Sorry your browser is not supported!

You are using an outdated browser that does not support modern web technologies, in order to use this site please update to a new browser.

Browsers supported include Chrome, FireFox, Safari, Opera, Internet Explorer 10+ or Microsoft Edge.

Geek Culture / Second hand laptop purchase

Author
Message
Philip
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 15th Jun 2003
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 29th Oct 2004 22:59
Link
Friends, Romans, Counterpeople and Bears of the World

In a mere three weeks time I am going on holiday for a lengthy spell to Australia and New Zealand. I want to keep working on my project while on holiday and so for this I must needs buy a laptop (note the slight medievael use of English there).

I don't want to buy a new laptop. So I need a second hand one. My thought is that as I don't need anything too cutting edge for this, cutting edge being my desktop's department, I should go for something like a reasonably high end P3.

What are your thoughts?

Philip

What do you mean, bears aren't supposed to wear hats and a tie? P3.2ghz / 1 gig / GeForce FX 5900 128meg / WinXP home
Back to top
Profile PM Email
spooky
22
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 30th Aug 2002
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 29th Oct 2004 23:04
Link
My thoughts are:

Stuff the laptop! You are going on holiday where the idea is to enjoy yourself in the sun and eye up all the Sheila's, enjoy a barbecue or three, drink like a fish, go bungie jumping, e.t.c.



Boo!
Back to top
Profile PM Website
flibX0r
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 14th Feb 2003
Location: Western Australia
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 00:10
Link
Ooh, If you're coming to Australia you should come say hello. We're all a friendly lot, really


Join the Expert Discussion forums dag nammit!
http://www.expertdiscussion.com
Back to top
Profile PM Email Website
Pricey
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 22nd Feb 2003
Location:
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 00:12
Link
Get a dell, you won't regret it.

http://wwww.johnsgames.tk
Back to top
Profile PM Email
Ian T
22
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 12th Sep 2002
Location: Around
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 01:04
Link
Get something on Ebay


Here we go again!
Whaddaya mean there's no such data type as a flaot?[/i]
Back to top
Profile PM
hyrichter
20
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 15th Feb 2004
Location: Arizona
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 05:05
Link
Quote: " Get a dell, you won't regret it"


Exactly my advice. I got me a used Dell about a year ago from eBay, and I've been very, very happy with it. P3 850, 10gb hd, 2 good batteries, leather case, etc. for $500. You should be able to find a good deal on eBay if you look.



Do not click the red button
Back to top
Profile PM Email
bitJericho
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 9th Oct 2002
Location: United States
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 05:06
Link
buy my laptop and fix it up

[center]
Come write!
Yarr join LoGD, and defeat other coders!
Back to top
Profile PM Email Website
JoelJ
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 8th Sep 2003
Location: UTAH
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 05:19 Edited at: 30th Oct 2004 05:19
Link
i'll give you $100 for it jerico :p

that is, if its even WORTH $100


<[jimmy]> pulling nose hairs is the worst pain in the world
Back to top
Profile PM Website
Kentaree
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 5th Oct 2002
Location: Clonmel, Ireland
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 05:21
Link
Make sure it works

I bought a new lappy yesterday from lidl, and when I tried to use it, it seemed the ac/dc adapter is b0rked, have to wait for them to send me a new adapter over the post from Germany

AMD Athlon XP2800+
GeForce FX5200 128MB
1.25GB DDR 333MHz RAM
Back to top
Profile PM Email Website
Ron Erickson
Moderator
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 6th Dec 2002
Location: Pittsburgh, PA, USA
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 05:34
Link
Keep a watch on this site for dell deals:
http://www.techbargains.com

I'm currently looking for a laptop myself

I've seen some good dell coupons on that site. A couple weeks ago they had 25% off any Inspirion. The best deal that I've seen on there was $750 dollars off select laptops of $1500 or greater in value.
The coupons are real. I priced one up and applied the coupon (after it is in the cart) and it discounts the price.

There isn't ANYTHING too great on there right now. The laptop that I'm looking to buy is an Inspirion XPS, 15.4" widescreen, P4 3.4Ghz with 1GB RAM, 256meg ATI 9800 video card, DVD-RW. My goal is < $2000

WOLF

EZrotate!
Tokamak Physics Wrapper!
Back to top
Profile PM Email
Complex
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 27th Apr 2003
Location:
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 05:37
Link
I have an IBM L40 SX for sale, with a max display resolution I could count on my hands, and (judging by its size) the posting costs would outweigh that of the laptop itself...

Interested?

Subspace Software
www.subsoft.tk
Software from a different dimension
Back to top
Profile PM
Yogz
19
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 11th Oct 2004
Location: England
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 07:50
Link
I recently bought a laptop off ebay for £26 + p&p. It's a Gateway Solo 2500 (P2 366, 64MB RAM, etc....) - not brilliant specs but for £26 is more than adequate for web design and basic dev work.
Back to top
Profile PM Email
Ilya
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 10th Aug 2003
Location:
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 07:56
Link
!!!
What was the shipping?

Quote: "I've seen the word programming and I'm not sure what it means. Anybody please explain?"


Quote: "We shouldn't sacrifice the truth to preserve "balance"."
Back to top
Profile PM Email Website
Philip
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 15th Jun 2003
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 08:13
Link
For the record, here is my itinerary:

1. Perth - I'm attending a wedding. This will be the second time I've been to Perth this year. The first time I went, in April, I loved it. Margaret River was ok but Perth was just excellent.

2. Sydney - lookin' forward to this

3. Auckland - meeting some Kiwi mates

4. New Zealand generally

+ laptop of course

Philip

What do you mean, bears aren't supposed to wear hats and a tie? P3.2ghz / 1 gig / GeForce FX 5900 128meg / WinXP home
Back to top
Profile PM Email
Mx5 kris
19
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 9th Oct 2004
Location:
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 08:55
Link
um.....compaq! I love their laptops. Mine costs $2000 right now, but is incredible..... P4, Mobility Radeon 9800, 90gb hard drive, and 18" screen. It is high end, but is worth it!

This is only the beggining...
The end is ony the beggining...
Back to top
Profile PM
OSX Using Happy Dude
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 21st Aug 2003
Location: At home
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 09:37
Link
No doubt there will be a fair few P3's on eBay, although you'll have to be careful that they haven't fallen off a back of a lorry - so to speak.

To be honest, its never worth buying anything electronic on eBay (some people would say its not worth buying anything, but there you go) - see if your local PC World has any half decent laptops going cheep cheep. Failing that, do what I do and rent 'em...

He who knows the cat becomes his slave; he who knows the dog becomes his King.
Back to top
Profile PM Email Website
indi
22
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 26th Aug 2002
Location: Earth, Brisbane, Australia
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 09:45
Link
dang what about brisbane .

You cant miss the great barrier reef while your here.

never mind, have fun while your here.

If no-one gives your an answer to a question you have asked, consider:- Is your question clear.- Did you ask nicely.- Are you showing any effort to solve the problem yourself
Back to top
Profile PM Email
bitJericho
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 9th Oct 2002
Location: United States
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 09:46 Edited at: 30th Oct 2004 09:47
Link
http://forum.thegamecreators.com/?m=forum_view&t=41859&b=2
if you want it

[center]
Come write!
Yarr join LoGD, and defeat other coders!
Back to top
Profile PM Email Website
BatVink
Moderator
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 4th Apr 2003
Location: Gods own County, UK
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 10:12
Link
Is it a DB Project? If so, the graphics card will be the decider. I have a 2.8 Ghz Intel laptop, 256 Meg RAM and a 64Meg SiS shared memory graphics card. It works...but it gives up quite quickly.

To give you an idea, my snake game gave up once I had around 30 objects. Polys doesn't seem to be the issue, it's more a problem with textures.

The advanced Terrain demo runs, but at around 10 FPS.

BatVink
http://biglaugh.co.uk/catalog AMD 3000+ Barton, 512Mb Ram, 120 Gig Drive space, GeForce 5200 FX 128 Mb, Asus A7N8X Mobo.
Terms & Conditions apply
Back to top
Profile PM Email
FoxBlitzz
20
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 19th Nov 2003
Location: United States
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 10:57
Link
What kind of DB project are you working on? If I wanted to work on a DB project using a laptop and had the choice to buy a new one, I would get one that has at least an ATI Mobility Radeon 9600, as it is the cheapest ATI card with 2.0 Shader support. Of course, you could just go for a lower model or even do with an integrated card, but integrated cards are evil, featureless, and slow.

HP Pavilion | Intel Pentium 4 CPU 2.40 GHz
512 MB Ram | NVIDIA GeForceFX 5600 AGP, with 256 MB Ram
Back to top
Profile PM Email
bitJericho
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 9th Oct 2002
Location: United States
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 11:23
Link
arg.. sorry cattle^_^

at any rate.. don't buy a laptop for your vacation... sheesh.. you're truly the geekiest of the geeky programmers I'm not even going to bring my computer to the US convention let alone bring one on a normal vacation

[center]
Come write!
Yarr join LoGD, and defeat other coders!
Back to top
Profile PM Email Website
Philip
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 15th Jun 2003
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 30th Oct 2004 21:53
Link
Guys, I don't need a particularly powerful laptop because I've got a really powerful desktop. The laptop is mostly going to be used as a platform to keep writing the code whilst I am away from the desktop. I can test it thoroughly when I get back.

Philip

What do you mean, bears aren't supposed to wear hats and a tie? P3.2ghz / 1 gig / GeForce FX 5900 128meg / WinXP home
Back to top
Profile PM Email
Ian T
22
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 12th Sep 2002
Location: Around
Posted: 31st Oct 2004 00:37
Link
Well, HP makes decent mid-range notebooks. I honestly wouldn't know where to find very low end ones .


Here we go again!
TRANSGRESS AND I SHALT BAN YE! (Just kidding...)
Back to top
Profile PM
Mentor
22
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 27th Aug 2002
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 31st Oct 2004 01:18 Edited at: 31st Oct 2004 01:33
Link
hmm Australia, keep away from bridges and crazed druggies, I hear they kill tourists in OZ just for their shoes, theres been a lot of tourists killed there latley (then again I wouldn`t tackle a bear...even if your a brown bear).

back on subject........
http://www.bargainpc.co.uk/reconditioned.laptop.laptops.uk.html
http://bargainpc.20fr.com/l.html
http://www.morgancomputers.co.uk/
http://www.laptops-computers.co.uk/a_laptop_a_uk_prices.htm

Mentor.

PC1: P4 3ghz, 1gig mem, 3x160gig hd`s, Radeon 9800pro w cooler (3rd gfx card), 6 way speakers.
PC2: AMD 2ghz, 512mb ram, FX5200 ultra, 16 bit SB.
Mini ATX cases suck.
Back to top
Profile PM
Philip
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 15th Jun 2003
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 31st Oct 2004 01:29
Link
Well, I've just got back from PC World in Charlton (where in the world? PC World!) I know I said I was going to buy secondhand but I thought, what the hell. This is what I bought:

1 x Toshiba Equium A60-152

Intel Pentium P4 532 (3.02GHz)
512 meg DDR ram (actually 256 meg DDR ram but I bought another 256)
40 gb HDD
DVD CD-RW drive
15" TFT monitor
ATI Radeon 7000 GFX card
etc

1 x Universal Power Adaptor

1 x 128meg USB pen drive thingy

1 x Burger with bacon, sausage and egg

Actually I didn't buy the burger in PC World - it was from a van just outside it.

Cheers

Philip

What do you mean, bears aren't supposed to wear hats and a tie? P3.2ghz / 1 gig / GeForce FX 5900 128meg / WinXP home
Back to top
Profile PM Email
Mentor
22
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 27th Aug 2002
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 31st Oct 2004 01:40 Edited at: 31st Oct 2004 01:42
Link
usb pen drive thingys are nice, I can load all the diagnostic apps etc onto my mates pc`s as easy as toast you get all sorts of uses for them you didn`t think of before (I use one for secure backups), oh! the laptop aint bad either .

Mentor.

edit: BURGER with sausage, egg and bacon, you sure that wasn`t a loaf it was wrapped in??

PC1: P4 3ghz, 1gig mem, 3x160gig hd`s, Radeon 9800pro w cooler (3rd gfx card), 6 way speakers.
PC2: AMD 2ghz, 512mb ram, FX5200 ultra, 16 bit SB.
Mini ATX cases suck.
Back to top
Profile PM
Philip
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 15th Jun 2003
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 31st Oct 2004 06:50
Link
No. It was a bit full I grant you. But I soon transferred that into my stomach.

Philip

What do you mean, bears aren't supposed to wear hats and a tie? P3.2ghz / 1 gig / GeForce FX 5900 128meg / WinXP home
Back to top
Profile PM Email
Karlos
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 18th Nov 2002
Location: United Kingdom
Posted: 31st Oct 2004 16:06
Link
you'll neeed the omega drivers for your card - it doesn't support hadware t&l

www.omegadrivers.net

makes it a bit more compatible with things.

All Hail the Glory of the HypnoToad
XP Pro - Radeon 9000 Mobility- P4 3.0ish
Back to top
Profile PM Website
Back to top

Login to post a reply

Server time is: 2024-09-22 22:16:34
Your offset time is: 2024-09-22 22:16:34