• Need help looking for a new / used laptop under $1000
    14 replies, posted
My U46E died a while back and I'm really missing the power it had. I filled out the Toms Hardware guide for less confusion. 1. What is your budget? $1000 2. What is the size of the notebook that you are considering? 12"-14" 3. What screen resolution do you want? 1366x768 or higher for 12", 1440x900 or higher for 13/14" 4. Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop? Portable 5. How much battery life do you need? 4 Hours or higher 6. Do you want to play games with your laptop? If so then please list the games that you want to with the settings that you want for these games. (Low,Medium or High)? Yes. Garry's Mod 13+ (High) Team Fortress 2 (High) Planetside 2 (Low) TES VI Online (Low) Far Cry 3 (Low) Other new titles (Low) I feel anything better than the sandy bridge integrated will handle this quite well. 7. What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo/Video editing, Etc.) Office, Web Browsing, Possible 3D modelling in the future 8. How much storage (Hard Drive capacity) do you need? 120Gb (SSD Preferred, HDD acceptable) 9. If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post their links. Newegg, Tiger Direct 10. How long do you want to keep your laptop? 5-7 Years 11. What kind of Optical drive do you need? DVD ROM/Writer,Bluray ROM/Writer,Etc ? DVD-RW or better 12. Please tell us about the brands that you prefer to buy from them and the brands that you don't like and explain the reasons. I will not buy from: No: Asus (questionable designs, dwindling quality) Acer (cheap) Gateway (owned by Acer) Toshiba (bad experience with quality and support) Sony (lacking quality and design; bad apple) Cyberpower PC / Ibuypower (does this really need explanation?) Preferred: Lenovo (Thinkpad models only, Haswell X40 models not acceptable due to quality and design issues) MSI (long time trusted parts manufacture) Gigabyte (long time trusted parts manufacture) Sager / Clevo (long time trusted custom laptop manufacture) 13. What country do you live in? United States 14. Please tell us any additional information if needed. I would prefer it if the laptop: (these are not required, but it would make one laptop more preferable over another) 1. Has a 3 (physical button) trackpoint 2. Has a rear cpu exhaust 3. Has an option for 9 cell removable battery 4. Has Nvidia optimus technology, if it comes with a dedicated card 5. Windows 7 and Windows 8 recovery options (Example: 7 installed through 8 downgrade rights from factory, comes with 7 and 7 restore partition, and windows 8 restore disks) I am currently looking at these laptops: Sager NP7338 Thinkpad L430 Thinkpad X230 Thinkpad T430 (Nvidia) Latitude E3440 (HD+ screen, Dedicated graphics advertised, however cannot be configured) Thinkpad T450 (If release with physical button trackpoint) Thank you in advance
Get a Thinkpad T430 and put an SSD and 9 cell in it. That should be well under 1000 dollars. Do you have a desktop?
I found 2 under $1000 with the NVS 5400M. 1 has an I5 and is $720: [url]http://www.ebay.com/itm/Lenovo-ThinkPad-T430-14-HD-i5-3320M-NVidia-NVS-5400M-8Gb-500Gb-Win7Pro-OPT-SSD-/281426184968?pt=Laptops_Nov05&hash=item41864ecb08[/url] The other is $990 and has an I7 and an SSD preinstalled: [url]http://www.ebay.com/itm/Lenovo-ThinkPad-T430-i7-2-9GHz-180GB-SSD-8GB-RAM-1600x900-LED-1GB-NVIDIA-Optiums-/151380334646?pt=Laptops_Nov05&hash=item233ef89836[/url] I can throw in a samsung 840 for $100 on the I5 and still walk with $80 leftover, is the I7 worth that? And yes, I have a (dated) desktop, Q6700, 4gb, GTX 460, plays everything I want it to.
Just get a Y40/50/410p/510p. They're no Thinkpads, but they're built god damn stronk.
Dell latitudes are very nice laptops, cheap too.
[QUOTE=fishyfish777;45889102]Just get a Y40/50/410p/510p. They're no Thinkpads, but they're built god damn stronk.[/QUOTE] My Y500 is a year old, doesn't travel, and is currently disintigrating. Built like pudding, more like. [editline]4th September 2014[/editline] And it will never do more than 3.5 hours even in single graphics configuration.
Didn't anyone tell you HCl cooling wasn't a good idea?
The best for the price/size/battery life and manufacturer choice is Sager. Check with resellers like XoticPC and see if there are any back to school deals that are still available. I really liked my Np9150 in build in design, but it was way to big and overpowered. Kind of wish I went with something smaller like the NP7338 you suggested. Also Thinkpads are very pricey for the performance and usually come with workstation gpu's or a FHD option that costs another $200+
New thinkpads are shit. Had one come in the shop today as it fell off the customers coffee table. The base plastics and palm rest plastics cracked so badly that it was held together by the motherboard and other internal components, also one of the hinges had come away from the bottom half. Built like ancient china more like.
[QUOTE=Trekintosh;45894047]My Y500 is a year old, doesn't travel, and is currently disintigrating. Built like pudding, more like. [editline]4th September 2014[/editline] And it will never do more than 3.5 hours even in single graphics configuration.[/QUOTE] I dunno, my friend's Y580 was pretty much pristine after several thousand hours of gaming and one person I know has a pretty god damn pristine Y500, as well. As I see it they seem to hold up pretty well. [editline]5th September 2014[/editline] At least it's not Sager where you get the computer and it's already falling apart.
[QUOTE=Trekintosh;45894047]My Y500 is a year old, doesn't travel, and is currently disintigrating. Built like pudding, more like. [editline]4th September 2014[/editline] And it will never do more than 3.5 hours even in single graphics configuration.[/QUOTE] IMO the Y500 isn't meant to be a good traveling solution. I've had mine for over a year now, it's more of a convenient desktop replacement that can be moved around easily. If you're planning to use it on the road for primary usage however, I wouldn't recommend one. I honestly only got mine because it's more convenient for me to have my primary PC able to go with me wherever I go without having to deconstruct the whole thing for transport. Other than key fading, it's still in excellent condition. I doubt running a SLI configuration on it helps it's life-span, however, but then again I never bothered.
Y500 series isn't <14" I also stated I wouldn't take any lenovo's that weren't last-generation thinkpads, because yes, they are in fact, piles of shit. I'm also looking into the X201/220/230, and the tablet versions, although I really don't have a use for a tablet.
[QUOTE=aPanzerIV;45905138]Y500 series isn't <14" I also stated I wouldn't take any lenovo's that weren't last-generation thinkpads, because yes, they are in fact, piles of shit. I'm also looking into the X201/220/230, and the tablet versions, although I really don't have a use for a tablet.[/QUOTE] I'd kill a man for an x201 with a better screen
Good luck running planetside 2 on an X201 though, lol.
[QUOTE=fishyfish777;45906428]Good luck running planetside 2 on an X201 though, lol.[/QUOTE] Planetside ran pretty well on my I5 2410, can't imagine 1 generation making a huge difference in speed. I'll cut you some slack on the lenovo. I searched Xotic pc today and found the closest thing to what I want, other than the sager... Is an Asus. [url]http://www.xoticpc.com/asus-e451ldxb51-p-7150.html[/url] 14", ulv processor, nvidia switchable graphics, cheap, 9 cell battery, 8 pro (can use downgrade rights to 7 pro), also $100 cheaper than the sager, but at the cost of a shittier screen.
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