How do you buy a laptop?

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#1

I’ve literally never done it.
I have £500-£1,000.
I want to
use the internet,
stream tv and music,
ms office package,
do a bit of Music recording (I have the separate interface and mic And software etc already)
probably use illustrator too
I want it to boot quickly and not get all slow and confused if I double click on things or run 4 programmes at once.

Want a pc not a Mac. Would consider second hand/reconditioned if people can recommend a place to get one from.

Any help greatly appreciated
x

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Any reason I shouldn’t get this laptop?
#3

Usually just go outside and buy one eh

#4

I was going to tag him but, well no time like the present @1101010
Theoooooooo!

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#5

same way you buy anything else? just go into a shop and point at one you like

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#7

I’m outside my house waving a monkey around, wish me luck.

#8

serious note, avoid Currys and all the big stores unless you really need to see it first. Use an online shop like ebuyer, laptopsdirect or scan.

You’ll need at least 8GB RAM for multitasking and watching films. Brands don’t really matter but ASUS are the top of the line, and Dell are really good quality but more expensive usually as their screens are the best out there.

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#11

I’ll give you 499 for it

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#12

I don’t know if they even sell laptops without SSD hard drives now but make sure you get one with a SSD hard drive.

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#13

I bought a refurbed Macbook from mac4less.com or something like that.

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#14

Cool thank you. Any brands to avoid?

#15

One of those things where the difference between a £500 and a £1000 one will actually be a big difference, so I find you need to really nail down a ~£100 price range and look within that.

Then buy the one with the most RGB lighting

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#16

I will look this up thank you

#17

I’ve never liked Acer or Sony

HP are the working class brand. Lenovo do well too

ASUS and Dell upper tier

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#19

…entering my card details right now :grimacing:

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#20

The last laptop I bought was a mid range one (650 quid?) and the difference in quality (build, speed, reliability, performance) compared to my last low range (450 quid) one before that was staggering.

That may be just down to the tech moving on I suppose.

#21

Good advice thanks

#22

Cool yeah that tells me something to build on Eps’s advice. I guess need to set my budget around 6/700

#23

Also decide if you actually want to play games on it, because I know you didn’t say you want it to play games, but I don’t want you back in here in six weeks going “wtf guys I bought this £1000 Lenovo and it can’t play Call of Duty, thanks a lot”. If you want it to run basically any game then it needs beefier graphics capabilities and that takes up a chunk of the budget so don’t assume that a more expensive one will have it.

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#25

Good tip, thanks. I don’t game, however I am unemployed as of 23 minutes ago.
(Work want their laptop back the pricks)

#26

gaming laptops are a bit of a trap, you might as well get a PC. I did get a good one 4 years ago built by Gigabyte, and it only really runs modern titles from around that time

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