Laptop advice for friend

[wedge22]

A friend from work asked for my advice on laptops, I dont know much about them so thought I would ask here.
He would like to do all the normal office stuff, surf, email etc. He would also love to play games. He is mainly interested in RTS so C&C3, SupCom, CoH, DOW, anything along those lines. He did not give me a budget but I guess around £500-600.

[staffsMike]

You dont get an awful lot of gaming laptop for less than £600

Your best bet is the new dell vostro 1500 or inspiron 1520 (same laptop, different colour), order over the phone and be sure to haggle.

With 2GB of RAM and a geforce 8600gt you'll be looking about the £650 - £700 mark after haggling but its a good deal.

You can also check out

www.rizeon.com
and
www.zepto.com

Rising stars as far as bangs for bucks are concerned.

EDIT: as im bored i had a look at the vostro specs

1.8GHZ
2GB of RAM
Geforce 8600GT

£527inc but minus delivery (which you will haggle for free)

Thats a friggin steal!!

http://configure.euro.dell.com/dells...N0815003&s=bsd

Always remember to select the most expensive variant of the model you want to configure as the prices are already reduced for you

[wedge22]

Thanks for the advice mate, I guess I should have said that I live in Vancouver so it must be for sale here in Canada, I cannot see the Vostro on Dell Canada's website.

[staffsMike]

You just need to go through small business

http://www1.ca.dell.com/content/prod...dt1&l=en&s=bsd

[Tabris]

I don't really want to make a new thread about it, but I was just wondering, what are the best places to go looking for laptops?

Building a PC from scratch, no problem. Finding somewhere which does decent laptops for a good price, I have no idea where to start. It's only really for work in my first year of uni, but if someone could give me a good idea of where I could get a decent laptop, it would be great. (Not really for gaming, though low spec gaming would be a nice plus)

[staffsMike]

You really can't go far wrong with the new dell laptops. As I said above £500 - £550 gets you a shinny new gaming laptop from them.

There's not really much point configuring it lower than that as you don't really save much money..as i said above the higher the starting value of the laptop the cheaper it gets if you take my meaning.

You can have a 14.1" version of the same laptop with the geforce 8400gs for the same sort of money maybe a little less. Thats more portable if its going to be moving a bit.

I keep up to date with laptops and there are other brands like Sony and Asus that I could recommend but the models don't touch the new dells in terms of bangs for bucks.

As for where you get them from.. misco are usually very good. Good range and normally cheaper than anywhere else.

[Tabris]

Thanks ever so much

[Ruggerbugger]

http://configure.euro.dell.com/dells...N0815003&s=bsd

Always remember to select the most expensive variant of the model you want to configure as the prices are already reduced for you

Will Dell deliver to home users from that link? Can we really get a VAT-less laptop?

[staffsMike]

Will Dell deliver to home users from that link? Can we really get a VAT-less laptop?

Yep you're completely entitled to order the laptop. When you finalise the spec it will quote including VAT and you go from there.. but i'd recommend ordering on the phone for further discounts.