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Laptop advice (1 Viewer)

I

I Am Arthur

Footballguy
So I am looking to get a new laptop for video streaming and light gaming. I found this one and was wondering if those in the know think it's a good deal or not. Anyone have a toshiba before?

Thanks for any help!

Toshiba Satellite S855-S5170 15.6-Inch Laptop (Ice Blue Brushed Aluminum)$799

  • Intel Core i7-3630QM Processor (3.4 GHz)
  • 8 GB DIMM RAM
  • 1 TB 5400 rpm Hard Drive
  • 15.6-Inch Screen, AMD Radeon? HD 7670M Graphics 2GB DDR3
  • Windows 8
 
Someone here is always gonna say there is a cheaper price. I think good place to start just to get some reviews and see what you can possibly buy would be CNET...some folks hate that place but I think they do a decent job of presenting new computers as they come out. They obviously love Macbook and Apple which is why a lot of PC folks hate them.

You can get a laptop for $500 but one that is light and works like a Macbook Air...not gonna happen. I have heard good things about Toshiba, the CNET guys seem to like a couple of their models a lot.

Lenovo is always worth pulling up to see what they have.

Good luck and report back if you do buy this.

 
I'd look at the Lenovo outlet assuming you aren't stuck on the video card. They had some great deals around Easter - those specs excluding the 2GB video card (assuming that laptop $800 is not going to be running a 1080p screen) but with an SSD cache drive were just north of $400 (picked up an Ultrabook U510 for $412). Right now, the deals aren't as good, but I think you can get something close to $500, once again without that video card.

http://outlet.lenovo.com/ - Link to Lenovo Outlet (replaced my expired link)

Here is an example for $483 that was available in the outlet on 4/20 - same specs as the one I picked up for $412 on 3/29 when they had an additional discount coupon

deaPad U510 - Refurbished, ultraportable class, about 4 lbs.

Outlet Part number: 4941XF3
Processor: Intel® Core™ i7-3517U Processor (4M Cache, up to 3.00 GHz)

Operating system: Windows 8 Standard 64 - English

Display: 15.6" HD WXGA (1366x768) TFT color, VibrantView, LED Backlight w/720p HD Camera

Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 4000 and NVIDIA GeForce® 625M

Memory: 8 GB (2 x 4GB) PC3-12800 DDR3 SDRAM 1600MHz SODIMM Memory

Hard Drive: 774GB (750GB, 5400RPM and 24GB Solid State) Serial ATA Hard Drives

Optical Drive: DVD Recordable 8x Max Dual Layer

 
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Been doing a lot of research on this myself lately, not a bad machine for the price, but still probably a bit expensive for what you are getting. Things I don't care for on that machine at that price:

  • standard screen (1366x768 resolution is pretty blah, IMO)
  • no touch (which is nice for Windows 8, although not 100% as necessary as some would say)
  • heavy - if you are getting it for portability, it won't be as portable as you probably want
  • bad battery life - 4-4.5 hours is what they claim, don't bank on getting 3 in real use
Now I am a little biased, I am looking more towards the ultraportables myself, so weight & battery life are really important. Screen resolution is a personal desire of mine, I think the 1366x768 screen is just way to cramped, recommend looking at HD+ (1600-900) screens if you are looking at $800 machines. Otherwise, you can probably get a really nice machine that comes close to all of these specs for around $600. (i.e. http://amzn.to/YCi3cG or http://amzn.to/YCi6VR)

Also, you may want to check the http://www.microsoftstore.com/store - they are often offering some impressive discounts on different models.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
I Am Arthur said:
So I am looking to get a new laptop for video streaming and light gaming. I found this one and was wondering if those in the know think it's a good deal or not. Anyone have a toshiba before?

Thanks for any help!

Toshiba Satellite S855-S5170 15.6-Inch Laptop (Ice Blue Brushed Aluminum)$799

  • Intel Core i7-3630QM Processor (3.4 GHz)
  • 8 GB DIMM RAM
  • 1 TB 5400 rpm Hard Drive
  • 15.6-Inch Screen, AMD Radeon? HD 7670M Graphics 2GB DDR3
  • Windows 8
Click to expand...
The games you're looking to play can have a significant effect on what your needs will be. Also, if you only want to stream and play games, 1TB is a lot more hard drive than you'll need, and you're potentially getting significantly more CPU than you need as well.

And check your graphics card's performance here or somewhere similar http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark-List.844.0.html

 
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Updated my expired Lenovo Outlet link above with a generic one.
Plain and simple warning - Lenovo Outlet is a PITA to use.
Set a view - say show only the i7's that have 8GB RAM or better in low-to-high price. You should then right click and say "open in another tab" to try to add something you like to a cart.
They reload the outlet every 15 minutes or so, as a result a lot of times it gives you an error msg because the item is no longer available,
To refresh the cart, you'll have to refresh your tab and have to reset the search.

Good news is that they have free shipping and returns so if you don't like it, you can send it back within 30 days, no questions asked. When they had the coupons around Easter, I ordered five because I was not sure if I would want the ultrabook and am sending three back tomorrow (which of course are the three cheaper ones, including a G580 that I clipped for $253 and a Z580 for $311, both with i5's and 8GB RAM).

This morning (830AM EST) they had an IdeaPad U510 - Scratch & Dent for $500 with the specs as listed below

Part number: CB19953054-4941XF4
Processor: Intel® Core™ i7-3517U Processor (4M Cache, up to 3.00 GHz)

Operating system: Windows 8 Standard 64 - English
[*]Display: 15.6" HD WXGA (1366x768) TFT color, VibrantView, LED Backlight w/720p HD Camera
[*]Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 4000 and NVIDIA GeForce® 625M
[*]Memory: 8 GB (2 x 4GB) PC3-12800 DDR3 SDRAM 1600MHz SODIMM Memory
[*]Hard Drive: 1024GB (1TB, 5400RPM and 24GB Solid State) Serial ATA Hard Drives
[*]Optical Drive: DVD Recordable 8x Max Dual Layer

 
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An i7 with 8 gigs of ram should be plenty of horsepower for most anything you can think of short of autocad.

 
Shrugs said:
What ultraportables are you looking at?
Click to expand...
Price for hardware, the newish Vizio's are pretty killer, but there have been some complaints about their keyboards/trackpads, and only the newest models are touch (and the newest models are currently pushing up out of my price range). I really like the Samsung Series 9, and Asus has a really nice ultraportable as well, but again, if I want to add touch it slips up out of the $1000 +/- I was budgeting. Also been looking at the Acer Aspire S7 (Microsoft store has a pretty great deal on them right now, but someone I knew got one and is sending it back, so taking some time to think about that one).

Kinda just holding out waiting for a deal, as I don't need it yesterday.

 
I ended up getting a Samsung Series 7 (740U) Ultrabook.. Got a 1920x1080 touch screen, i5CPU, 4GB/128GB Ram/HD, plus it also has upgradable RAM (to 16GB), which is unusual on an Ultrabook. I got it at Best Buy for $999. I actually got the Asus Zenbook Prime that Best Buy had for $1099, but it had a black matte finish that got really oily really fast (and I don't have unusually oily skin). That, plus the fact that this had upgradable RAM made me return that and get the Samsung. So far, really happy with the choice.

 
In the market for a new laptop myself. Only real hard requirement is that it MUST have HDMI output, as I'll be connecting it to my HDTV a lot. Not looking to spend a ton, but rather getting the most bang for the buck.

 
I would at LEAST get a 7200 rpm drive. Better yet, if you can afford it go with an SSD. Do NOT go with the 5400 rpm drives - way to slow IMO.

 
dparker713 said:
Brady Marino said:
Brady Marino said:
In the market for a new laptop myself. Only real hard requirement is that it MUST have HDMI output, as I'll be connecting it to my HDTV a lot. Not looking to spend a ton, but rather getting the most bang for the buck.
Click to expand...
No one?
Click to expand...
Unless you're getting a netbook, most laptops have an HDMI port.
Click to expand...
Yup. Although one thing to watch out for is proprietary micro-HDMI connectors - if it is a mini-connector, do a little research and make sure that it is standard, not something you'll need the adapter from the manufacturer.

What's your price range? Besides HDMI, anything else you are looking for?

 
Maelstrom said:
dparker713 said:
Brady Marino said:
Brady Marino said:
In the market for a new laptop myself. Only real hard requirement is that it MUST have HDMI output, as I'll be connecting it to my HDTV a lot. Not looking to spend a ton, but rather getting the most bang for the buck.
Click to expand...
No one?
Click to expand...
Unless you're getting a netbook, most laptops have an HDMI port.
Click to expand...
Yup. Although one thing to watch out for is proprietary micro-HDMI connectors - if it is a mini-connector, do a little research and make sure that it is standard, not something you'll need the adapter from the manufacturer.

What's your price range? Besides HDMI, anything else you are looking for?
Click to expand...
Not looking to do any gaming whatsoever on it (I have a PC for that), so $300-$500 probably. Big thing will be playing videos.

Will check slickdeals and fatwallet, too.

 
Another question:

Maybe a laptop wouldn't be the best option for me. Is there anything out there that would let me stream videos I have saved on a different computer as well as streaming online video like YouTube, Skype, Vimeo, etc? Maybe I don't need a full blown laptop, but maybe some sort of box that exists for that kind of thing?

 
I'm a big advocate of at least getting a solid state drive big enough to hold the OS. It won't help you a lot in gaming unless the game does a lot of loading. But it's so nice to be able to just open up your laptop and have it instantly come out of hibernation and be ready to use like it will with an SSD.

You can always get a second, standard drive for holding data and your installed games and programs.

 
Looking for deals out there for a friend's second laptop for her small business. Would like at least an i5 processor, SSD drive, and 6GB or more of RAM. Don't need any other bells & whistles like DVD/RW, huge storage, etc. This will get a lot of use, but it just needs to be fast and run one business program that works on SQL Server. She'd like to be in the $500 range, but will spend more if it makes a dramatic difference in performance. Any good deals or recommendations?

 
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