Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 11:10 am, by: Adam Lonergan(Alchemistal)
If you tax deduct it and you buy from someone like Dell you can package the insurance, warranty etc. Dell seems to have specials every week on a four week cycle, so if you go with them just wait until the components/options YOU want are on special not just random ones.
Don't go for Dell!!! Any decent computer retailer will tell you that, which explains why they dont stock it, and it is only available to buy direct from Dell (since noone will sell it for them). A family friend owns a reputable shop in Osborne Park and he told me these laptops are made really poorly and their warranty terms are very dodgy (can't remember the details) so even though they are cheaper to buy than a HP or a Toshiba, they most certainly will break during the warranty period and you WILL pay a portion of the cost of repair, even if the person over the phone says otherwise, read the entire fineprint with lawyers glasses mate. When he did sell these laptops in the past, every single one broke, and every single person HAD TO PAY extra to get it fixed, customers weren't happy, so he stopped selling them.
Apart from that, as far as brands are concerned, HP, Toshiba, Acer, Compaq... whatever, they dont make their own laptops, they only make the cases, and buy third party components such as RAM, HDD and processors. You will find that they all share the same stuff anyway, only different label on the case. I got a HP laptop, my entire office got HP laptops, great, whatever brand you like. My gf just a fortnight ago was buying a laptop. She was after a 60 gig, 768 meg RAM, 1.7 Ghz AMD (Centrino equivalent, forgot what its called) with wireless, 15.4" widescreen screen, dual layer DVD burner etc etc. All up it cost her $1200 brand new, got a bag and an external mouse with it too. ANd since it started as an empty shell, she got to choose every siongle component. Now even though she was label conscious, an equivalent specced HP or Toshiba laptop would have cost her almost $2000. She got a generic brand (MSI or something like that from memory) and it works quite well, same components inside, just different case on the outside. Centrinos are good for Laptops coz they consume less power, they have a different clock cycle to say a P4 processor, so a 1.7 Ghz Centrino is equivalent to a 3.4 Ghz Pentium 4 speedwise, so dont be put off by such a low figure, they are just as fast.
Another tip I can give ya is this, if you are an employee who requires a computer (I presume you do since you got a column in the West Australian ) you can get your employer to do what is called a FBT Exempt Employer Reimbursement on the laptop, which basically means, your boss will salary sacrifice your wages, and pay for the laptop with your pre-tax pay... in laymans term it basically means you will save roughly a further 30% (depending on how much money you make a year of course, what tax rate you're on) That is exactly what my gf has done, and her laptop in the end only really cost her $840 (1200 * 70%). It won't cost the employer a cent extra to do it, as it is FBT exempt, and generally most employers are quite happy to do it. It is a federal govt initiative to get people 'mobile' and it only works for laptops, not desktops. You can also get a PDA, mobile, a $2000 Prada bag (aka briefcase for the ladies) that way too but not going into it. And you dont have to use it for work neither, you can sell it straight after that, they won't care, govt basically will pay for almost half of your laptop
Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 03:05 pm, by: Shane Ilich(Ferret)
i can vouch for acer's after-sales warranty service...
just cant vouch for their "desknote" models....
i CAN vouch for their travelmates though...
basically, whatever you buy, from whoever, fork out the extra cash for an extended warranty - laptops by nature are likely to cop a few more knocks and bumps, and as such things are more likely to go wrong with them than a pc that just sits on your desk 24/7.
Yeah but refurbished ones won't have the latest hardware will they. These things age so quickly after 2 years they are almost useless (depending on what u wanna do with it of course). One thing to watch out for with refurbished ones is to check it has a new HDD and battery. U'd find most of them have just been sitting around in the office running 8 or 9 hours a day, 2 or 3 years of that the battery is already stuffed so it won't hold as much power and the HDD is almost close to its use by date. If you're a grandma that just checks email, go refurbished, if you are after a proper machine than just buy a new one, they are cheap nowadays anyway.
Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 04:45 pm, by: Adam Foster(Adam)
the only brands i would buy are toshiba, asus, acer, hp, samsung, sony and ibm. but i would highly recommend having a look at the asus a6kt laptop. although they are amd, im very impressed with there performance and gaming abilities if your into that stuff. i have sold a few of this particular model and the customers i have sold them to have been really happy, especially when it came down to value for money and what the laptop was capable of, they cost around $2500 - $2600
Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 05:05 pm, by: Antony Borlase(Borlase)
Well Thiess just signed (as in a year ago) a contract with Dell. Service (warranty) and service call-back from Compaq and IBM was total and absolute crap.
Warranty claim disasters from Compaq included a $22,000 dollar 4D-CAD specialised desktop (twin 3GHz Zeons, 8 Gig RAM and 2 CPU 512 Meg graphics card with 4 75 Gig SCSI drives) taking 2 months for a burnt out power supply.
I have been using the same Dell Latitude D810 (2.0GHz P4/m+1 gig RAM = 15.4 w/s + 80 gig HDD) for over a year and never had a drama.
The big difference in Dell stuff (and yes it does go from good to crap like all others) is whether it is aimed at 'Home use' or 'Business use'. Sadly there is a price difference. I believe the Latitude are the Business ones, and the same in a home laptop is a Inspiron? Mine was $3995 and the Inspiron was $2200 at the same time, for same specs, just one was 'stronger and more reliable for the busy business person who cannot afford down time' (or some other such like crap)
In the end, a rebuilt ex-government laptop might be really fine if you are just using office (Open or MS). You really need to look honestly at what it will be used for, and get what you need.
Things change so much, there is no point spending for the absolute best now, as it will be outdated in about a year.
Ken Cornell Tinkerer Western Australia 4.0GT V8 Soarer
Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 06:05 pm, by: Ken Cornell(Dunadan)
Adam Foster wrote on Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 04:45 pm:
but i would highly recommend having a look at the asus
I don't deal with laptops much, but I've never known asus to make a bad product. Also would add HP to the list of what not to buy! They tend to sell outdated parts in pretty cases, at new prices (and only show the stats that dont give this away)!
Mike Beck TryHard New Zeland no soarer... v8 has been sold.. Celsior as replacment perhaps?
Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 06:26 pm, by: Mike Beck(Gold_40gt)
I bought a laptop a while ago for $480 nzd. A used Dell C610. It was a really great laptop. 128mb ram (I put 256mb more in later) 1Ghz Pentium processor went very well.
I had it for about a 2 months and sold it - only because i felt since it was 3.5 years old i may break. This was due to one problem with it - the screen kept on going fuzz with a 100% distorted colour image... it was to do with the screen cable being loose so wasnt a major. However it may have been fine for a long time if that was fixed.. still you never know with those kind of things so its best to be safe than sorry! Hence selling it. Plus i used it for what i needed so didnt need it any longer!
But in general it was very good for the price. Came with all everything. Bag, cables....
Before I bought it I did some research into which ones to buy. I found Compaq laptops were terrible always having problems so I kept well away and went for the Dell.
Not necesserily Ken. My HP was very much up to date with all the other brands when I got it, reasonable price too. Specs were exactly the same as other brands in that price bracket (well, actually got an inbuilt memory card reader as an extra woohoo!). I chose it because it was ummmm... pretty
If specs are so imnportant I'd build one from scratch in a generic case. Will cost you 50% less doing that, and u're just missing out on a badge I'll see how my gf's laptop goes for the next year or so and if all well I'll do that with my next laptop, will get a kickass spec one on a budget! Does anyone know where I can get a HP or a Toshiba sticker?
Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 08:00 pm, by: Tom Kneebone(Tomk)
I sold my brother in law an LG similar to Rob's found the unit to be quite good and reliable. Have recently had to look at a Sony Viao unit which cost between $5K and $8K which has had a HDD fail and now on board video failure.
You never know irrespective of the reputation of the gear.
This is what I will be recommending to a lawyer client of mine to replace the above mentioned Sony.
$2200 GST inc prices subject to change if the wholesaler does it first.
Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 08:13 pm, by: Tom Kneebone(Tomk)
If I sold it for that I'd just cover the petrol to pick it up and deliver it. It's something I've found recently, with all the specials sometimes you can't beat the larger operations.
Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 08:20 pm, by: Tom Kneebone(Tomk)
They call themselves wholesalers, there is one place in Perth that sells to the public for almost what the wholesalers sell to me on a lot of things, sometimes cheaper. It's why I don't push hardware sales that much.
Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 08:22 pm, by: Jason Kingsmill(Jason_k)
There are many people that think "A computer is a computer". Totally wrong. It's the same as saying a 3L VL commodore will perform the same as a 3L supra.(insert random car comparison here)
There can be a very large difference in performance of one machine to the next using the same published specs(memory, processor and hard drive).
The reason you can get some laptops cheap is because of manufacturing costs, like using inferior components, inferior mainboard design. 2 mainboards can use exactly the same components, but of different physical design, and can have totally different characteristics. Component placing is a big factor, things like heat sensitive components near the processor etc. Couple that with cheap crappy components like leaky electrolytic caps (browse google for IBM Netvista mainboard problems with cheap caps), poorly designed inductors/chokes emitting too much RF, causing intermittent hanging.
How about cheap power supplies that are filtered poorly, or designed for a lower continuous current than intended, causing too much load ripple... The list goes on.
There's always a bargain to be had somewhere, and a ripoff to be found. But in the end, you get what you pay for.
Mike Beck TryHard New Zeland no soarer... v8 has been sold.. Celsior as replacment perhaps?
Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 08:31 pm, by: Mike Beck(Gold_40gt)
Tim Eacott wrote on Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 07:04 pm:
I use a dell D610 it runs very well, but it does get very hot... not good to have on your lap!
Yeah! I had the same thing. Boy did that thing get hot.. I thought it would have broken at temperatures like that.... lap got quite hot after a wee while! was rather annoying
Tom Kneebone TryHard WA factory 5 spd TT : Auto TT
Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 08:31 pm, by: Tom Kneebone(Tomk)
All too true Jason but Joe Average does not consider this there is too much propaganda. I see all the cheap PC's going at the moment and think back to the LG / Intel and AMD / MSI seminars I went to where they predict all CPU's will be dual core 64 bit by the end of the year if not earlier. Every netvista and an E series server at one of my clients failed due to electrolytics failing. (Got me an E series server for the cost of a few caps)
Friday, March 10, 2006 - 01:02 am, by: Tom Kneebone(Tomk)
Luke Nieuwhof wrote on Thursday, March 09, 2006 - 11:14 pm:
om, I am assuming you are in the biz?
Yes Luke, Went freelance consulting about 3 years ago. Have accounts with 4 wholesalers but really only do the hardware thing at present when I receive enquiries. Most of my hardware sales are to clients I am doing other work for.
Previous
) you can get your employer to do what is called a FBT Exempt Employer Reimbursement on the laptop, which basically means, your boss will salary sacrifice your wages, and pay for the laptop with your pre-tax pay... in laymans term it basically means you will save roughly a further 30% (depending on how much money you make a year of course, what tax rate you're on) That is exactly what my gf has done, and her laptop in the end only really cost her $840 (1200 * 70%). It won't cost the employer a cent extra to do it, as it is FBT exempt, and generally most employers are quite happy to do it. It is a federal govt initiative to get people 'mobile' and it only works for laptops, not desktops. You can also get a PDA, mobile, a $2000 Prada bag (aka briefcase for the ladies) that way too but not going into it. And you dont have to use it for work neither, you can sell it straight after that, they won't care, govt basically will pay for almost half of your laptop 
I'll see how my gf's laptop goes for the next year or so and if all well I'll do that with my next laptop, will get a kickass spec one on a budget! Does anyone know where I can get a HP or a Toshiba sticker? 
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