Stooples Acer 18.4" laptop 4G Ram 320G HD for 1K

[TorontoFish]

As a RDFer, I have been troubled by a tough task. A friend of mine just landed with a new job and need a new laptop, and the company will pay for the cost. I have been helping a lots of my friends find really really cheap laptops, but this time is not that easy. A couple weeks ago, I recommended to her a $700 laptop which Dell had on sale, but she think that's a waste of this once a life time opportunity, I kind of agree with her, why go sub-1k laptop if somebody else is paying the bill? But the problem is I really don't know where to find a good-value-for-the-money laptop for over 1K.

I was at Staples last night and saw an Acer laptop for $999. I think it's very similar to this one:
Acer AS8735G Aspire 18.4" Wide HD Notebook PC
(http://www.staples.ca/ENG/Catalog/cat_sku.asp?CatIds=73%2C74%2C75,4402&webid=830079&affixedcode=WW)

She will basically use it as a desktop computer, because she is living in a small apartment, she doesn't want to go with a desktop. So Size, weight and battery life is not an issue.

What do you guys think about this? Please please help me, and thank you very much!!!

[EPcjay]

I dont see hot deal anywhere??:-0

wrong forum buddy, use the computer & electronics forum

[TorontoFish]

I dont see hot deal anywhere??:-0

wrong forum buddy, use the computer & electronics forum

So you think it's cold? Can you point me to one hotter than this?

[Tornado F2]

$1000 to spend, doesn't need to carry it around, going to use it as a desktop - simple, she can buy an amazing DESKTOP for that price. Or an amazing desktop and a netbook or basic 15in laptop if she just needs occasional portability. Maybe the company will allow her to go the 2 PC route when they see that it's intelligent use of the money, not squandering of it. It wouldn't cost them any more than the single, overpriced, overweight, boat anchor of a laptop option that you are considering.

It's amazing how far $1000 will get you these days. It doesn't seem that long ago that all laptops cost around $1000 or more.

BTW, if your friend is smart, she won't jeopardise her new job for a "once in a lifetime" chance to waste her new employer's money. $1000 is nothing in the long run if they let her go early because of it.

And advice for you - only offer advice, but leave the final decision up to her. You don't want her blaming you if things go sour.

Oh, and EPcjay's right. Wrong forum. :)

[newdeal]

If someone were offering to pay for a top of the line laptop for me I would get a loaded 17" MacBook pro. There are definately other laptops that have more features and are cheaper but having used almost every windows operating system since windows 3.1 I would say the best feature is the stability of osx. Windows 7s stability has been WAY overexagerated

[riskit]

check this out

http://www.hp.com/canada/store/outlet/notebooks.html

[BooR4dL3y]

I agree with the other about this being in the wrong forum.

The notebook in question is pretty fair for the price. It has a dedicated video, LED backlit display, HDMI, and Blu-ray drive. All modern up-to-date components.

It might be considered a deal if you can stack some coupon codes to bring down the price.

[BooR4dL3y]

He's only got a budget of $1000.

If someone were offering to pay for a top of the line laptop for me I would get a loaded 17" MacBook pro. There are definately other laptops that have more features and are cheaper but having used almost every windows operating system since windows 3.1 I would say the best feature is the stability of osx. Windows 7s stability has been WAY overexagerated

[bobo22]

If someone were offering to pay for a top of the line laptop for me I would get a loaded 17" MacBook pro. There are definately other laptops that have more features and are cheaper but having used almost every windows operating system since windows 3.1 I would say the best feature is the stability of osx. Windows 7s stability has been WAY overexagerated

So is MacOSX's

[newdeal]

I can't see that it says the budget is $1000...I read it a few times

[Tornado F2]

He's only got a budget of $1000.

A Mac system seems like one way to inflate the purchasing price. I'd still stick with a PC though, unless the employer has a clear Mac preference.

Wonder if there are any $1000 Linux systems out there? :cheesygri

[BooR4dL3y]

I can't see that it says the budget is $1000...I read it a few times

Ooops my mistake... I thought in the title he had $1000 limit. If the sky's the limit the Apple Mac would be what I'd get as well. Then I'd get myself Windows 7 so I'd have the best of both worlds. But, in the end I'd probably end up installing Linux somewhere and using that since that's what I've been using the last while.

I kind of feel he has limit to his budget because there's tonnes of more pricier and better systems, but he ended up selecting that Acer as his choice.

[nick227]

$1000 to spend, doesn't need to carry it around, going to use it as a desktop - simple, she can buy an amazing DESKTOP for that price. Or an amazing desktop and a netbook or basic 15in laptop if she just needs occasional portability. Maybe the company will allow her to go the 2 PC route when they see that it's intelligent use of the money, not squandering of it. It wouldn't cost them any more than the single, overpriced, overweight, boat anchor of a laptop option that you are considering.

It's amazing how far $1000 will get you these days. It doesn't seem that long ago that all laptops cost around $1000 or more.

BTW, if your friend is smart, she won't jeopardise her new job for a "once in a lifetime" chance to waste her new employer's money. $1000 is nothing in the long run if they let her go early because of it.

And advice for you - only offer advice, but leave the final decision up to her. You don't want her blaming you if things go sour.

Oh, and EPcjay's right. Wrong forum. :)


+1 It's way better value to buy a desktop and netbook or basic laptop. For ~700-800 you can get an i5 with 6gb of RAM or more if your lucky. 18.4" notebooks are a waste imo.

[TorontoFish]

Thank you all for your help. I find the advice from RISKIT is particularly helpful.

check this out
http://www.hp.com/canada/store/outlet/notebooks.html

I appreciate the comments from NICK227 and TORNADO F2, I know a desktop + a notebook/netbook make sense, but things are not always happening according to sense, for example, I was given a hp xw8600 workstation at work, with dual quad core CPUs but came with Windows XP 32 bit pre-installed, and I was told not to install 64 bit OS because of some company policy in place. Now I am running multiple VMs all within 3 GB ram, meanwhile the workstation itself can support 64GB.

My point is that desktop is definitely out of picture, she got a desktop at work, this one is only for home use. And Mac or *nix are out of picture too, the accounting software package she uses is for Windows only. And NEWDEAL is right, there is no celling for the price.

So, any new idea any one?

[Oversized Rooster]

If your friend is interested in a higher quality "built" laptop, has she considered some of Lenovo's Thinkpad offerings? Some of them can be had with BOTH onboard and discrete video cards.

Or what about the Dell Studio line? Those are "media" type laptops.