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Is this an okay price for a laptop?

This is the first time I am using pcspecialIst. I want to replace my old laptop. I mostly use it for web surfing (got 60 tabs on Chrome). I want to start gaming again which my old laptop stopped me from doing. I also was interested in starting a hobby in creating animations/graphic design

The price quoted for my configuration is £1007. I was wondering whether this seemed appropriate 'bang for buck'? My budget was actually £1000.

Intel i7 quad core
16GB RAM
120GB SSD
1TB spinning hard drive
GeForce GTX 970M
Full HD screen 15.6 inch

I've included the specs in the attachments. It doesn't come with an OS because I was thinking of installing the free windows 10 upgrade from my old laptop. The case for the laptop looks decent, their customer service isn't the best based on my first impression.

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ImageUploadedByStudent Room1439633190.750582.jpg

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Reply 1

00100101

ImageUploadedByStudent Room1439635208.100057.jpg

I'm uploading from my phone. If you can't see the first image, here it is again

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Reply 2

Treypound

Original post by 00100101

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Why do require such an expensive laptop? Why do you need 16GB of RAM?

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Reply 3

Pro Crastination

I would say it's pretty reasonable for those specs. However I don't really rate laptops as great for gaming, as compared to desktop PCs - that being said I still forked out for decent specs so I could continue casual gaming whilst at university, and you benefit from a machine that boots up and does pretty much everything else pretty quickly.

Reply 4

Bradley.

Why don't you build a computer instead? It will shave a lot of money off that price.

Reply 5

Siberiaan

Pc>Laptop for gaming anyways. Im assuming ur going to or in university , so i guess a laptop is more practical.

Reply 6

00100101

Original post by Treypound

Why do require such an expensive laptop? Why do you need 16GB of RAM?

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Original post by Pro Crastination

Original post by Bradley.

Why don't you build a computer instead? It will shave a lot of money off that price.

My reasoning is pretty much similar to Pro Crastination. My old laptop had 6GB, and I could still make it slow down to a halt. The options I had for RAM were 8/16GB. Thought I'd splurge a little on it among other features.

That said, some time in the future, I do want to learn I build my own gaming PC. For now I'm more of a laptop guy.

Would have thought about trying out my first Mac, then I remembered it was overpriced. I then checked out the dell XPS 13 and fell in love with it. Then I found out it was overpriced (look at what graphics card it has). Next step was looking at laptop configuration companies. I know all laptops will turn to metal bricks as time passes by, but I want a laptop that stays decent for at least a couple years (and does what ever random job/hobby I want to get into).

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Reply 7

00100101

Does anyone think the components will stay relatively modern for the next couple of years? Or did I pick old outdated stuff?

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Reply 8

username612415

Original post by 00100101

Does anyone think the components will stay relatively modern for the next couple of years? Or did I pick old outdated stuff?

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It''s a solid spec and well in line with what you should be expecting for the price tag. The graphics card will play almost any game currently on the market maxed out at 1080p with solid frame rates, and 16GB of RAM is overkill if anything. The only way it could possibly start being considered "outdated" is that the GPU is going to struggle playing newer games maxed out at 4K, which is growing in popularity, but to get that in a laptop you need something insanely expensive running two 970M or 980M in SLI, or you'd most likely be plugging it into a 4K monitor rather than playing on 15" one, in which case you'd be better off with a desktop anyway. 1080p gaming isn' going anywhere any time soon (hell consoles can't even manage it on 95% of their games yet), so as long as you're not after the absolute bleeding edge (and the massive budget increase that would require) this laptop will be great.

Reply 9

00100101

Is the RAM really that overkill? I could think about switching out the 16GB for 8GB I suppose (that would bring the price down from £1007 to £911). Main reason I chose 16 was because my old laptop has 6 and It can slow down/freeze quite a lot at times. That and I thought it could be a good investment in case I need to do something very burdening in the future

I also have a second laptop in mind, it's not as nice to look at but according to notebookcheck it has a better processor (i7-5700), the specs seem similar to my (inexperienced) knowledge, although the down side is that it is about £100 more (£1098) and has half the RAM (8GB).

I use notebook check to compare CPUs (I.e whether one is better than the other), but how would you tell which is better for its money?

Spec for the second laptop:

Intel Core i7-5700HQ Quad Core (2.7GHz, 6MB Cache, Intel Turbo Boost Up To 3.5GHz)
15.6" (1920x1080 Full HD Resolution)
Microsoft Windows 8.1 64-bit
8GB (DDR3 1600MHZ)
128GB SSD + 1000GB HDD
DVD Rewriter (Records DVDs 8x & CDs 24x & Dual Layer Super Multi)
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M with 3GB GDDR5 Dedicated Memory
802.11b/g/n Wireless
10/100/1000 Gigabit Fast Ethernet
Integrated Webcam with Microphone
4x USB 3.0
Bluetooth 4.0
Integrated Sound System
1 External VGA Port
1 x HDMI Port
1x eSATA Port

So far it seems I have three options:
-keep the current configuration-£1007
-swap out 16GB for 8GB RAM - £911
-get other laptop, better CPU/ half the RAM -£1098

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Reply 10

username612415

Original post by 00100101

Do you have links to the two laptops?

It's definitely not worth upgrading to 16GB if they're charging £90 for an 8GB increase, you can buy a full 16GB of laptop RAM for £60-£70. If you were to opt for the first one I would get whatever the minimum volume of RAM is and purchase a 16GB kit separately if you definitely want that much.

Have you actually checked Task Manager or other programs to confirm that your computer slowing down is the result of all 6GB of memory being taken up, and then checked to see what exactly is occupying it? 8GB is more than enough for most people, and moar RAM won't instantly make a computer faster if you're doing something to slow down a computer which isn't related to the RAM.

Reply 11

00100101

Don't know if I can show a link for the first laptop because it's configured. It's from pcspecialist if that matters?

The second laptop is shown here:
http://www.saveonlaptops.co.uk/P55W-v4-CF1-Gigabyte-P55W-v4-CF1_1805489.html

From a quick google, it seems that the 5700HQ is only a tiny bit better than the 4720HQ. Can't tell for sure, but it seems like it's not worth the price increase.

Fair enough, regarding RAM, i haven't checked how much RAM is actually being used. I suppose the slow downs could potentially be due to other issues.

If it's cheaper to just get my own RAM (assuming I wanted to add more), it seems like my best option is to get the first laptop with only 8GB RAM, which is great because that's the cheapest option :biggrin:

I don't mind paying more so long as there is some benefit e.g future proofing for the next couple years, significant improvement in performance etc

Edit: looked at how much I'm using right now, fairly little usage in my opinion, and I'm using about 4.93GB according to task manager. I haven't actually checked how much I'm actually using when I'm at the most resource hungry

It seems I'm mostly deciding between 8GB/16GB configuration. But then even if I could buy the RAM myself cheaper, there would also be the issue of being able to install it without screwing up

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 12

mehdi313

Hi,

Is a gaming laptop suitable for university? I mean, I know that gaming laptops suggest that they are for gaming, but it has the best performances and RAM’s a laptop could have. And my thought process is if I’m going to buy a laptop, might as well buy the best performing ones with high processor speeds.

(The laptop I am considering is the LENOVO Y50 15.6" Gaming Laptop - Black
SPECIFICATION
Processor - Intel® Core™ i7-4710HQ Processor-
Quad-core- 2.5 GHz / 3.5 GHz with TurboBoost-
6 MB cacheMemory (RAM)
16 GB DDR3LGraphics card NVIDIA GeForce GTX-860M (4 GB GDDR5)
Storage 1 TB SSHD)

Any advices are appreciated!

Thanks,

Reply 13

00100101

Just bought the laptop :biggrin:

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Reply 14

Iqbal007

Original post by mehdi313

Yeah but they are heavy and battery life is poor in comparison as they are aimed at getting the most performance.

Have you checked elsewhere like saveonlaptop, scan, novatech, etc?