laptops: the field narrows

[snugglekitty]

It's starting to seem that the Toshiba Satellite series and the HP Pavilion series would make the most sense for my needs. Right now I am considering the HP Pavilion dv4t and the Toshiba Satellite M300. Any comments or suggestions?

ETA: Current deal at Microcenter is an HP Pavilion dv4-1290us for $699 after rebate. Specs are here (but the one I saw was not in the hideous bronze, thankfully). Can anyone suggest one better?

Comments

[rampala.livejournal.com]

Way for LJ not to tell me you friended me; I only realized it now when I went to friend you!

I don't have an experience with Toshiba laptops, or Toshiba computers at all, but I have owned two different HP Pavilion laptops and I highly recommend them. I know this isn't the case for everyone, but I also found their technical support to be superb while my laptop was under warranty... not so much once it ran out.

They are, nevertheless, very tough computers. The one I had with me all through college survived a surge/shock that should've fried the motherboard, but all I lost was a USB port.

The only thing about buying any new PC is you'll have to go hunting for one that comes with Windows XP rather than Vista (which I highly recommend doing, if you can). If you have to get a computer with Vista on it, make sure it has at least 3 or 4 GB of memory, seeing as Vista takes up a whole gig just to run.

[lady-anemone.livejournal.com]

Oh, I used to have that problem with the Friending notification. I can't remember where you fix it, though. :(

Thanks for your thoughts on the HP Pavilion. I'm glad to hear they're tough. Yeah, I'm a little concerned about the whole Vista thing, but I do have XP Pro on my current laptop. I can always just reinstall it on the new one, if necessary.

And now I can say "I've done it before!" My first reinstall was successful. :)

[pink-pet.livejournal.com]

I've had good experiences with Toshiba and bad. I got a Toshiba for pinkdomme and it kept crashing. It went back to Toshiba for repairs about 3 or 4 times. They never could fix it so we gave up.

On the plus side, I had one for 5 years and it was great. It died, but I figure 5 years is about the shelf life I expected.

I got pinkdomme a Sony Vaio from Overstock.com. They sell refurbished computers and laptops, some are really good deals.

So far, 6 months in, we are loving the Vaio. I have a Vaio desktop that is 6 years old and still going strong. But Sony has pretty much abandoned the desktop market.

[lady-anemone.livejournal.com]

Thanks for sharing, about the Toshiba. Customer support and repair services do seem to be where they are a bit lacking, from the research I've been doing.

I was looking at the Sony Vaio, but the reviews are pretty bad... I'm glad you guys have a good experience with them.

Mrow!