Buying a new laptup, Are Asus any good??

[knealeedis]

I'm looking at buying a new laptop shortly as my current one is on its lase legs and keeps overheating and shutting down.

I have found what appears to be a good deal at ebuyer for an ASUS one which looks like it will be suitable (See link below)

Asus A7U-7P274C 17" WXGA+ Laptop AMD TL58 1.9GHz 2048MB 250GB DVD-SM WLAN Webcam HDMI Windows Vista Home Premium 2 Years Warranty - Ebuyer

Does anyone have any experience with Asus laptops as there dont appear to be as well known as some of the other brands.

My other option is an Acer one with similar (slightly lower spec) and is £50 more.

My main criteria is thet it is reliable, and reasonably quiet when not being worked hard (my current one is difficult to hear the TV over cus the fans are that noisy and are running all the time)

Dont really need it to be light and protable as it doesnt get moved very often, and battery life isnt that important as long as it last lonner than the 30min I get out of my current laptop.

[Nathanio]

We have just brought that exact laptop!

It rocks it really does, the price is fantastic and the standard kit is great. Screen is lovely and is nice and crisp. Honestly it should be priced nearer £600 than £400! It comes with a Webcam (update the driver as it caused some issues with Live Messenger).

Battery life:

In high performance: 1h15ish

Battery Saving: touch under 2 hours

I have brought a memory upgrade as vista is a bit memory hungry and so we now have 4GB in there which makes a difference.

2yr warranty is nice as standard as well.

We also brought a Belkin Neoprene skin to leave it in for travel and round the house. This also makes a nice lap blanket to keep the heat off

[knealeedis]

Thanks for the reply, whats it like noise wise when its running, but not being used particulary hard (web surfing/word processing)

Also what is involved in the memory upgrade? as I understand it comes with 2 x 1gb memory chips, to upgrade to 4Gb did you have to buy two new chips? and what was the cost and how easy was it to fit?

We have just brought that exact laptop!

It rocks it really does, the price is fantastic and the standard kit is great. Screen is lovely and is nice and crisp. Honestly it should be priced nearer £600 than £400! It comes with a Webcam (update the driver as it caused some issues with Live Messenger).

Battery life:

In high performance: 1h15ish

Battery Saving: touch under 2 hours

I have brought a memory upgrade as vista is a bit memory hungry and so we now have 4GB in there which makes a difference.

2yr warranty is nice as standard as well.

We also brought a Belkin Neoprene skin to leave it in for travel and round the house. This also makes a nice lap blanket to keep the heat off

[Nathanio]

Basic web surfing, email etc and the noise is minimal and can hardly hear it. Even when I am re-encoding DVDs using DVD Fab at full tilt it's not that noisy. It is quieter than my work Dell Precision M65 laptop.

Memory upgrade is very easy; one slot on top under the keyboard and one underneath under a cover. Took about 10 mins to do both modules. Cost is roughly £55 for a 4GB kit (Corsair Value Select DDR2-5300 (DDR2-667) SODIMM would be a good set to pick). I paid £35 for my 4GB upgrade as found a stonking deal on Amazon thats all sold out now.

[VRStu]

I got that in an email from then and thought it was a good buy.

[Aspman]

Recent thread here with some suggestions

TAZ Forum :: A Computer, Gaming, and Social Network Community of Friends :: TAZForum :: View topic - Recommend laptop to buy

I'd rate Asus over Acer by some distance.

I'm very please with my HP and I'd rate Toshiba laptops very highly too.

17" screen will suck down the battery quite quickly so you might want to consider a 15.4" if that is an issue.

Other than that it looks a pretty good deal.

[mrgregm]

seems good, worth buy me thinks

itll be fine for pretty much everything and even some gaming possibly, amd duel core processors work just fine but the clock speed is ofton mis reported as half the speed as it is shared between two cores, the processor is running at 1.9 (950mhz per core) how ever i have experianced windows to beleive that the clock speed is infact half(950mhz) which is fine cuz its running faster but some software (pertic games) refuse to run as it sees the clock speed as reported too low

so if your not going to do any gaming super, if you are look for something with an intel processor

asus are a good make, ebuyer is a good site (use it all the time lol)

stay away from generic brands in stores like emachines/eisystems and advent (they are both dsg owned brands and are only sold in dsg stores, thats pc world dixons and currys) and philips pcs be warey of, cuz philips dont actually make them other people make them and then buy the philips name to make them sell better.

for cheap laptops, try zoostorm laptops, they are a small britishcompany that make computers and laptops they currently only sell through a few stores and i think ebuyer have recently started stocking them, before they only sold through pcnextday.co.uk and next

Zoostorm PC and Laptop Computers

but they make good cheap computers and laptops

however asus is a good brand, have bought numerous motherboards and gpus from them, never had one fail and always a good price, theyre solid.

[mrgregm]

oh and btw, stay away from the cheapest of cheapest laptops, theyre always **** and obsolete in 6 months

they market them on the fact that "WOW ITS GOT 2GB MEMORY AND A MILLION GIG HARD DRIVE" and people go wow and buy it when its infact got a processor that was designed in 1983 and a shoddy build quality. just so you know get something with an all round spec other wise your higher end components will be sitting around at half load waiting for the slower and cheaper components to do their job.

god i ramble alot lol sorry but hope this advice helps

[Tech1e]

Been looking at Asus EEEPC's recently with the view to running VAG COM and VAG Tacho on one, anyone spotted any good deals? Windows progged one? Or can you get a cheaper Linux one and program XP yourself?

Discuss...

[Nathanio]

seems good, worth buy me thinks

itll be fine for pretty much everything and even some gaming possibly, amd duel core processors work just fine but the clock speed is ofton mis reported as half the speed as it is shared between two cores, the processor is running at 1.9 (950mhz per core) how ever i have experianced windows to beleive that the clock speed is infact half(950mhz) which is fine cuz its running faster but some software (pertic games) refuse to run as it sees the clock speed as reported too low

so if your not going to do any gaming super, if you are look for something with an intel processor

asus are a good make, ebuyer is a good site (use it all the time lol)

stay away from generic brands in stores like emachines/eisystems and advent (they are both dsg owned brands and are only sold in dsg stores, thats pc world dixons and currys) and philips pcs be warey of, cuz philips dont actually make them other people make them and then buy the philips name to make them sell better.

for cheap laptops, try zoostorm laptops, they are a small britishcompany that make computers and laptops they currently only sell through a few stores and i think ebuyer have recently started stocking them, before they only sold through pcnextday.co.uk and next

Zoostorm PC and Laptop Computers

but they make good cheap computers and laptops

however asus is a good brand, have bought numerous motherboards and gpus from them, never had one fail and always a good price, theyre solid.

Urmmm do you know anythign about computers? It is not 1.9GHz shared between two it is 1.9Ghz per core. The 950Mhz is the speedstepped speed where it reduces the speed of the processor to increase battery life and reduce temps

[mrgregm]

yes i do the point im trying to make is that with the amd duel core architecture i have experiaced operating systems mis reporting the speed, eg my dad and his 1.8(i think it was) amd turion x2 laptop reporting that it had an amd turion at 900mhz, i perhaps didnt word it too well, not good at english lol

i did a btec in systems support and then did a levels where i did computing, i read a fair bit of tech news and have built numurous computers and do help out my friend with a web design project, am bit of a geek

good at computers, the opposite when it comes to the english language

[anonymouse]

Bought self-same Asus laptop for daughter 2 months ago from eBuyer - brilliant value (and I messed with it for some time to get it set up properly for her).

So, defo good value (as you'll also note from the buyer reviews) :thumbup:

[knealeedis]

I've bit the bullet and ordered myself one this morning, due to be delivered tomorrow so I'll have a play and see what its like.

Any idea if its worth me trying to sell my old one which is slightly faulty.

Its A Fijitsu Siemens Pentium 4 (3GHz I think) 1Gb Ram, 80Gb HDD, DVD writer, Wi-Fi, all the usual stuff, works ok, but tends to overheat after a while and shut itself down, also the fans are fairly noisy. My solution to this has been to raise the computer up off the desk to help cooling and turn the TV up to overcome the noise of the fans.

I'm tempted to stick it on eBay, and advertise it as faulty. At the end of the day, any money back is better than nothing.

Bought self-same Asus laptop for daughter 2 months ago from eBuyer - brilliant value (and I messed with it for some time to get it set up properly for her).

So, defo good value (as you'll also note from the buyer reviews) :thumbup:

[Sporky McGuffin]

I'd strongly recommend the Lenovo R61 - really solidly built. Not pretty, but very good engineering. The screen has a "roll cage" so there's no flex at all, and the hard drive is shock-mounted and has software to park the heads if it detects any impacts to the computer.

[mrgregm]

there is usualy a removable panel (usualy a peice of plastic and one screw) over where the cpu is, you can then take the heatsink and fan off clean it and reseat it with new coolant compound, coolant compound is v.cheap you can get it from maplins, and they give you way more than enough so you can do it again in future on another machine etc,

i know someone with a laptop that overheats from time to time, as the heatsink just gets clogged with crap, some machines more suspectable due to location my friend smokes and has pets, so there is bound to be more matter in the air

but at that spec, deffinatly worth ebaying me thinks

that method should hopfully sort it, alot of laptops have fans that speed up with temp so it might keep the noise down too, v easy to do, and if it doesnt work then just list it as faulty on ebay, lots of people buy slightly faulty/damaged laptops to recon and sell or strip for parts i sold a very old laptop with a lot of damage and faults once, i was honest, listed them all, and it sold for £60 the thing was absolutly useless lol

[Lady Elanore]

I’ve got an Acer 5920 series lappy. Only 15” but reasonably quick (1.8 core 2 duo) but the battery life is around 3 hours on a medium performance setting.

[knealeedis]

Just finished stripping the computer to bits, had the main proccessor out, all the fans, memory chips, vaculed all the dust and rubbish out of it, cleaned both the fans and cleared a couple of big blockages of fluff, re-built it again with silver heat sink compound, turned it on and nothing happened. Doh!!

Took the proccessor out and re-seated it, re-assembled it and it burst into life, fans are now much quieter and seems to work fine and stay much cooler.

I'v been tempted to do it for a while but didnt want to incase it died totally and left me with nothing. So tonight I thought I've got nothing to loose.

Only problem now is the new one is due to arrive tomorrow from ebuyer and I dont really think I need it, so im going to have to look at there returns policy.

Pretty pleased with the evening efforts as its been playing up for a while and has been sent back to Fijitsu Siemens twice for repair and all they did was replace the hard drive and sent it back and the problem persisted.

there is usualy a removable panel (usualy a peice of plastic and one screw) over where the cpu is, you can then take the heatsink and fan off clean it and reseat it with new coolant compound, coolant compound is v.cheap you can get it from maplins, and they give you way more than enough so you can do it again in future on another machine etc,

i know someone with a laptop that overheats from time to time, as the heatsink just gets clogged with crap, some machines more suspectable due to location my friend smokes and has pets, so there is bound to be more matter in the air

but at that spec, deffinatly worth ebaying me thinks

that method should hopfully sort it, alot of laptops have fans that speed up with temp so it might keep the noise down too, v easy to do, and if it doesnt work then just list it as faulty on ebay, lots of people buy slightly faulty/damaged laptops to recon and sell or strip for parts i sold a very old laptop with a lot of damage and faults once, i was honest, listed them all, and it sold for £60 the thing was absolutly useless lol

[Tech1e]

I want one of these...

Acer punts £199 Linux laptop | Register Hardware

Not sure if I should go for the Linux and whack on a small XP install or pay the extra £100 and get the 80gb HDD and XP.

Out mid July.

[mrgregm]

Just finished stripping the computer to bits, had the main proccessor out, all the fans, memory chips, vaculed all the dust and rubbish out of it, cleaned both the fans and cleared a couple of big blockages of fluff, re-built it again with silver heat sink compound, turned it on and nothing happened. Doh!!

Took the proccessor out and re-seated it, re-assembled it and it burst into life, fans are now much quieter and seems to work fine and stay much cooler.

I'v been tempted to do it for a while but didnt want to incase it died totally and left me with nothing. So tonight I thought I've got nothing to loose.

Only problem now is the new one is due to arrive tomorrow from ebuyer and I dont really think I need it, so im going to have to look at there returns policy.

Pretty pleased with the evening efforts as its been playing up for a while and has been sent back to Fijitsu Siemens twice for repair and all they did was replace the hard drive and sent it back and the problem persisted.

oh dear lol, when your new one arrives see how you like it and then find out how much similar or same spec laptops are going for on ebay and weigh it up, thats if the returns policy says theyll take stuff back thats outa the box, bear in mind youll prolli have to pay delivery back, and i think ebuyer have some sort of systems where they pay you a smaller and smaller percentage of what you paid for it in th first place the longer you have it or at least they used to, then again the company keeps changing, they good now they were so **** at one point.

of course when your mind is made up if you want i will quite happily come and pick the laptop you dont want up and take it off your hands free of charge if you would like, that offers always open

[knealeedis]

Thanks for your offer, to take the old laptop off my hands free of charge, but I dont think I will be taking you up on it.

I've checked the returns policy for ebuyer, and aslong as I let them know within 10 days of reciept that I dont want it any more, and aslong as it is returned in a new, un-used condition they will take it back no problem, but i have to pick up the postage cost which shouldnt be too bad.

I think when it arrived, I'm going to leave it in its box, and give the old one some hammer over the next few days to make sure its working ok, and then I will make up my decision on what ot do with it. Might choose to sell the old on, and keep the new one?

Any idea what the old one is likely to go for on ebay now its working?

Fijitsu Siemens Amilo D

3.0 GHz Pentium 4

1Gb Ram

80Gb HDD

15" widescreen

Wi-Fi and all the usual stuff.

Reasonable condition, just a few marks on the case from where its been used.

oh dear lol, when your new one arrives see how you like it and then find out how much similar or same spec laptops are going for on ebay and weigh it up, thats if the returns policy says theyll take stuff back thats outa the box, bear in mind youll prolli have to pay delivery back, and i think ebuyer have some sort of systems where they pay you a smaller and smaller percentage of what you paid for it in th first place the longer you have it or at least they used to, then again the company keeps changing, they good now they were so **** at one point.

of course when your mind is made up if you want i will quite happily come and pick the laptop you dont want up and take it off your hands free of charge if you would like, that offers always open

[Sporky McGuffin]

Aye - Distance Selling Regulations mean they have to take it back and cannot charge any restocking fees or for the original delivery, though they don't have to pay for you to return it.

[cheezemonkhai]

If your order is less than 7 days old you can in writing cancel the order under the distance selling regulations and they must treat is as if you never placed the order.

You can actually decline to take the order from the courier as long as you have called them and written to them to cancel the order under the above laws.

[mrgregm]

Thanks for your offer, to take the old laptop off my hands free of charge, but I dont think I will be taking you up on it.

I've checked the returns policy for ebuyer, and aslong as I let them know within 10 days of reciept that I dont want it any more, and aslong as it is returned in a new, un-used condition they will take it back no problem, but i have to pick up the postage cost which shouldnt be too bad.

I think when it arrived, I'm going to leave it in its box, and give the old one some hammer over the next few days to make sure its working ok, and then I will make up my decision on what ot do with it. Might choose to sell the old on, and keep the new one?

Any idea what the old one is likely to go for on ebay now its working?

Fijitsu Siemens Amilo D

3.0 GHz Pentium 4

1Gb Ram

80Gb HDD

15" widescreen

Wi-Fi and all the usual stuff.

Reasonable condition, just a few marks on the case from where its been used.

haha, didnt think you would

well you should get at least £200 - £250 for it, its worth at least that if it works fine

there is this toshiba laptop with an almost identical spec going for £260

TOSHIBA SATELLITE A60 15" P4 3.06GHz 1GB RAM 80GB HDD on eBay, also, Laptops, Computing (end time 19-Jun-08 20:24:14 BST)

and there is your exact model of laptop going on ebay as faulty as it has an overheating problem (just like yours did) and a faulty ethernet card but thats no big deal so you could see how this one goes (as its bidding) and make a decision from there

FUJITSU AMILO D 1845 LAPTOP NOTEBOOK P4/1GB/80GB SPARES on eBay, also, Laptops, Computing (end time 22-Jun-08 22:23:45 BST)

hope this helps

the other option is if you know any 17/18 year olds about to go to uni or if you have a kid who is or knows people then ask about, as most undergrads want to get a laptop to take to uni and about 80% are poor and want something cheap lol

EDIT: also if you want to try the new one then you could open the packaging v.carefully and try it, the laptop will ask you to set up an account etc but if you decide you want to return it, then run the bundled recovery disk and do a full recovery then just turn the laptop off when it asks you to create an account again, just remember to put the disk back in the packet. to open sealed plastics and paper envelopes you can heat the glue with a hairdryer then peal it back gently with a knife, did that with the warrenty sticker on my xbox 360 lol.

[knealeedis]

Well I think I'v made my decision, I'm going to keep the new laptop, and sell my old one. I've been watching an identical one on ebay which eneded last night for £280, so I'm thinking if I can get around £200 for mine then the new one has only cost me £200 which isnt too bad.

The old one has been faultless since my work on it the other night and is still quiet and no longer get warm nevermind hot to touch like it used to. I've been working it hard the last few nights ant it has never crashed/locked up or shut down once.

Meanwhile the new one is still sealed up in its box at the side of me, and has been tourmenting me for the last few nights.

haha, didnt think you would

well you should get at least £200 - £250 for it, its worth at least that if it works fine

there is this toshiba laptop with an almost identical spec going for £260

TOSHIBA SATELLITE A60 15" P4 3.06GHz 1GB RAM 80GB HDD on eBay, also, Laptops, Computing (end time 19-Jun-08 20:24:14 BST)

and there is your exact model of laptop going on ebay as faulty as it has an overheating problem (just like yours did) and a faulty ethernet card but thats no big deal so you could see how this one goes (as its bidding) and make a decision from there

FUJITSU AMILO D 1845 LAPTOP NOTEBOOK P4/1GB/80GB SPARES on eBay, also, Laptops, Computing (end time 22-Jun-08 22:23:45 BST)

hope this helps

the other option is if you know any 17/18 year olds about to go to uni or if you have a kid who is or knows people then ask about, as most undergrads want to get a laptop to take to uni and about 80% are poor and want something cheap lol

EDIT: also if you want to try the new one then you could open the packaging v.carefully and try it, the laptop will ask you to set up an account etc but if you decide you want to return it, then run the bundled recovery disk and do a full recovery then just turn the laptop off when it asks you to create an account again, just remember to put the disk back in the packet. to open sealed plastics and paper envelopes you can heat the glue with a hairdryer then peal it back gently with a knife, did that with the warrenty sticker on my xbox 360 lol.

[anonymouse]

Meanwhile the new one is still sealed up in its box at the side of me, and has been tourmenting me for the last few nights.