Looking for a cheap laptop to take notes on

[Dreaming]

Hey all,

I might be getting a new laptop over the summer, this would be for student work mainly, taking notes in lectures for example. I might try and get the hang of using Microsoft OneNote just for this as I've heard it's quite good. At the minute I take notes on random bits of paper and they get discarded.

It's going to be a reward if I average over 60% in my exams this year. Really the criteria is along the following:

- quite cheap, maximum of £500
- easy to use / pull out and use
- portable
- keyboard use has to be comfortable (I have small, girl-sized hands, so laptop keyboards <100% aren't necessarily bad, though I found an original EEEpc really difficult to type on)
- nice battery life, consider that I could be in lectures and seminars for a few hours at a time, 1.5hrs battery life won't cut it.

Potential for games would be interesting, but only as an afterthought so certainly not up there as a priority. Any help would be really helpful. Touch screen functionality might be useful for note taking i.e. a tablet pc but they will probably cost too much.

Not averse to upgrading memory myself

[Dreaming]

A friend is selling his Samsung Q210 12" for £450, do people think it's worth it?

Cheers
Rich

[format]

Dell Mini 10, the most basic starts at &#163;199.

I'm looking for pretty much the same thing as you for next semester, and that's what I've been looking at. I'll probably upgrade the battery and maybe buy my own SSD though.

[staffsMike]

Make sure you try the sammy before you commit to it as the screens are rubbish imo.

The graphics are still very limited on them as well but the rest of the system is great for overall power compared to netbooks and the like.

The nvidia ion based netbooks would probably be your best bet if you could get one but they're still thin on the ground.

[holy god of nil]

Depends when you want it for, but maybe wait and see what the new culv laptops are like? Really thin, really light and 8 hours battery sounds good to me!

[arthurleung]

For taking notes a 10" won't cut it.

I use an Inspiron 1525 for notes taking, with 9+6+6 cell batteries it last through 12 hours easily at full brightness and wireless. If I drag it long with close to minimum brightness and switch wireless off it will last up to 20 hours.

I never bring a plug into uni, which the plug always located in awkward positions :S

Higher end CPU are very power efficient at close to idle, and CULV won't make a very big impact (almost half the power usage on mine is from the LCD, 20&#37; from the wireless card, and the CPU is more like 25% at about idle).

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

This notebook should do the job:

http://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/Acer_...27/version.asp

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/165409

A review:

http://www.laptopmag.com/review/lapt...810t-6415.aspx

Seems to have good battery life.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

If you do not mind lower battery life then these notebooks are even better:

http://www.morgancomputers.co.uk/sho...CategoryID=363

http://www.morgancomputers.co.uk/sho...CategoryID=363

http://www.morgancomputers.co.uk/sho...CategoryID=363

http://www.morgancomputers.co.uk/sho...CategoryID=363

[Infinite]

Asus' T91 netbook with touchscreen is coming out soon. Maybe worth having a look at that. Im personally waiting for the 10" version with win7 and multitouch.

[Barry]

I recommend the ACER 6030G, there around &#163;550 new but Argos tell referbs for &#163;440 on ebay, comes with a 9600m GT for gaming but is not the smallest thing around

[Dreaming]

He's knocked the price of the Q210 down to &#163;350 which is a bit of a steal at that price, so he's coming around tomorrow and if on inspection everything checks out I'm going to go for that :thumb:

[staffsMike]

That's more along the lines of what it is worth assuming it's in good condition