What Is A Bad *ss Laptop Nowadays?

[85 Cutlass Brougham]

I went into Comp USA today to buy the last of my hard drive transfer stuff and looked at new laptops (I don't like desktops). I was shocked that they do not seem to have advanced much in processor speed since I bought mine back in March of 2007, and that mine now out spec's most of the ones costing less than $1,000 in all but processor speed and even then the difference was not big enough to be relevant. Mine (Gateway MX-8711 with upgrades) has a 1.73 gig dual core Pentium, 320gb hard drive and 2gb of RAM, and runs Vista home premium. I was hoping that the $700 laptop of today would have come with much more than this, but the processors were all around 2gigs or less! I was thinking of a new laptop when Windows 7 came out, but if the machines aren't much better I guess I'll stay where I am. I really wanted to upgrade to a 64 bit OS and maybe 8gb of Ram, but that does not seem possible for a reasonable price. Am I wrong though? Have they improved more than what I was seeing at the $700-$1,000 price point?

 

[phaZe]

Alienware is the best way to go. They build laptops that are high quality and have the best available hardware in them.

This $2000 laptop has 64bit Windows Vista:
http://www.alienware.com/products/area- ... KU-DEFAULT

This $1300 also has 64bit Technology:
http://www.alienware.com/products/area- ... KU-DEFAULT

 

[3XBrownCutty]

Glad to see this topic not to change the it, but I will be a Engineering student at Penn State Behrend College, and was wondering if any of you guys had suggestions for laptops as far as operating systems and stuff like that.

 

[StreetDogg316]

PhaZe took the words right out of my mouth, Alienware is a very good brand, And you can finance them too. I just built my dream system the other day, It was a Laptop, It would cost me around $4,600..... A bit extreme considering it will be obsolete in a years time. And as far as operating systems, I recommend Windows XP Pro, It is a good operating system, That is what I am running on my laptop right now. I have heard a few people say that, Believe it or not, Windows 98SE was the best and the most stable OS Microsoft made, I really have no complaints about it, But it is too outdated to be used in todays world... Kinda makes you wonder about Microsoft, If they really made a good operating system that everyone loves, Than why make more? I mean, Why keep making flops like Windows ME and Vista and potentially ruin your brand name?

 

[3XBrownCutty]

good point. I've heard that Vista isn't too good overall. What about the actual computer itself? What do you guys have, what do you reccomend? My sisters BF is into electronics, and he has an ASUS, as well as my sister.

I think he built it online, and they had any brand of anything you wanted to put in it as far as software, I think anyways. Would it be better to buy a laptop like from Best-Buy or to order a personalized one?

 

[foxtrot]

$4600!!!

I've had many cars that were less than that!!! PC’s are a commodity slave labor product that I’m not willing to pay top dollar for. The only exception in my mind would be extreme gaming or business use – also should be noted that most high end business computers aren’t PC’s….

 

[phaZe]

I've been running Vista for a while and it's just fine for me. It looks a lot better and those "annoying" security pop-ups only happen when you try to install something and they're not very annoying.

If you don't have the processor, ram or video card to run it, you probably won't like it very much.

 

[StreetDogg316]

I have a IBM Thinkpad T-40, It's not the most powerfull laptop in the world, But it is alot faster than I thought when I bought it. And $4600 was for one of the top-of-the-line Alienware laptops built for gaming. And that's kinda one of my points about Vista, I mean I can understand upgrading your RAM to use it, And MAYBE even your processor, But having to upgrade your Video Card? Who ever heard of that? That's why MS is coming out with Windows 7, Because they gave up on Vista because people were having problems and constantly complaining about it. If you are just a casual user who just likes to get on the internet, Vista is fine, But if you like gaming(like me), I heard it is a nightmare. If you want a good 64-bit Operating System, Get Windows XP Pro. I will wait to see what Windows 7 is like, Untill then, I will keep Windows XP. And as far as buying one or building one, It's up to you. If you want one for the internet, Videos Etc. Just buy one from Best Buy. But if your into Gaming, Get one custom built to your specs, Most that you buy from the store is not that good for gaming, Especially the games that are coming out in the near future. Hope this helped.

 

[phaZe]

People were having problems because companies like HP, Dell and Gateway were selling computers that were suppose to work with Vista, but were actually just the required amount of hardware and not the recommended.

 

[StreetDogg316]

Lol, I heard about that too. Another dumb move my MS, To put Vista on one of their own laptops that will barely run it. If I wasen't that much into games like I am, I would get a Mac laptop.