Looking for notebooks, any advice.

[[JiF]KellysHero]

Anyone have experience with Asus notebooks? I'm looking at this one,
http://www.microcenter.com/single_produ ... id=0373587" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

A bit above my budget, but seems to be packed with some good features, just not sure how well Asus notebooks stand up. It does have a USB3.0, 6 gigs of ram, and seems sturdy.

Next would be this one from Dell, the 15r.
http://www.microcenter.com/single_produ ... id=0373503" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

And finally a Lenovo,
http://www.microcenter.com/single_produ ... id=0375282" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Only one that is actually reviewed, and has 4.8/5 stars. No HDMI out though.

One upgrade I'd like to do is add a SSD, and from what I've read the Dell you have to take a lot of it apart to get to the hard drive.

Any suggestions? Not looking for anything bigger or smaller than a 15.6" screen, will be used for surfing, email and word processing, so no BF3 on it.

[[JiF]Uncle Stinky]

Kelly - I jut did a lot of research to replace my dead laptop, and finally decided to get an Acer Aspire Timelinex 4830TG 6450. It's got a 14" screen, which I wanted for convenience, and more importantly it has an nVidia GeForce GT 540M card. This line of laptops has gotten good reviews, and seems to be many people's choice for a lower-budget gaming machine.

I got it on Amazon. It listed for $729, was reduced to $644, then I got a $50 Amazon gift card, a $40 credit on a new Amazon credit card, and finally free 2-day shipping. It arrives Monday, which happens to be my birthday!

http://www.amazon.com/Acer-TimelineX-AS ... pd_cp_pc_1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The Acer Aspire 5830TG has a 15.6" screen, but I see it is now listing for $725.

http://www.amazon.com/Acer-TimelineX-AS ... 164&sr=8-1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I'll post my impressions of it after it arrives Monday.

------------------
Adding after seeing Phantomx's comment. The Acer is supposed to get 8 hours of battery life.

[[JiF]phantomx]

I've procured a lot of laptops for my employees. We used to be an HP shop then moved to dells. But I've moved everybody to asus one recently. I am personally very happy with my asus. I have a Ul30 and I get about 6 hours of active work on its battery.

I would recommend an asus.

[[JiF]Lt Gav]

I wouldn't recommend HP/Compaq they don't seem to last very long!
I don't know what other companies customer support is like, but HP sucks as far as I & many like me feel.
I currently have a fairly high end HP that has been nothing but trouble virtually from the first day out of the box. All the fixes for the problems I have had, have not been supplied by HP but the community of disgruntled users in their forums.
I am just about to take delivery of my 1st Dell notebook, an XPS with a 3Gb 3D Graphics card & 3D capable screen. My Christmas present from the company I work for.

[[JiF]KellysHero]

Have also expanded a bit to include a Sony Viao "E" series, mainly because it is for my wife and comes in pink. Actually it seems like a really solid system, core i3 second gen, 4 gigs of ram, 15.6" screen. A bit pricey though as it is hard to find deals on Sony's. The build quality is what I like about it. Not a lot of flex and seems solid. I think some of the lower end systems, the build quality is what is going to hurt in the long run. She does want to carry it around the house, and we have a 15 month old that loves to bang things (not sure how the remote control has survived as long as it has), so it may take some abuse.

One weird thing that I can't figure out is the 14" model is slightly more expensive than the 15.5" display especially when everything else seems to be pretty much the same. Is it since they are cramming the same functionality into a smaller form factor?

Also, agreed about HP. I have one for work that is relatively new, and it is pretty good, but have an issue with the docking station. About half the time it won't pop off the station. I need to put it back on, try and release it again and again. Pain in the butt.

[[JiF]Uncle Stinky]

The Acer arrived today and it looks sweet. I'll put it through the paces over the holidays.

I agree on HP. My desktop is an HP Elite, and I'm sending it back soon for the motherboard to be replaced. So many people had problems with them that they filed a class action suit, and HP has agreed to replace all the MBs for certain models, even if they are out warranty.

[[JiF][AARP]Tissueman]

Just picked up a Samsung 300E5A-A02 for Tissuema'am. Her old Dell was down to less than 3 GB of free space on her HD. Since she got a new camera she filled up the remaining disk space pretty fast. It was only a 120 GB HD. So now she has 500 GB to play with and a much faster laptop. She has an i3 2350 M and 6 GB memory so I think she'll be pleased with performance. She watches videos of the grandkids and plays solitaire mainly - oh and buys stuff on ebay.

The best part was my son did the file transfer and got rid of the junk programs that came with it. I need to set up the email for her, but that isn't too hard. Plus we finally got rid of Vista.

I was hoping hers would last a few more months since I bought a new system on Black Friday, but it was getting too hard to keep it operational.

Tissue

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Samsung+-+1 ... Id=4707182" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;