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dutox101
join:2010-01-02

dutox101

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Dell, HP, Lenovo or Acer laptop ?

Anyone has any inputs or suggestion for a brand that will provide me with good price vs quality and a good service it something breaks for a new laptop. No Apple products for me sorry.

Thanks

urbanriot
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join:2004-10-18
Canada

urbanriot

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They all have their good models and they all have their lemons.

For Acer, I suggest ignoring anything in the Aspire line and focus on the Travelmate line as it's business oriented with an entirely different support structure (North America). Business laptops are typically more reliable laptops.

HP ProBooks are well built durable laptops that I feel are quite nice but if you have the cash, the EliteBook will make you say 'wow'. They're super durable, illuminated keys on the higher end models, quality LED LCD panels and just plain sexy.

Lenovo keeps changing the models within their lines so often it's hard to suggest. Most lenovo's are durable but they all have their annoying little nuances, like the touchpads on the Lenovo ThinkPad Edge E530's are awful.

LazMan
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join:2003-03-26
Beverly Hills, CA

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Dell - but dig a little deeper, and go with a business model, rather then the "home" series...

The Latitudes are an excellent choice... I'm on my 3rd one (replaced every 3 years as part of our company leasing program) - they are solid, and seem very reliable.

The Inspiron I have personally, is less impressive - when I replace it, it'll be with a Latitude.

elwoodblues
Elwood Blues
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join:2006-08-30
Somewhere in

elwoodblues

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said by LazMan:

Dell - but dig a little deeper, and go with a business model, rather then the "home" series...

The Latitudes are an excellent choice... I'm on my 3rd one (replaced every 3 years as part of our company leasing program) - they are solid, and seem very reliable.

The Inspiron I have personally, is less impressive - when I replace it, it'll be with a Latitude.

I concur, I like Dell, simply from a support perspective, it's damn easy to find drivers/bios updates etc. at the touch of a button.

Their "corporate' support is good, unless you occidentally get re-directed to India. I have a Latitude D620, all of a sudden the screen went pink... video card... the stupid rep reading his script wanted to troubleshoot.

I yelled at the moron asking what part of PINK did he not understand!

Kardinal
Dei Gratina Regina
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I like my current HP, but I've used Lenovos in the past and I'll be going back to them for my next one. They're super durable and while they may not be as flashy as some, I'll take dependable over bell and whistles any and every time. Neat feature: the keyboard on most models now have a liquid drain, so a couple of oz of fluid just drips out the bottom. What a great idea.

TLS2000
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join:2004-02-24
Elmsdale, NS
Ubiquiti UDM-Pro
Ubiquiti U6-LR
Ubiquiti UniFi UAP-nanoHD

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I'm on my second Dell now and I would recommend them to anyone. Even if they have their support people read scripts to you, they provide excellent service.

My last laptop had a problem with the DVD-Rom and we went through their script despite me saying what the problem was. Their diagnostic program ended up finding a problem with the hard drive as well and they shipped both to me.

This time I got the next day in home care and accidental damage replacement insurance since I'm lugging this thing to college a few times a week.

Dell allows you to configure your computer decently and they provide decent financing options. I'm taking advantage of their 0% for one year to better use my funds. Come December I'll pay it off in full in order to avoid any interest charges. Even then, the interest will be 9.9%.

ekster
Hi there
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join:2010-07-16
Sainte-Anne-De-Bellevue, QC

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With laptops, I usually just go with any that has the best price for the specs I need out of the following:

Dell
HP
Asus
Toshiba
Acer

They all end up pretty much equal in quality and price from my experience, so I just grab whichever one has a sale or best price.

JC_
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join:2010-10-19
Nepean, ON

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I've had IBM, Dell, Acer and HP over the years and my current laptop is an HP DV7-6C95DX which I bought in August 2012 and it's been great and I haven't had any issues.

My sister and a few of my friends have bought Acer laptops at my recommendations and they haven't had any issues with them since they got them.

If you want to go with a Dell, I would recommend only going with one of their business class models.

IBM/Lenovo laptops are pretty good from what I've heard and experienced from my use, however my use of IBM has been limited to old used laptops vs new.

rustydusty
join:2009-09-29
Red Deer County, AB

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+1 for Dell. We use mostly HP at work, however we may switch back to Dell. I personally rock an Alienware M17R4. Seems first year or so Dell bought Alienware, their product went to crap. This one seems rock solid though. Their XPS stuff is also good. Ordered two of them for some power users and love them. Also had good luck with my Asus G60 and G73 models. HP, and Acer are about the same quality, which I would say is mid-range. Dell and certain Asus models are a mid-high range.

.02

Onemeg
join:2002-04-27
Grimsby, ON

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I bought a business Dell last year. It came without a video card, of which I was aware. First thing I noticed is that the screen is difficult to see unless you are directly in front of it and adjust it to your line of sight. Any deviance from that and it is difficult to see properly. There was no video card with this model and it is impossible to set the screen settings so you can view a black and white image properly. There is always a blue cast to it.
I had tech support out twice, changing screens, keyboards, etc. but they could not fix it. I even had a test pattern set up on my desktop computer and one on the Dell and showed the tech guy the difference. He agreed it had a distinct blue tinge.
I opted to RMA it and they sent another replacement with a better cpu (i5) and I settled for that. Still had the same blue tinge. I wouldn't buy another laptop without a video card and only after I have checked out the video adjustments.
Everything else works okay, just the video sucks.

Wolfie00
My dog is an elitist
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join:2005-03-12

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Dell. Inspiron vs. Vostro is mostly a matter of feature preference, IMO. Consumer models have glossy screens optimized for pictures and video, business models have matte screens optimized for office work. Right now most business models have the advantage of being able to select a real OS (Win 7) while consumer models are infested with Win 8.

Mike2009
join:2009-01-13
Ottawa, ON

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I like my Dell but I also like Lenovo.

Devanchya
Smile
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Ajax, ON

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You can look at this:

»ncix.ca/products/?sku=79 ··· ure=ASUS

Almost all the Laptops coming out this year will have some form of touch screen due to Windows 8...

Thane_Bitter
Inquire within
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Not Acer!
No support, no updated drivers, no interest in quality.

I prefer Lenovo's Thinkpad notebooks, they may not be flashy looking like some god awful fashion accessory, but they do work and they still understand what support means.

Gone
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join:2011-01-24
Fort Erie, ON

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Dell and Acer (even their "consumer" lines) are very easy to fix yourself and service manuals can be located without much effort. This is a big benefit if you're giving these laptops to people who have a bad habit of spilling stuff on the keyboard or cracking LCDs. They also don't lock their PCI-E slots to specific approved PCI IDs, meaning you can upgrade you WLAN card and stuff like that.

While I can't speak for Lenovo as my mother and my father-in-law haven't broken theirs yet, I know from personal experience that HP/Compaq stuff is a major pain in the ass to fix and I now refuse to work on them due to many ruined weekends trying to replace LVDS cables and displays. They and Lenovo also lock their PCI-E slots, which sucks balls.

urbanriot
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join:2004-10-18
Canada

urbanriot

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said by Gone:

I know from personal experience that HP/Compaq stuff is a major pain in the ass to fix and I now refuse to work on them due to many ruined weekends trying to replace LVDS cables and displays.

Your experience may be dated as some of the HP Probooks made in the past few years are a dream to work with. There's a lever system to pop off the bottom tray on some models where you have access to practically everything. Elitebooks too, naturally.

Gone
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join:2011-01-24
Fort Erie, ON

Gone

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The ones I worked on were consumer models. I cannot fully describe just how absolutely horrendous they were to work with.

Of the consumer and corporate Dell and Acer machines I've worked on, they have been equally as easy to deal with. It helps that Dell uses the exact same components for the Vostro and Inspiron lines, the only real difference being the inclusion of matte displays and 7200RPM hard drives in the Vostros.

The Latitude D-series were weird, though. Needed to remove the keyboard to get to the second DIMM slot, and you needed to snap parts of the top bezel off to remove the keyboard. Replacing the motherboard in them is easy, though.

urbanriot
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join:2004-10-18
Canada

urbanriot

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The Acer's I've seen are typically easy although some require all screws to removed from the plastic covering before you can get access to the HD / RAM.

Samsung and Toshiba units I've seen have been a bitch.

Gone
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Fort Erie, ON

Gone

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Yeah, some Acer machines have a unified bottom cover for everything. My TimelineX has three screws to open the bottom cover, which gives access to two DIMM slots, the hard drive and two PCI-E slots.

EUS
Kill cancer
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What will the laptop be used for? This pretty much determines budget/build.
Three years ago I bought a 17" Acer from Walmart for ~$350.
Yeah it's slow, the cpu is old (athlon dual core), it's heavy, and the battery does not last long, and as someone mentioned, driver updates are non-existant.
But it serves my purposes, which are:
1) kid entertainment on long trips. mostly HD Movies
2) gen usage banging around the house
3) children usage
If it dies, I won't cry, it cost $350, and has lasted longer than I thought it would, and we can watch movies in the car, while we drive to the beach.

Wolfie00
My dog is an elitist
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Not all Dell laptops are equally easy to service. I remember reading a review of one of the current rock-bottom low-end laptops (don't remember if it was Inspiron or Vostro, but I think Inspiron) where the complaint was that you had to remove the keyboard (and related components) just to get at anything internal, even to upgrade or replace memory. There were no removable access covers on the bottom at all.

I love my old Inspiron 1501, even though it's getting pretty long in the tooth now. It was bottom-of-the-line at the time. I upgraded the memory (access cover on the bottom), installed Win 7, and replaced the HDD with an SSD (two screws to remove, two more screws in a bracket). Beautifully easy to work with.

Pentangle
With our thoughts we make the world.
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I've been really happy with my 17.3" Asus G75VW-DS71. Twin 750GB 7200rpm SATA hard drives, 12 GB RAM, 2GB Nvidia GeForce graphics card, 4 USB 3.0 ports, 2.3-GHz Intel Core i7 CPU and it comes with a two year warranty. Very solidly built. Great sound and blu-ray optical drive. Keep the higher end Asus models in consideration.

Gone
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join:2011-01-24
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said by Wolfie00:

Not all Dell laptops are equally easy to service. I remember reading a review of one of the current rock-bottom low-end laptops (don't remember if it was Inspiron or Vostro, but I think Inspiron) where the complaint was that you had to remove the keyboard (and related components) just to get at anything internal, even to upgrade or replace memory. There were no removable access covers on the bottom at all.

A lot of Inspiron and Vostros - both desktop and mobile - share the same base components and casing at any given time. But yes, you need to remove the keyboard. What they didn't tell you is that the keyboard snaps into place and is incredibly easy to remove, not requiring the removal of a single screw. Contrast this with your Inspiron 1501 (and the 1540 my wife had prior to the Vostro 2420 she has now) that not only requires screws to get into the bottom service bay, but also snapping a plastic piece off the bezel and then removing two screws to get the keyboard off, too.

I've replaced an LCD on these new Inspiron/Vostro machines. Trust me when I say they are easy to work with compared to some of the other stuff out there. Getting to the PCI-E slots and the hard drive is more annoying than it should be, but in the grand scheme it's not too bad as long as you aren't afraid of pulling on a plastic bezel.

Devanchya
Smile
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Ajax, ON

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I bought the ASUS I posted earler in this thread yesterday. It's a bit slower in the CPU and memory but it's a good form factor and does what I want... except when I was stress testing it and it reported that the IP thread was corrupted... and it's now stuck in a Windows 8 Repair Cycle hell.

urbanriot
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Canada

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said by Gone:

I've replaced an LCD on these new Inspiron/Vostro machines.

For a good time, replace a physically broken screen on an macbook.

Gone
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join:2011-01-24
Fort Erie, ON

Gone

Premium Member

said by urbanriot:

For a good time, replace a physically broken screen on an macbook.

I've replaced hard drives in some of the earlier MBPs. The pain has already been felt.
Bob4
Account deleted
join:2012-07-22
New Jersey

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I got a Toshiba laptop in November:
• i7-3630QM Ivy Bridge processor 2.4 GHz / 3.4 GHz
• 8 GB RAM
• 1 TB HDD
• 15.6" LED-lit 1366 x 768 display
• LED backlit keyboard
• Bluetooth
• Harman/Kardon speakers (finally laptop speakers that sound great!)
• built-in 2M pixel webcam and microphone
• $830