New Generation Laptop at Low Budget

P

Prabs1

Recruit
1. What's your Budget?
  • Between 20 to 25 K
2. What will be your primary usage for the notebook be?
  • General, Office, Surfing
3. What size and weight considerations do you have?
  • Preferably 14"
4. Any brand that you prefer, or any brand that you detest?
  • Any brand which can withstand a little careless handling and the A.S.S. is good with spares easily available in case of any unforeseen circumstances.
5. Any other considerations?
  • Good battery life is greatly welcome. Light weight and should run cool.

NOTE: This laptop is basically meant for my wife who has always used a desktop or my laptop only. This will be her first independent machine. I understand that my budget is small and I am still looking for something that is not ancient. I prefer something recent but my wife doesn't want me to spend anything more than 20K for her first machine.

Apart from whatever you knowledgable gentlemen recommend to me, I also need your sincere advice on the following three machines that have personally found:

1. A Pentium Dual Core (2nd Gen) > HP Notebook 430 (HP Notebook 430 (2nd Gen PDC) Laptop: Flipkart.com: Compare, Review HP Notebook) also from Flipkart for 21,628/- which saves me some money for peripherals.

2. An Intel Core i3 (2nd Gen) > Toshiba Satellite C640-i4014 (Toshiba Satellite Price in India | C640-i4014 Specifications, Features and Reviews) which is available from Saholic.com for Rs.24,499/- that appears to be a decent deal and suits my budget.
3. An Intel Core i5 (2nd Gen) > Toshiba Satellite C640-X4014 (Toshiba Satellite C640-X4014 Laptop: Flipkart.com: Compare, Review Toshiba Notebook) available from Flipkart for Rs.28,138. This over-shoots my budget by roughly 3000/- bucks.

Though I would prefer to go for the third choice of i5, but keeping in mind my wife's usage requirements, I am open to going for the one which is VFM and will also continue to give us good service for at least next 3-5 years, I would certainly prefer to go for it as we already have two other pretty decent machines with us.

Thanks to all here in advance. I await your wise inputs.
 
i5 = i3 with turbo boost mainly. Check this: Asus X54C-SX261D. Add 2GB more ram (1 ram stick). All within 25k.

And i'll suggest better leave the Toshiba C series. Those heats up a bit but looks plain boring. And touchpad+keyboard is not the best.
 
Thanks sam811 for your input.

I had actually looked at the model suggested by you earlier and had liked it too except for the fact that it has a 15.6 in screen. I guess it becomes a little big for easy handling, if required to carry it around.

What is your take on "HP Notebook 430" that I have mentioned above? If it is a good machine for general use for the next 3-5 years, I don't mind going for it too. It saves me some good money which I can use to upgrade RAM and get other peripherals.

I once again say that the new machine will not be used for any heavy stuff like designing or gaming etc, other than some regular office work and browsinf etc.

Please advise. Thanks again :)
 
Prabs1 said:
What is your take on "HP Notebook 430" that I have mentioned above? If it is a good machine for general use for the next 3-5 years, I don't mind going for it too. It saves me some good money which I can use to upgrade RAM and get other peripherals.
Click to expand...

Yes you can take that route too. Add 2-4GB more ram and should be sufficient to handle general task for a few years.
 
@ Rahul25755 > I really appreciate your POV. However since it's going to be the first machine for my wife who is just graduating from a desktop, I would like to give her some time to set her hands on an independent low-cost machine and then slowly move to a much powerful machine, if required. We all know from experience that a desktop can take much more mis-handling and wear-n-tear than a laptop. It would be wiser to spend lesser at this stage. After all, a penny saved is a penny earned. Thanks for your suggestion. Please do not feel angry :)@ sam811 > Thanks for your reply. Since your reply came a little late, I did some more research about the "HP Notebook 430" and the chip etc and I found it to suit my requirements greatly. Thus I have decided to take that route and have already ordered it from Flipkart. Thanks for supporting my decision. I will upgrade the RAM once I see the machine in person in a day or two.Now my next question from you is - Since it is a SB based machine, can I install Win XP Pro on this machine comfortably or do I have to go the Win 7 route? Most of my other software are also compatible with Win XP. I wait for your suggestions.Thanks again to both you gentlemen :)
 
Prabs1 said:
@ sam811 > Thanks for your reply. Since your reply came a little late, I did some more research about the "HP Notebook 430" and the chip etc and I found it to suit my requirements greatly. Thus I have decided to take that route and have already ordered it from Flipkart. Thanks for supporting my decision. I will upgrade the RAM once I see the machine in person in a day or two.Now my next question from you is - Since it is a SB based machine, can I install Win XP Pro on this machine comfortably or do I have to go the Win 7 route? Most of my other software are also compatible with Win XP. I wait for your suggestions.Thanks again to both you gentlemen :)
Click to expand...

yes you can install Windows XP. You must have heard things like Windows XP is not supported by SB but thats not true. XP is supported by even IVB.
 
Thanks sam811. I made a mistake in asking my question. What I actually meant by installing Win XP on this machine of SB design is that - does XP Pro have all the drivers to support this configuration or do I have to get them from HP site. Coz if I use XP, then I don't have to worry about getting more RAM initially. Do you have any other suggestions or recommendations to make using it a pleasurable experience?
 
drivers will be mainly required for the wireless & sound. cause display drivers can be found at HP else Intel site. And for wireless you can get by digging a bit but not sure about audio.
 
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