
When - From this July until Next June (11 months and a bit)
Why - Using a host families computer would just feel awkward, plus I will be doing alot of work
How - Well, I need to be somewhere to physically buy this, in Canada.

Long story short, I am accepted to become an Exchange student in Germany for my 11th year in highschool. I need a laptop for all of my schoolwork, and whatever other activities I will ever need. I am not entirely friendly towards Macs, so unless it has something huge over a windows machine I'd rather not hear about it. I am looking for something that will get the job done, and last me until I go into University/College a few years from now. I have no idea where to start, so point me in a general direction for things I should look for, and wouldn't expect from only owning / using a desktop computer...

Thank you, for well, sharing your knowledge in advance.

Wow, 11 years in highschool, and I am only 15! I think that is an accomplishment...

[maxama10]

Hmm well I have a Powerbook G4 and absolutely love it..the only fault i can really find is that i bought a portable hard drive usb powered and apparently my ports are powerful enough to power it. but anyways err Macbook Pro? 2000$? On the Windows realm of things Id suggest a Toshiba Sattellite, not sure of their cost but from what ive heard theyre pretty decent. Id deffiently reccomend getting a large hard drive. My 80 gigs isnt cutting it and ive only had mine for 6months? Anyways id say like 120 gigs or so if youre into music and videos. err other than that dunno what to tell ya. Goodluck though, sounds like an adventure.

[govnamac]

my 11th year in highschool.

You've been in high school for 11 years? Man just give up and drop out


BTW, I bought a dell, and they're decent. Nothing special, and they run pretty well when you take delete all the crap they install for you. That stuff slowed it down like you wouldn't believe. Best of all, they are pretty damn cheap

[Glickman]

BTW, I bought a dell, and they're decent. Nothing special, and they run pretty well when you take delete all the crap they install for you. That stuff slowed it down like you wouldn't believe. Best of all, they are pretty damn cheap

meh, dells are alright, but their service is... well. what service? hehe.

i would highly recommend Acer, their laptops are extreamly thin, light, tough, and great specs for their price.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/category/category_slc.asp?MfrId=12&CatId=17

most of the time i dont recommend buying anything from where i work (computer renaissance tech) but acer's are the exception, and will be what im personally buying.


i will also recommend that if possible you should wait till august, because there will be many back to school sales on specifically laptops

[SpecialBlend2786]

I say Acer or TOSHIBA

[9868Classic]

I have a Gateway with a AMD 64 processor I picked up at BestBuy locally for 1200. Its now priced down around 899-999 and its a great machine. No problems running any games. Little screen lag. It came with an upgraded graphics card(256kmb) and 1gig of ram. Runs flawlessly.

Nice big screen too.

[Maggot6]

Well, through a bit of searching I have finally decided to go with

http://www.costco.ca/en-CA/Browse/Productgroup.aspx?Prodid=10290413&whse=BCCA&topnav=&cat=20133&hierPath=84*20133*

[sbpyro]

Stay away from toshiba's
Have had 3 failed (2 seperate customers and 1 replacement) from the same problem
and apparently it is not worth it for them to fix the problem just easier to deal with the repairs.

[Recon by Fire]

I have a Fujitsu Lifebook with pretty respectable stats. Nice laptops

[pachytriton]

I've had 2 prostars, they are real powerhouses (for a laptop). Nothing bad I can say about them.

https://www.pro-star.com

edit: don't expect to play any games if you go with the costco machine-sis graphics cards have no shader support

[SpecialBlend2786]

Stay away from toshiba's
Have had 3 failed (2 seperate customers and 1 replacement) from the same problem
and apparently it is not worth it for them to fix the problem just easier to deal with the repairs.

At the place I work we have about 7 Toshiba laptops not including my own, never had a single problem with any of them.

My Toshiba Tablet works like a dream, and my mom's Toshiba has never had any problems either. What was the problem you were running into?

[Dubstar112]

I just bought a HP dv1550 se. It was $949 USD at Best Buy. It has good specs and WiFi built in so it is fully capable wherever you go. I suggest any HP unit because I feel they have the best deals out there and the service is up there with the best of them. It really boils down to what you need, want and can afford though.

[Recon by Fire]

My wife has been wanting a laptop to make use of the wireless network at home; homework, web browsing, and chatting with me on messenger mostly. I bought her a new Dell laptop tonight (1.5ghz, 1gig RAM, 60gig HD, 15.4" widescreen, wireless of course) for $530

I love Ebay

[Maggot6]

edit: don't expect to play any games if you go with the costco machine-sis graphics cards have no shader support

I don't play many games at all anyway, but would the terrible shader support inhibit any other common usages of a computer?