Which laptop?

[onelegout]

If you had $1200USD to spend on a laptop, what would you get?

I am off to california tomorrow morning and Im hoping to get a laptop out there! If you had $1200 to spend on a laptop, what would you get? I am a keen gamer but I dont expect that I will be able to get anything which would play something like counterstrike: source would I?
I also want to do a lot of photo editing and I would need wireless on it. I am not fussy about size or weight, I just want the best performance and quality for my money!
So if you could give me some suggestions that would be great!

Also, I have no idea about what to look for in a laptop, so if someone could give me an idea of what i should be asking when im out shopping for one, that would be great also!
Thanks for your help! I realy appreciate it!:)
H

[Rankenphile]

For big-box manufacturers, the Dell XPS M170 or the Toshiba Satelite M55-S331 are both not bad and sub-$1200. I don't have a ton of experience with laptops either, so I'm sure someone else could probably recommend better, but either of those seem okay.

[onelegout]

Well, I went to compusa earlier, walked in the door, and was met by a discontinued model clearance of various discontinued laptops.
I got an acer ferrari 3400 , AND a 3 year international waruntee worth 300 for 1200 bucks exactly! :D
The specs are
2ghz athlon64
512mb 333mhz ddr sdram
80gb hdd
128mb radeon 9700 dedicated gfx card
Im picking it up tomorrow cause they had to re-install everything before they could give it to me! :)
Cheers
H

[OvRiDe]

Glad to hear.. sounds like you got what you wanted..

[DaveW]

You lucky b#stard!

-Dave

[Rankenphile]

nice score! lol, that's quite a lucky deal.

[Aero]

sweeeeeeet.



^says it all

[onelegout]

Guess what?

4 days after i bought it, it refused to boot. Wouldn't even enter bios! and current was running through the back panel and would give you a shock if you touched it! So I've had to take it back and got a full refund, but now im stuck again.
I will be buying one from the UK now, but my mum says that she will spent a few hundred quid more to get one of the same spec.

So my question to you all is what brands of higher end laptops are the best? I can probably spend around 900 quid (GBP) and will be buying from the internet. Are alienware laptops realy as good make as their reputation and price suggests? Are there better alternatives?
Thanks guys
H

[OvRiDe]

What a bummer!!! Well I dunno what can be said that wasnt before.. heh

[AKA_RA]

alienware are great for gaming, if you can afford them. you can build your own desktop way cheaper than an alienware and have the same specs, as for the laptops, im sure that theres other companies that will do just as good of a job as alien ware without all the extra plastic on the outside to make it look like a gaming laptop. but then again, if you want a gaming laptop that looks cool, i think alienware is your best bet. either that or get a regular laptop and mod it yourself with a little vynil dye and be creative about it.

[R/C Pilot]

I have an area 51 7700 M and have had problems with it. Their tech support sucks. I got a bad video card and it took almost a month to get a new one sent out. The problem wasnt fixed so I had to send it in and it took them another month to get it back. 2 months no laptop. another guy I know had a bad mobo, had it replaced and it failed again in a few weeks. and they wouldnt replace it again because his warranty had expired 1 week before. I don't think I would buy another from them.

[onelegout]

hmm ok so apart from alienware, what other brands of performance laptops are there?

[onelegout]

Another quick question - Sorry for being annoying! - Has anyone here used www.overclockers.uk and are they reliable? I was thinking of purchasing an asus laptop from them - anyone got any experience with asus laptops or know what they're like?
Cheers!
H

[public_eyesore]

i hear thats where most uk'ers get their stuff.

[onelegout]

Aight well Ive ordered the Asus A6KM
Eighth down on this page
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/Asus_Notebooks.html
Good deal? :)
H

[crenn]

Well.... if you wanted to later, you should upgrade both the RAM and the HDD.....

But overall, fairly good laptop.

[onelegout]

Yeah I dont realy like the sound of that slow hdd, but Im sure that it will be reasonable. Do all laptop HDDs work in all laptops? I have a broken lappy somewhere which might have a faster drive.... what do I need to look for when checking compatibility?
Peace
H

[lotech]

Check out Mesh Computers (www.meshcomputers.com) - I know they have very good prices on desktops and I don't see why their laptops would be any different...

[onelegout]

Wahey my laptops here! :) Firstly the build quality is exceptional! and the screen is pretty nice too. One thing annoys the hell outta me though - the fn key and the ctrl key are switched (fn on outside) and it's driving me insane! lol! but im sure I'll get used to it in time. One thing that REALY amazed me about this laptop was the sound - when it first booted it played some music during the xp startup, and I spent about half a minute trying to work out why my surround sound was on and my pc playing music. Then I realised it actualy WAS the laptop. The speakers are underneath the laptop at the corners, and the sound kinda bounces up around you - it makes perfect surround sound! :D I'd definately reccomend this laptop to anyone who wants good performance at WELL under a grand. I shall now install bf2 or something and see how it plays :)
peace
h

[lotech]

Glad to see you got one you are pleased with :) Just ordered £200 of bits to kit out my PC, can't wait to get modding :)

[onelegout]

Cool! post pics :D

[lotech]

Oh, will do for sure :) I'm going to do it all this Sunday I *hope*, big hope there!

EDIT: Woo... Desided to go for it ahead of schedule, and i'm typing from my new rig! Had a few probs... It's my first mod, but it works!!! Now off to install the liquid cooling system, wish me luck. Damn this thing is green :P