Overall laptop

[Divided by Zero]

Hello everyone, I'd like some advice

I'm thinking of buying a laptop since I'm going to be abroad for studies for a year, and I was wondering if you could tip me with some good laptops? I don't want a stationary rig since I already have fairly good one at home, but I'm sharing it with my family members so I can't bring it with me, and a laptop's quite convenient (already have one but it's getting slower each day that passes).

I'm thinking of using it to studies (Office, browsing) but also music (both listening and working with it, Finale), movies, and a little gaming, like HoN, SC2, CoDMW. I'm not a hardcore gamer so the graphics mustn't be top-notch, but I'd like to have some flow in the frames when things get a little intense.

I'm thinking a price-range up to 1500$/1000Euro (I'm going to study in Germany, might buy it there), maybe a bit more if it's attractive enough ^^

Please feel free to give suggestions, I'm grateful for every tip

 

[Jerubbaal]

The cheapest way would be to build your own, but building a laptop is tough work. If you want to buy a premade, I would suggest Alienware. People will tell you they're overpriced, but compared to comparable Asus and other brand models they were all very close in price. The only big downside to Alienware is that you have to deal with Dell.

Also, if you care about Linux at all, don't get any laptop that has an Nvidia and Intel Integrated Graphics card together. As I discovered with much sadness, it is absolutely impossible to run Linux if you have such a setup.

 

[Ziadaine_v1legacy]

The cheapest way would be to build your own, but building a laptop is tough work. If you want to buy a premade, I would suggest Alienware. People will tell you they're overpriced, but compared to comparable Asus and other brand models they were all very close in price. The only big downside to Alienware is that you have to deal with Dell.

Also, if you care about Linux at all, don't get any laptop that has an Nvidia and Intel Integrated Graphics card together. As I discovered with much sadness, it is absolutely impossible to run Linux if you have such a setup.

I think that might be a bit difficult.

While I agree Alienware isnt that bad, there are others better for an affordable price.

Eg: Netbook Alienware costs $800. Toshiba Netbook costs $400. EXACT same specs, only difference is Alienware made it look prettier.

 

[Ac30]

The cheapest way would be to build your own, but building a laptop is tough work. If you want to buy a premade, I would suggest Alienware. People will tell you they're overpriced, but compared to comparable Asus and other brand models they were all very close in price. The only big downside to Alienware is that you have to deal with Dell.

Also, if you care about Linux at all, don't get any laptop that has an Nvidia and Intel Integrated Graphics card together. As I discovered with much sadness, it is absolutely impossible to run Linux if you have such a setup.

I think that might be a bit difficult.

While I agree Alienware isnt that bad, there are others better for an affordable price.

Eg: Netbook Alienware costs $800. Toshiba Netbook costs $400. EXACT same specs, only difference is Alienware made it look prettier.

Toshiba gaming netbook for $400?! Link please.
OT: have a look around Newegg. They've usually got good deals.

 

[Ziadaine_v1legacy]

The cheapest way would be to build your own, but building a laptop is tough work. If you want to buy a premade, I would suggest Alienware. People will tell you they're overpriced, but compared to comparable Asus and other brand models they were all very close in price. The only big downside to Alienware is that you have to deal with Dell.

Also, if you care about Linux at all, don't get any laptop that has an Nvidia and Intel Integrated Graphics card together. As I discovered with much sadness, it is absolutely impossible to run Linux if you have such a setup.

I think that might be a bit difficult.

While I agree Alienware isnt that bad, there are others better for an affordable price.

Eg: Netbook Alienware costs $800. Toshiba Netbook costs $400. EXACT same specs, only difference is Alienware made it look prettier.

Toshiba gaming netbook for $400?! Link please.
OT: have a look around Newegg. They've usually got good deals.

I never said gaming, They're both standard netbooks with the exact specs but a major price jump.

4GB DDR3 RAM
160GB HDD
Intel Extreme on-board graphics
Windows 7 Starter
14.5"
i3

 

[Jerubbaal]

I never said gaming, They're both standard netbooks with the exact specs but a major price jump.

4GB DDR3 RAM
160GB HDD
Intel Extreme on-board graphics
Windows 7 Starter
14.5"
i3

I'm trying to figure out exactly what Alienware you're talking about. Because their 11" starts at $700, and that includes a 1GB Nvidia card and a 320 GB HDD.

 

[NezumiiroKitsune]

I have found some awesome laptops for incredibly low prices recently, so for what you want, you aren't even going to be looking at anywhere near ?1000 (unless you want to spend a bit more anyway, which is cool, the laptop will last longer).

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=631887&CatId=4938

This is an excellent example. LED-Backlit 17.3" screen with a 1600x900 resolution, a true 4 core CPU that was just released by AMD (they have on-board GPU's that seriously improve performance of dedicated GPUs, similar to Sandy-bridge, but statistically a lot more significant an improvement), a very competent GPU capable of running most games at high settings with a good frame-rate, and 4GB of RAM that is (as is common) upgradable to 8GB. It's a good laptop all round, with the only caveat being the low 1.5Ghz processing speed, however some reviews I've read say good things about gaming performance and heat dissipation, so if it becomes necessary, it will be very easy to overclock a little.