HP Special Edition L2000 Series Laptop
For all you Dell haters out there, I have found an awesome deal from HP. Today I configured a very powerful L2000 series laptop for only $999. This particular series of HP laptops have a Lance Armstrong theme and are very slim and sleek, ideal for a carry along laptop. The notebook I configured included all of the following specs and promotions for the flat price of $999, and no annoying mail in rebates!
• MD Turion(TM) 64 ML-37 (2.0GHz/1MB L2 Cache)
• FREE Upgrade to 14.0 WXGA BrightView Widescreen!!
• 512MB DDR SDRAM (1x512MB)
• 80 GB 5400 RPM Hard Drive
• DVD+/-RW/R & CD-RW Combo w/Double Layer Support
• 54g(TM) 802.11b/g integrated wireless card
• Free Shipping!
Anyone who reads my Blog on a consistent basis knows that I’m a big Dell fan, and you should also know that I’m a big fan of the AMD processor. With that being said and all things considered, I’m going to recommend this machine as the best value I’ve found yet. The package also includes a variety of other features and available upgrades not listed above. For more information about this laptop and other HP specials, visit the link to the right!
Dell Inspiron E1705
I have found yet another awesome deal from Dell this month. I’m starting to think I should change the name of this Blog to Dell laptop buying guide. The notebook I want to promote today is far and away the best deal I have come across in quite some time. Dell’s new Insprion E1705 does it all.
The notebook can be found under the home computers in the entertainment section. The Insprion E1705’s base model featured price is $999 after a $250 mail in rebate. The bundle includes:
-Intel® Core™ Solo Processor T1300 (1.66GHz/667MHz FSB)
-17” display
-Windows XP home edition
-512MB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 533MHz
-60GB3 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive
-
FREE!8x CD/DVD burner
-Anti-Virus/Security Suite (Pre-installed)
-Corel WordPerfect word processor!
-Dell Wireless 1390 802.11g Mini Card (54Mbps4)
-1 Year warranty from DELL!
The offer also includes free shipping and 3 months free financing. In my opinion this notebook package blows the competition out of the water. There are also a variety of other packages available for those who need/want more power. I would recommend this machine to most anyone. It is an ideal home computer, and would make an excellent machine for a college student. One thing to remember is that Microsoft Office is typically extra on all home computers, no matter where you buy. So if you’re going to need Office on your machine, make sure you factor that in when looking at the initial price.
To view this laptop and more specials, click on the Dell link to the right!
Dell Laptop specials - XPS M140
As promised, I have a found a Dell special for $999, and this deal blows the Compaq out of the water. This featured laptop, the XPS M140 special from Dell, includes a Pentium M 700 class processor running at 2.13 GHz, a 533MHz front side bus, and 2MB of Cache! This notebook special also includes a single 512 MB RAM chip, upgradeable to 2GB, 40GB hard disk, a DVD ROM CD burner combo drive, just about all the connectivity you could ask for, and a 14 inch wide screen. A variety of other upgrades are available on this machine, but the base model alone is definitely a competitive price.
You’ll be hard pressed to find a machine with more processing power at this price during the 2005 holiday season. There is also a variety of software packages and other specifications included in this laptop special that are not noted above. For more information about this machine, and other Dell specials, click on the Dell link provided on the right of the page. Thanks, and check back again soon for more competitive notebook specials.
Compaq V2000Z series notebook PC
For this post I decided to take a look at what Compaq is offering these days, and I ended up configuring a very nice machine. As many of you probably already know, HP bought Compaq a few years ago, but decided to keep the Compaq name. In comparison there's really no difference in the Compaq Presario and HP Pavilion as far as the brand goes. As I have said many times before, most of these manufacturers are using the same parts from the same companies and all they are really doing is assembling the machines. This is why I always suggest looking at specs instead of brand. The only time brand comes into question is when you're looking at the systems software and service.
In configuring this notebook I decided to spend an extra $200 bringing the total spent after rebate to $999. The extra money was well spent. I included an AMD Turion(TM) 64 ML-37 2.0GHz with 1MB L2 Cache! In my opinion, this is an awesome processor. It includes all the benefits of a Centrino processor, with the added benefit of 64 bit processing. For those of you who have not read my entire Blog, 64 bit processing is the wave of the future. Currently there aren't too many applications out that support this, but five years from now everything will. I went ahead and spent some extra money on a single 512MB RAM chip for the reasons noted in my previous post. I also included a 60GB hard drive, DVD/CD-RW Combo Drive, 14.0 WXGA Bright View Widescreen display, and a ATI RADEON graphics card. All for $999 after a $50 manufacturer mail in rebate!
This computer is ideal for anyone. It has plenty of processing speed and hard drive space to last for quite a while. I would definitely recommend this to a student going off to college, but you'll probably have to include Office suite($339), which is going to be the case with most any notebook your purchase. All in all, I'm giving this machine two thumbs up.
My next post will feature a comparable Dell for $999… Stay tuned!
For more info or questions, please leave comments or visit the manufacturer links to the right.
Gateway NX500X
In my quest to find the best deal on a laptop during the 2005 holiday season, I now turn to Gateway. The Gateway NX500X is not their cheapest model, but very comparable to the Dell Inspiron 6000, with a couple of hassles. Since we are assuming that you want to find the best deal on your next notebook and are willing to jump through a couple of hoops to do so, I'm going to recommend this featured computer.
The Gateway NX500X notebook offers an Intel Pentium 4 M(mobile) processor with 2Mb of level 2 cache! This is a fast processor with the added benefit of Intels speed step technology. Speed step technology enables the processor to run slower when full speeds are not needed, which in most cases doubles the battery life. The machine offers 512 MB of 533MHz DDR RAM allocated on two 256MB chips. This poses a bit of a problem when doing RAM upgrades; the computer only offers 2 RAM banks, which is standard on most laptops. The main problem arises when you decide that you need more memory for the machine. With both banks full, you're going to have to get rid of one, or both chips. If you are leaning towards this machine, I would definitely recommend upgrading to the single chip, you'll thank me later. The laptop also features a 40 GB hard drive, which is pretty standard for this price range. Remember, there's no such thing as too much memory and it's better to have too much than not enough. Also included is a CD rewrite DVD player combo drive, an 802.11 G wireless network card, and a decent graphics card.
I would put this machine up against the DELL any day of the week, with the only drawback being a $100 mail in rebate. If you read my last post, you know how I feel about mail in rebates. It’s true that I don’t like them, but 100 bucks is 100 bucks and in my opinion the money outweighs the hassles. During my years as a computer salesman I would fill my customer’s rebate forms out for them, and all they had to do was mail it off. Every rebate I filled out was repaid and I never had any complaints (when I did the paperwork). This means that as long as you read the instructions carefully and make sure all the required paper work has been mailed by the required date, you’re going to get you money back. That being said, I hate mail in rebates!
For more info or suggestions, feel free to leave comments, or visit the websites advertised to the right.
HP ZV6000 Laptop
I have found some comparable models for the Inspiron 6000 post I wrote earlier this week. I’ll start off by saying I still think the Dell is the better deal, but for all you Dell haters out there, this is also a good machine for a competitive price.
One thing I do like about HP over Dell is the fact that they will use both AMD and Intel processors in their computers. Dell only uses Intel processors. That being said, in this comparison I like the Intel processor being used in the Dell computer much better. The HP is using an AMD Sempron 3200 processor, which runs a 1.8 Ghz and carries 256 Kb of level 2 cache (note: the processor in the dell carries 2Mb of level 2 cache!). The laptop I configured featured a 15.4 inch WXGA(Wide XGA) screen, 256 Mb of RAM, $40 Gb of hard drive space, a cd burner – dvd player combo, and a 54G wireless Ethernet adaptor on board.
The price came to $754, which isn’t bad, but for your extra 45 dollars you would get a considerably more powerful / faster system from dell. There’s also a $50 mail in rebate figured into that price. I’m not a huge fan of mail in rebates, and I think offering a mail in rebate over your website is just silly. The reason the company does this is because on 16% of all rebates are actually filled! This is not because the company will not fill them, it’s because consumers don’t want to bother with it after the purchase has been made, or they screw up the rebate procedure. In addition to that, they normally make you wait for two month before they mail them, they do this to insure the item is not returned
AND to collect interest on your money during this period. Now that’s either very shady or very smart on their part.
In closing, I would recommend the Dell over this HP and for all the Dell haters out there, I’m sure there’s a couple. Come to terms with those demons, because they really are the best. For more info about these systems and more visit the links to the right. Thanks!
Dell Inspiron 6000
One of Dell's laptop promotions for the 2005 holiday season is the Inspiron 6000. This is a great computer for moderate use. The base model features a 1.6 Intel Pentium 4 processor, windows xp home edition, 512mb of DDR RAM, a 15 inch wide screen, 40 GB hard drive, a cd burner dvd player combo, and a wireless network card. And a variety of upgrades are available.
Advertised at $799.99, I would recommend this laptop for anyone who travels frequently and needs a notebook when away from the office. It's ideal for college students although you may want to upgrade the Hard Drive and RAM if you're planning to keep it for four years. Note: RAM can be upgraded fairly easily in laptops, but hard drives cannot, so you'll probably want to go as big as you can. This laptop is ideal for internet surfers, Microsoft office software, video(play back, probably not editing) and music. This machine will also play most games, but you'll probably run into some problems down the road with the graphics processor, which is built into the mother board and not upgradeable. I would not recommend this notebook in its base model to any big time gamers.
All in all, I'm very impressed with this machine, and I think at $799 it's a steal. I dbout you'll find anything as competitive as this at any of the major retailers and if you do, you still won't be getting Dell's award winning customer service. By clicking on the Dell link to the right, you can view this great special and more...
