Which (CHEAP) Laptop To Choose?

[Jakg]

Pre-face - I know a lot about PC's etc, I'm just not up on the "laptop/netbook scene"

My current laptops screen is now totally screwed, and a new screen is at least £175 - I need a new laptop for School, but I only have about £300 handy and when I go to Uni I plan on buying a very very very nice laptop with my student overdraft - So all I need is a cheapy to tide me over.

All I need is XP (Vista would be better but meh), although I do have a spare key of XP so I could just install it myself, and the ability to run Chrome and Office (preferably 2007).

So far the cheapest solution i've found is to buy something like a second-hand eee for about £115 and then just add some more RAM and install XP. Is there anything else you think I should look for? I don't understand the eee model range at ALL!

7" is a little small, but i've always wanted a netbook and well it'll have to do 'cuz i'm poor!

To elaborate a bit:
Screen-size - Must be under 15.4", but bigger than like 5" obviously (although any size isn't really an issue),
Battery - Must last longer than 50 minutes,
CPU - Doesn't matter. Must be able to run XP without being too slow,
RAM - Doesn't matter if I can chuck some more SODIMM's in,
HDD - Doesn't really matter if I can drop SD cards etc in there. Would like enough space for XP, Office, few apps and about 500mb space for work.,
GFX Card - Doesn't matter,
Bluetooth - Would be nice but no deal breaker,
WiFi - Must have some king (even if it's just B standard),
Webcam - Doesn't matter,
Microphone - Would be nice but will pay nothing over £5 extra for it so meh.

I have no problem buying something with or without an OS (would probably wipe it and nLite XP anyway).

ATM i'm looking at second hand eee's, but don't really "get" netbooks. Not sure about the different models etc. Looking to spend under £200 hopefully less. Like I said - I will not be using this for that long. Have no problem with the Acer One and the Advent 42whatever, but it has to be cheap!



My old laptop was great, and as the screen was on it's last legs I had planned to keep it 'till I went to Uni and then buying a cheap-o LCD TV (i.e. a 15-19" one) and then just removing the screen from the laptop and using the TV as a screen, but alas I can't do that either now! Will certainly miss trying to use 1680*1050 on a 15.4" screen though - that was immense!

[staffsMike]

Well I'd take a look here first
http://www.bigpockets.co.uk/cat.php?...aptops&nav=227

But if it's a netbook you are after then you are on the right path.

Acer's One is about £200 with linux. Dell's mini is about £240 I think.

Samsungs is the best I've heard of so far, sounds right up your street but it's £300 The MSI wind or rebadged advent isn't bad either

So you aren't limited to Asus and certainly not the 7" screen (which is naff, as is the keyboard).

[Jakg]

but £200 is well over what i'm looking at paying...

So far i'm bidding on an Acer eee with 2GB of RAM, XP, Bluetooth, 2x 8GB Storage, WiFi Draft-N for around £150...

[Jakg]

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ASUS-Eee-PC-70...QQcmdZViewItem is what i'm looking at (cost wise).

[Webby]

If you want to do any decent amount of typing on this machine then you will really want something bigger than the 7" Eee, the keyboard is just to small for any sort of typing comfort and speed (unless you have pixie hands!).

I would say if you plan to do a lot of work on it that you will want a 9" as a minimum (just for the keyboard size more than anything else). The Aspire One has a reasonable sized keyboard it is wider than the 9" Eee (still quite small though).

I guess you could always attach a keyboard via USB if doing any large amount of typing (but then the screen may be a bit far away!).