Good Budget Laptop

[Mark Sefried]

Just wanted to let everyone know that I picked up a really nice compaq F750US laptop last Sunday at Circuit City. It cost me $450 after rebates (not including taxes). The specs are: 1.9 ghz Athlon Dual Core processor, 120 gb 5400 rpm hard drive, 1 gb ram, up to 287 mb video memory, and it even has a dvd burner. It has Windows Vista installed on it. I already ordered a 2 gb stick of ram for $30 so I will be running 2.5 gb of memory once I install it. Not bad considering I got everything for $480. It does not come with an express card slot, however for me thats no problem as I run data through my phone via usb. The 15.4" screen on this machine is simply awesome for the price as it is crystal clear! It is on sale through February 16. Here is the link to the laptop:

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Comp...id/-12963/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do#prodspecs

 

[Kevin Askew]

Ditto, I have same setup & extreamly happy with it. I have GR3, and all my data on it. runs great. I have Verizon wireless card & runs great too. Very fast, in so Im going to drop DSL & run wireless card for both home & Laptop. Anyway this system runs great & wont be disapointed!
Kevin

 

[Gordon Spencer]

There seem to be lots of good deals right now on quality Laptops . Just check weekly adds for Best Buy , Circuit City and various office chains . For the software you stormchasers run I would suggest at least 2 meg of Ram and a dual core processer. I have seen all sorts of laptops lately with that for $600 to $800 .

 

[Tony Laubach]

Tigerdirect.com and Newegg.com have a host of refurbs for less than $600, many with 2GB of RAM with dual-cores. Something to check out as well and may save you on sales tax.

 

[Derek Weston]

From personal experience, and from someone that works with and knows a bunch about laptops and hardware: Acer and Toshiba are highly recommended.

 

[D. Hayes]

Acer has really come along ways over the years. I have a Acer Ferrari 4005wlmi and it's been a great laptop. Now I won't touch anything made by Compaq or HP. They tend to break about the time the warranty runs out.

on a side note...

Now I know the chase crowd tends to be older folks and not all are computer savvy. So I'd recommend a cheap dell laptop with a good warranty. dell has been fantastic with support with my father who knows very little about computers but uses them daily for his home business. I got sick of my dad calling me all the time for help so I convinced him to get a dell and they have helped him with all sorts of issues.

 

[Ben Prusia]

I just picked up an Acer Extensa 4420-5237 at Best Buy for only $499 yesterday, it has 2GB of DDR2 memory, a dual core Athlon x2 64 (dual core processor) and runs all of my apps I need and my Sprint card smoothly. I was originally going for the Gateway 3GB model for $699 listed in the ad, but why not save $200!