best lap top under $500

[paceman]

so herer is my question..

what is the difference between

500 GB HDD 7200rpm   OR  500GB 5400rpm with 8GB cached Hard drive  its a $20 upgrade

Dual band 3160AC Bluetooth 4.0 OR  Intel dual band AC/B/G./N 7265   Its a $15 upgrade

Cheap upgrades are they worth anything to me ..can get the 14 or `15 at $600

i3 5005u  3Mb 2.0GHZ
8 Gb Ram PC3 - 12800 1600Mhz DIR3L
Then the hard drive option as above
Comes in at  $619.00 delivered with above options selected or $549.00 without options selected

Jet

stick with the 7200rpm, IMO, as the the drop to 5400 from 7200 is a big drop...

get the intel dual band ac/b/g/n

[jetcrew]

Thanks mate ..

had no idea on that one so the system will now only be $564.00

I thionk thats a decent little lap top for $564 with quality processor and decent ram coupled with the durability of the lenvo .

i will call them tomorrow and place an order

Thanks everyone 

[prodigyrf]

I think Brian Gill answers your question well here-
https://www.quora.com/Hybrid-5400-rpm-with-SSD-cache-or-7200-rpm-without-SSD-caching

SSD drives are fast on bootup and fast for lots of heavy crunch computing (which isn't what most of us do) but the drawback is unlike mechanical HDDs they give you no warning when they fail. In that respect you can up the RAM that also has fast interface with the motherboard but again what are you using it for? That's where the gamers want top processor, max RAM, SSD and powerful screen/video card with plenty of cache capacity. Are you a Gamer is the question and at what price point?

OK so how big a mech HDD do you need? About 500Gb to run any foreseeable software and you should be backing up all your music, video, files on another portable drive in case you get a hardware failure, killer virus or ransomware and remember you don't keep the backup/storage drive plugged in while you're net surfing, etc because you pick up a rootkit virus or ransomware and they'll knock that over too at the same time. Another tip is it's better to have more smaller drives (say 1TB) than a 3 or 4TB one in much the same way as you only need 500GB onboard running the laptop as smaller drives have greater longevity and are easier/quicker for the computer to search, all other things being equal. Lastly when they say it's a biz laptop like that Satellite Pro, you'll know it does most things well and it won't fall apart on you like some.

That's what I've gleaned from the geeks on Whirlpool Forums and it's stood me in good stead. I also like Dell PCs for their backup and the biz Toshiba 850 Satellite Pro I bought a couple of years ago has some excellent housekeeping software from Toshiba. It's hard to put a price on that when you see the cheaper offerings.

 

[jetcrew]

Thanks mate i did  a bit if reading too and i will stick with the single 7200rpm 500gb as paceman also suggested

[jetcrew]

Well just when i thought i was done ..Lenovo say 2 maybe 3 weeks to get one..

I leave in 4 week actually less.. so the lenovo is out ..cant even buy it at a store either ..

It was a very well specced unit for $619  ..have totally stopped even bothering with stores and the online places I cant even call someone and when i can its just a call centre..

So I have gone to 2 computer shops and left my details and specs i want and they are going to put some prices and packages together for me.

both surprisingly dont do the HP G3 or G4 that all the onliners and mainstream shops sell..to many issues they both said ..Lenovo/toshiba and asus were the offerings so will wait for them to come to me now .

And both can do it in a week tops so watch this space for the final outcome.

[prodigyrf]

Don't forget one of these for the trip-
http://www.scorptec.com.au/product/Notebooks/Power_Adaptors/49489-HK-NBCAR90XM
and note that connected equipment insurance warranty so don't be tempted by the cheapies on ebay without that guaranteed electronic protection
Targus have one too but only 2 year warranty-
http://www.officeworks.com.au/shop/officeworks/p/targus-laptop-car-charger-and-usb-fast-charging-port-taapd046au

 

[tryagain]

Well just when i thought i was done ..Lenovo say 2 maybe 3 weeks to get one..

I leave in 4 week actually less.. so the lenovo is out ..cant even buy it at a store either ..

It was a very well specced unit for $619  ..have totally stopped even bothering with stores and the online places I cant even call someone and when i can its just a call centre..

So I have gone to 2 computer shops and left my details and specs i want and they are going to put some prices and packages together for me.

both surprisingly dont do the HP G3 or G4 that all the onliners and mainstream shops sell..to many issues they both said ..Lenovo/toshiba and asus were the offerings so will wait for them to come to me now .

And both can do it in a week tops so watch this space for the final outcome.

I STILL think this is a very good option, as good if not better deal than any you have posted is under budget and says it should arrive by this Friday if orderd now. If you wanted the extra ram it is cheap to add extra and about as technically hard as wiring up an anderson plug.

I bought a computer from a bricks and motar store about a year ago and had a warranty issue so took it back to store, I was told they could deal with it but it would probably be quicker if I called the warranty line myself, so I did. My most recent computer purchase was online as it was the best deal and being able to take it back to a shop for warranty wasnt a consideration.

[Bird]

these days at work we recommend dell to home users for the warranty... which is rarely needed we find even with the work ones.

you make a phone call, and some bloke that doesn't speak English is there the next day with parts..

[jetcrew]

I STILL think this is a very good option, as good if not better deal than any you have posted is under budget and says it should arrive by this Friday if orderd now. If you wanted the extra ram it is cheap to add extra and about as technically hard as wiring up an anderson plug.

I bought a computer from a bricks and motar store about a year ago and had a warranty issue so took it back to store, I was told they could deal with it but it would probably be quicker if I called the warranty line myself, so I did. My most recent computer purchase was online as it was the best deal and being able to take it back to a shop for warranty wasnt a consideration.

I found out today that many of those HP have only 1 ram port so to upgrade to 8gb i need to bin the 4gb i cant just add another 4.

I just hate ebay for many reasons and if an item costs that much I just cant bring myself to buy on eaby ..I,m a sook I know ..I would happily pay another $50-$100 for a store.

I will see what the 2 quotes come back at and what they are ../.

but at this stage I am seriously thinking of upping the limit to $800 ..that extra $200 just starts to blow things away with simple ready to go solutions like this

https://www.jbhifi.com.au/computers-tablets/laptops/lenovo/lenovo-ideapad-300-15-laptop/945788/

all done walk in pay walk out .. and its an I5 6th gen with 8 Gb and  1TB thats a lot more machine for $198 more than my budget  and its readily avail..I am sure there are lots more to look at in the $800 bracket but it opens up the availability and variety . I am really liking the lenovo stuff from what i have read on here and online . Yes no dedicated graphics card but i can live with that.   

Got 1 quote back 
HP G4 250
i3 5th gen
8 gb
500 HDD
$695.00


so for $103 i can get the above lenovo unit instead

Jet

[tryagain]

I will genreally pay a bit more to support a local small business as well.
I know you dont like eBay but I think I might have a deal that may make you reconsider buying there, yes you have to buy of eBay but no they wont make any money out of you if anything you will likely cost them a bit. They have a promotion with the Good Guys where you get 20% off if you purchase throught their eBay store. You can get it delivered or click and collect, just have to use the code COLLECT at checkout.

This one comes too $637

so for $103 i can get the above lenovo unit instead

You can have it for $58 dollars less, you just have to come to the dark side 

[jetcrew]

wow thats pretty good mate 

considering JB said they would have to order in for me in any case this could be the go..I will need to break all my rules though...hmm your a tempting man tryagain ...

after loosing it at the son again about the fact it worked when i gave it to him ..old lap top i,m talking about here.. we have dropped it off at the computer store. I got quotes from and they said $49 to diagnose the issue ..with it most likely being a corrupted version of windows when he tried to re load windows 7 on it  they are seeing it a bit he reckons .

the memory and Hard drive check out ok on the BIOS test or something.

so if its just that they will load windows 7 back on for $40.00. So the son will be $89 out of pocket and a lesson learnt ..leave things as you find them esp when asked..
if its anything more than that it will be binned and if it is not related to the update / re load then the son is in the clear.

If i can get it going ..reliably I would do this as it wont matter if gets knocked around a bit . if not then tryagain will have convinced me to pop my cherry with ebay  and I will order the one in his link ..Thanks again for looking at that for me mate 

I'll need someone to buy me dinner though LOL..

jet

[jetcrew]

tried to progress to payment but it seems the 20% is maxed out at items to a $500 value so no disc is applied at all ..I thought that only $500 would qualify for the disc .. not that it would exempt the entire item.

or am I doing something wrong.

jet

[tryagain]

or am I doing something wrong.

jet

This, max discount is $500 (so that would be on a $2500 purchase) you need to click on buy it now and then enter collect where it says redemption code and click on apply, my guess is that you arnt a registered user or signed in so isnt working at the moment.

[prodigyrf]

Nearly forgot the important bit about laptops and that's battery size--
http://www1.euro.dell.com/content/topics/topic.aspx/emea/topics/landing_pages/en/hmc-battery?c=uk&cs=ukdhs1&l=en&s=dhs
My 6 pack Toshiba finally died and I've replaced it with a 9 pack for on the road
That Ideapad only has a 4 pack

[jetcrew]

I guess there will always be compromises in the lower end of the price scale 1080 and battery quality are prob the first 2 .. But if you can't gave champagne on s beer budget I guess.

Jet

[jetcrew]

Well lap top is back ...

Windows 7 back on it a gealth check and a bill of good health issued $50 in total as the stuffed up the timming and i had to wait arond for 2 hrs .

Only issue is that the priduct key sticker was unreadable on bottom of unit so they installed thier store version with no key provided to me ..but there is no WORD  on it ... i had this before

Do i now need to buy this again ..

[Fizzie]

Open Office https://www.openoffice.org/, will do pretty well anything that Word or Excel can & it's free! 

[tryagain]

Product key is usually different for Word and windows so depending on how you purchased word last time you might still have that product key, If so it can easily be downloaded.

[prodigyrf]

Well lap top is back ...

Windows 7 back on it a gealth check and a bill of good health issued $50 in total as the stuffed up the timming and i had to wait arond for 2 hrs .

Only issue is that the priduct key sticker was unreadable on bottom of unit so they installed thier store version with no key provided to me ..but there is no WORD  on it ... i had this before

Do i now need to buy this again ..

It may be a bit late now but there are Microsoft software key finders-
http://pcsupport.about.com/od/productkeysactivation/tp/topkeyfinder.htm
but it always pays to keep a copy of the key on file separate from the computer

[Troopy_03]

Open Office https://www.openoffice.org/, will do pretty well anything that Word or Excel can & it's free! 

Libre Office is another good free office suite as well.

[Rocky and Bullwinkle]

Shop around sometimes run out models are the cheapest, my daughter picked a Lenovo 6 years ago cheaper at Big W than what we could get on my mates IBM employee account.
The HP I am currently using was a $2800 laptop, I paid $1600 brand new in a sealed box at JB HiFi at South Wharf because it was the last one. You can save some serious dough if you shop around!
   

[Garfish]

I miss the old days when Microsoft product keys just had to add to seven.

We are using office 365 as with the kids in school we get it for the right price.... $0.00.