flash Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 dad is looking to exchange all our PCs for laptops, because we live in devon and he works in surrey, he wants to be able to move the computer with ease. been looking at the dell computers, ive had one before, and it was alright, just wandering if anyone knows aything about these models, mainly the £375 model. laptop also ive heard some bad things about vista, anyway i can run XP on this laptop instead. cheers flash Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisNicholls Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 I have an Inspiron laptop and have had no problems with it, a different model though, the 6000. Acer are also worth a look. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pin Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 I have in the past and still do a lot of business with Dell. Solidly made, mind at that price they are trying to sell you 90 day warranty not a year (which I am not entirely sure they can do). The laptop you mention might be billed as "basic" but its more than enough to deal with most general computing tasks. You'd be mad to run vista until at least service pack 1 comes out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oly Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 Acer's give a lot of laptop for the money, had mine for about 3 years now and still very up to date...quite 'future proof'! Very reliable too, never had any trouble with mine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
naddan28 Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 Acer laptops can be quite dodgy esp the basic ones, at shcool we had 3 and everytime you disconected the battery charger to run it off the internal battery within 5 mins it overheated and turnt its self off. This was on at least 3 laptops and acer refused to sort it. Dell, PC's are **** imo had lots of problems with my gf's old one and bloody difficult to change parts. As for laptops no exp so no opinion really. Flash don't forget if your dad is buying these for work purposes make sure he reclaims vat. Before I went to uni my mates and I all brought laptops and they were fortunate enough to have family/parents with private companies so there £1k budget allowed them to buy £1.2k laptops. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Axe Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 We run a couple of Acer's at work. They have proven to be extremely good, reliable and robust. Downside, the battery time is just under an hour. Dell's wouldnt touch em with a barge poll. The unit actually appear to be well made but Dell's aftersales support is non-existant i'm afraid. They also suffer with alot of conflict issues with other software. These opinions are based on experiences I have had over many years. Things may have changed now?. I would highly recommend either Toshiba or HP. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pin Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 I would highly recommend either Toshiba or HP. Find him a £349 Tosh or HP and I'm sure he'll take your hand off On the Dell support front, I would qualify my comments - all my experience is with managed account sales and contract support (hardware only) which I have never found wanting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
novice cushie shooter Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 bought an acer aspire 5610z at xmas and have had no problems with it,personal i find the vista as good as xp but thats my opinion. happy hunting..computer that is Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SNAKEBITE Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 I have had an acer for just over a year now and I have found it excellent. The battery time is low as AXE has already said but I always leave it plugged in when I am using it. I chose a laptop over a desk top because of the limited room I have to have a desk top. That and I can put it away so my daughter does not ruin it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oly Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 Re Acers: A lot (particularly the larger ones) do have short battery time as they are designed as a small replacement to a desktop, they do however also do long battery time ones too - not sure on the current range but search around and you'll find them. Dad had one that after about 6 years switched off after overheating and wouldn't restart, but a quick trip to a local computer guy found that the tiny thin layer of insulation between a processor (I think!) and another component meant instanteous overheating. Put some new insulation on there and it's away again, fine! I would agree though - Toshiba's are still the dog's do da's - hence the price! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hawkeye Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 I have a toshiba that i bought when i worked for a living it has just sat on the floor in the office for the last 4 yrs i now just use it to backup my Photo's and Music.......good laptops but not cheap..... You get what you pay for in my opinion ........ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
monkeyjaimz Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 I havent had any experiance with Dell, although a friend bought one for him, one for his daughter and one for his son - and apparantly he's had great aftersales service from them. I have a HP dv8000 laptop at home I bought from pc world - dont spend any money with them, their after salesservice is almost as bad as nissan :unsure: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peter-peter Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 dad is looking to exchange all our PCs for laptops, because we live in devon and he works in surrey, he wants to be able to move the computer with ease.been looking at the dell computers, ive had one before, and it was alright, just wandering if anyone knows aything about these models, mainly the £375 model. laptop also ive heard some bad things about vista, anyway i can run XP on this laptop instead. cheers flash toshiba , running xp pro. with grisoft avg anti virus software, no problems at all good machine good software. you get what you pay for. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnGalway Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 Have had a Dell Inspiron 9300 for a good 18+ months now. It's never let me down and actually isn't showing signs of aging, not that I go looking for that fancy web video stuff lol (bloody dial up). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dunganick Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 i would recomend you look at the pc world website, look in the clearance area for laptops, you will get laptops that have been repaired under warrenty and repaired and then sold on at very competitve prices. Got my computer in a deal like this, £280 with everything but moniter and its not put a foot wrong in over a year now. Acer are very good for the money, as are packard bell at the moment. Value for money and build quality i think fujitsu siemens is very good. My old man has a fujitsu laptop and its very good, and my computer is also fujitsu, also very reliable. 90% of battery life is to do with the way people treat them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
naddan28 Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 Packard Bells are uselss, have you ever seen one in a commericial situation? No, every IT manager loathes them! Although saying that my old PB desktop was ok but I wouldn't go on that as laptops are a whole different kettle of fish. Fujitsu seimens went through 3 £1100k laptops in a month but that was more I batch issue and there customer service was amazing, even phoning the company I brought it from who refused a refund and threatened to withdraw franchising rights! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dunganick Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 found packard bell to be fine, each to their own :unsure: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NorfolkBoy Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 Bought a Toshiba Satellite M55 two years ago and its great - probably obsolete five minutes after I bought it but it works for me - only down sides are short battery life and the cooling fan is noisy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
potshot Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 All the major brands Dell, Acer, Evesham, etc produce much the same per pound however after nearly 20 years in It related biz IMO the only one who really delivers the goods (AT THE MOMENT) in terms of after sales service and back up is Evesham. Dells usual back up is bad to unbeleiveably appalling unless you happen to be a major business client. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pin Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 found packard bell to be fine, each to their own :unsure: A long time ago I held a senior position with DSG retail, honestly, leave Packard Bell well alone. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
naddan28 Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 PC World are shocking stay well clear bargain or not! My gf had a dodgy tosh satilette from them a while back and after being sent off for repair it came back 10 days later in the orginal state when sent. They refused to do anything, she said "fine will tell me dad" they sort of laughed and then asked who he was? Mentioned he was a senior partner with Reeves & Neylan (largest independent accountant in Kent) and also owned a private investment firm with them. Needless to say when the little twerp ran off to get the management and the company name was mentioned to him (a large corporate client spending £10'sk a year with them) he knew he was **** and magically they went from stubbon ******* to bend over backwards boot lickers. Amazing stuff! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dunganick Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 PC World are shocking stay well clear bargain or not! My gf had a dodgy tosh satilette from them a while back and after being sent off for repair it came back 10 days later in the orginal state when sent. They refused to do anything, she said "fine will tell me dad" they sort of laughed and then asked who he was? Mentioned he was a senior partner with Reeves & Neylan (largest independent accountant in Kent) and also owned a private investment firm with them. Needless to say when the little twerp ran off to get the management and the company name was mentioned to him (a large corporate client spending £10'sk a year with them) he knew he was **** and magically they went from stubbon ******* to bend over backwards boot lickers. Amazing stuff! Just because you have one bad experiance with 1 salesman is not to say this represents the store as a whole. Well they did the wrong thing, sales assistants or management should not have done anything different from what they were doing. They follow a set system, which they cannot do anything different with. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pin Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 One story of one bad thing is one thing, and usually should be disregarded. I could tell you thousands though Like the technician in one store who replaced 8 motherboards before realising it was the power supply at fault :unsure: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dunganick Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 One story of one bad thing is one thing, and usually should be disregarded. I could tell you thousands though Like the technician in one store who replaced 8 motherboards before realising it was the power supply at fault :unsure: once again 1 person, in a store with alot more employes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
naddan28 Posted May 8, 2007 Report Share Posted May 8, 2007 PC World are shocking stay well clear bargain or not! My gf had a dodgy tosh satilette from them a while back and after being sent off for repair it came back 10 days later in the orginal state when sent. They refused to do anything, she said "fine will tell me dad" they sort of laughed and then asked who he was? Mentioned he was a senior partner with Reeves & Neylan (largest independent accountant in Kent) and also owned a private investment firm with them. Needless to say when the little twerp ran off to get the management and the company name was mentioned to him (a large corporate client spending £10'sk a year with them) he knew he was **** and magically they went from stubbon ******* to bend over backwards boot lickers. Amazing stuff! Just because you have one bad experiance with 1 salesman is not to say this represents the store as a whole. Well they did the wrong thing, sales assistants or management should not have done anything different from what they were doing. They follow a set system, which they cannot do anything different with. Nick no they shouldn't have done anything different but the fact my gf was a 18yr old computer noob woman who they felt it was acceptable to refuse basic legal rights too. Pin, with my gf's tosh after 20mins of inspection (with me watching through the window) they came out saying it had no RAM wouldn't listen to me telling them they were looking in the EXPANSION slot hence why empty :unsure: took another 10mins for them to realise. DCG retail is PC World, where PIN worked! lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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