GRcade

I posted recently about a possible laptop purchase for £170. Well, I would spend a little more on this computer below if I knew it was any good. Please help:

Depends what you're planning to use it for.

Going by ebay, no that's not a particularly good price.

A square screen!?!

KKLEIN wrote:A square screen!?!

What's better than Retina? Retina Squared.

Somebody Else's Problem wrote:Depends what you're planning to use it for.

Simple stuff - Internet browsing (needs to be quick) and writing on a website using a basic CMS.

There was never a 4x3 iMac was there?

Gario: Almost anything you buy will do that acceptably - a tablet with one of those keyboard/stand addons would keep cost to a minimum and probably be fine.

Floex wrote:There was never a 4x3 iMac was there?

Not unless you go way way back. The rest of the pick looks ok so yeah that is a bit dodgy looking, plus I always figure if you are selling more than second hand gooseberry fool on Facebook you are a scammer.

I'll avoid. The hunt continues. Karl: my editor tells me the site doesn't work well on tablets and phones.

Errkal wrote:

Floex wrote:There was never a 4x3 iMac was there?

Not unless you go way way back. The rest of the pick looks ok so yeah that is a bit dodgy looking, plus I always figure if you are selling more than second hand gooseberry fool on Facebook you are a scammer.

Sorry I meant the new model design. Something looks odd about that picture.

You could probably walk into PC World and ask them "what's your cheapest lump of gooseberry fool for web browsing" and walk away with something that would get the job done just fine. At least it would be in widescreen.

In fact they've got laptops from Toshiba, Asus and HP for under £180.

Floex wrote:

Errkal wrote:

Floex wrote:There was never a 4x3 iMac was there?

Not unless you go way way back. The rest of the pick looks ok so yeah that is a bit dodgy looking, plus I always figure if you are selling more than second hand gooseberry fool on Facebook you are a scammer.

Sorry I meant the new model design. Something looks odd about that picture.

Yeah that's what I mean, only the old ones where the new ones aren't mind you that isn't close to a new model anyway and the side on pic looks like it is marked on the top corner.

Basically avoid its bullshit.

Gario wrote:I'll avoid. The hunt continues. Karl: my editor tells me the site doesn't work well on tablets and phones.

Fair enough. In which case you just want a cheap, basic 13" laptop. Don't worry too much about specs, I can't imagine anything being tripped up by your requirements, which are pretty minimal. EDIT: KKLEIN has the right idea.

KKLEIN wrote:You could probably walk into PC World and ask them "what's your cheapest lump of gooseberry fool for web browsing" and walk away with something that would get the job done just fine. At least it would be in widescreen.

In fact they've got laptops from Toshiba, Asus and HP for under £180.

After a few hours' use my laptop grinds to a halt and I can't afford to lose minutes as I'm expected to write a minimum number of articles. Ok I'll have a look.

It is is just browsing you may get away with just a Chromebook.

Errkal wrote:It is is just browsing you may get away with just a Chromebook.

Are they the small ones? I have big hands and I've borrowed my mate's 10in one (no homo): was a pain to use.

Some of them are yeah, cost wise though looking into it they aren't mega cheap which seems odd as they don't really do much.

It sounds like your laptop is broken or malware infested rather than being underspecced. But if you have the money to get a new one that's probably easier than trying to fix it. You can also ask PC World if you can try out the laptop you're interested in in-store - just go to your CMS ACP and play about for 10 mins, make sure it's responsive enough for you. If it is (and it should be!) then go for it.

http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/laptops-n ... html#cat-0

Brilliant for the price. No disc drive but you get 2GB more RAM and a 500GB HDD for your money. I'm sure it comes with a load of bloatware on start-up but that can be uninstalled.