# Help Me Pick a Cheapo Laptop! **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 21, 2014, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611 "2014-04-21T15:07:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/1 "2014-04-21T15:07:27Z")
I’m buying myself a laptop as a graduation present - but I’m doing it with Amazon rewards points (and by cashing in a number of gift cards and things.) That means I have to buy it via Amazon. I won’t be using any actual money to pay for it, for a variety of reasons (mostly because I’ll be taking a lot of time off work to prep for the bar exam and because my wife will yell at me.) So, my budget is about $350; maybe $400. I realize that isn’t going to buy me the latest and greatest, and that’s fine. I currently have a Toshiba Satellite that’s about seven years old and I’ve been very happy with it, other than the ridiculous amount of preinstalled bloatware. Hence, I’ll probably pay a slight premium for another Toshiba. I don’t play games until they’re like $10 on Steam, so it’s not as though I need some sort of uber-gaming rig. I _don’t_ want a Chromebook; I need to be able to use pretty much the full panoply of MS Office programs without any formatting issues. I don’t really care about size or weight. I’m not going to be toting the thing around the world. Battery life is definitely a One thing I particularly don’t understand is multi-core processors; I bought my last laptop before those were commonly available and I have very little idea how to compare them. [This Gateway](http://www.amazon.com/Gateway-NE52203u-15-6-Inch-Laptop-Silver/dp/B00CPZL9GC/ref=sr_1_41?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1398092732&sr=1-41#productDetails) (whoah, they still exist?) seems like a particularly good deal but I don’t know anything about AMD laptop processors. Feel free to point out what’s wrong with it so I have a better idea of what to look for. ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/2 "2014-04-21T15:12:27Z")
I got a $280 HP laptop kit from Best Buy, and this is probably the best laptop I’ve ever had. It comes with a case, flash drive, and mouse, but if you return all the extras and just buy the laptop, it’s like 260. It comes with 4 gig RAM and 750 gig HD, but I paid $40 to make it 8 gig (windows 7/8 can handle unlimited ram.) ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/3 "2014-04-21T15:13:47Z")
I can’t buy from anywhere but Amazon. What do you mean by “kit”? Like, you had to put it together? ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/4 "2014-04-21T15:15:10Z")
No, it came bundled with case, flash drive and mouse. Oh, if I wanted to spend $400, I could have gotten a touchscreen laptop or a hybrid touchscreen that can be detached from the keyboard and used as a tablet. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/5 "2014-04-21T15:26:46Z")
So you’ll be wanting to shop from [this page, then.](http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=amb_link_362805182_10?ie=UTF8&field-availability=-1&field-price-mp-owner-bin=00000-39999&node=565108&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=merchandised-search-leftnav&pf_rd_r=0TCJXS3WVYG1MK01N208&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1774685162&pf_rd_i=2956501011#/ref=sr_nr_p_n_feature_eighteen_0?rh=n%3A172282%2Cn%3A%21493964%2Cn%3A541966%2Cn%3A565108%2Cp_74%3A00000-39999%2Cp_n_availability%3A1248800011%2Cp_n_feature_eighteen_browse-bin%3A6819965011&bbn=565108&sort=price-desc-rank&ie=UTF8&qid=1398093782&rnid=6819964011) ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/6 "2014-04-21T15:28:45Z")
Yes, pretty much. Incidentally, I’m not particularly concerned about touch capability (which AIUI means Win 8.) Maybe I’m missing something, but I don’t see it as much more than a substitute for a mouse based on my experiences with phones and tablets. ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/7 "2014-04-21T15:30:07Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Yes, pretty much. Incidentally, I’m not particularly concerned about touch capability (which AIUI means Win 8.) Maybe I’m missing something, but I don’t see it as much more than a substitute for a mouse based on my experiences with phones and tablets. The only advantage to getting a touchscreen is for windows 8. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/8 "2014-04-21T15:32:13Z")
If you are wanting Windows 7, then [this is the one in your price range](http://www.amazon.com/Acer-Aspire-NX-M89AA-009-V5-131-2680-11-6-Inch/dp/B00IF0QIAI/ref=sr_1_2?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1398094217&sr=1-2), and it has free shipping. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/9 "2014-04-21T15:41:45Z")
It’s not that I want Windows 7, just that I don’t care if I get Windows 8. I would prefer a 15" if possible, since I’ll be doing a lot of reading on it. Is there anything I’m missing out on with [this one](http://www.amazon.com/ASUS-D550MA-DS01-15-6-Inch-Laptop-Black/dp/B00HQZGZ38/ref=sr_1_2?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1398094809&sr=1-2#productDetails)? ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/10 "2014-04-21T15:44:44Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > If you are wanting Windows 7, then [this is the one in your price range](http://www.amazon.com/Acer-Aspire-NX-M89AA-009-V5-131-2680-11-6-Inch/dp/B00IF0QIAI/ref=sr_1_2?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1398094217&sr=1-2), and it has free shipping. I dunno, says it has a 1.6 Ghz processor. Mighty slow by modern standards, and by a lot of older standards too. I wonder if it can even play some of those $10 steam games. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/11 "2014-04-21T15:48:03Z")
[This](http://www.amazon.com/ASUS-X552EA-DH42-15-6-Inch-Laptop-Black/dp/B00F0RD9QA/ref=sr_1_1?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1398095153&sr=1-1#productDetails) seems to be the only 15.6" with more than 4GB of memory. Will I notice the difference? ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/12 "2014-04-21T16:42:47Z")
[This one](http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Satellite-C55-A5302-15-6-Laptop/dp/B00G2J0XUA/ref=sr_1_1?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1398098458&sr=1-1&keywords=gaming+laptop#productDetails) is available from a third party seller for $368. Again, anything wrong with it? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/13 "2014-04-21T16:44:40Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > [This one](http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Satellite-C55-A5302-15-6-Laptop/dp/B00G2J0XUA/ref=sr_1_1?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1398098458&sr=1-1&keywords=gaming+laptop#productDetails) is available from a third party seller for $368. Again, anything wrong with it? Perhaps the fact that it’s from a third party seller? Can you use your points on it? ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/14 "2014-04-21T16:46:37Z")
Yeah. I can use them for anything listed on Amazon except digital downloads. I have a Prime account so usually it’s cheaper to buy directly from Amazon because of the free shipping, but the third party seller has it cheaper even with shipping cost. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/15 "2014-04-21T17:04:29Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > [This one](http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-Satellite-C55-A5302-15-6-Laptop/dp/B00G2J0XUA/ref=sr_1_1?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1398098458&sr=1-1&keywords=gaming+laptop#productDetails) is available from a third party seller for $368. Again, anything wrong with it? The reviews say the audio is not very good, but other than that, looks great, and 2.5 ghz is a lot faster than other laptops mentioned here. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/16 "2014-04-21T17:40:07Z")
Yeah, I saw that. I don’t really care about the audio because I’ll be running it through external speakers any time I’m using sound and I don’t really listen to music anywhere but the car. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/17 "2014-04-21T17:43:57Z")
I’m not seeing any mention of built in Wi-Fi. Did I miss something? ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/18 "2014-04-21T18:21:59Z")
According to [Toshiba’s website](http://www.toshiba.com/us/computers/laptops/satellite/C50/C55-A5302) it has built-in wi-fi. Does anyone even make computers with no wireless connectivity anymore? ---
**Author:** ![Merneith](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/57b2e6/32.png) [@Merneith](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merneith)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/19 "2014-04-21T19:55:24Z")
It’s got Intel integrated graphics, not a real graphics card. That’s fine for general computer use but double check what the requirements are for your games. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2014, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611/20 "2014-04-21T19:56:56Z")
I don’t think I’ll find anything with a separate graphics card in this price range. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-pick-a-cheapo-laptop/686611.md?page=2)