I am deciding between a HP Pavilion dv8000t and a Dell Inspiron E1705. When I customized each laptop to the features I wanted, the Dell came out about $500 more. Is there a big enough difference in quality & service to buy the Dell or should the HP be fine?

I'll be using the laptop for school work, listening to music w/ iTunes and watching TV using wintv. Also I play a lot of poker so I need a system that won't stall or freeze while I am playing multiple tables - why I need 17" screen, listening to music and downloading files. Thanks in advance.

-Jordan

 

My vote is neither...

Have you considered Toshiba or Acer...?

 

Not untill now, what are some of the pros/cons?

 

Some places worth visiting before you buy:

http://www.pcmag.com/category2/0,1874,9,00.asp
http://reviews.cnet.com/4566-3121_7-0.html?tag=dir


Overall, I've had less problems with Toshiba and Acer laptops than your other two choices...I'm sure there are lots of Dell and even HP users on AZ who would say how great their machines are...But, I stand behind my opinion that my two recommendations are just better built overall and are better bang for the buck (esp. the Acers).

 

HP HP HP!!!

I can't even tell you how many I buy for my friends and family and they love them.

In fact, I have purchased 2 DV8000 series for my brother and my realator. They both love them!

 

Yea HPs are nice but mine broke down twice within a year of purchasing it. Anyways there pretty sweet and pretty inexpensive. And does HP allow dual core chips yet?

 

HP does offer Dual Cores now, But both of those computers are pretty heavy. Mine is 6.6 lbs and isn't a joy to cary for long periods of time. 8 pounds lis getting into battleship territory for a "laptop"

I followed yumcha's advice back in august and bought a acer 8104. It's been a great little computer. The price at that time was around 1900 bucks, I added a acer extended 3 year warentee for another 99.

The HD died around christmas time (can't really blame a hd dieing on acer, especially since it's a expensive seagate drive). I called their support people and was fairly confused when I was connected with a guy in texas. My dad had owned dells for years and it was rare that I would speek to somebody from my country. Here I went and bought a taiwanees computer and their phone support for this continent, is on this continent. Anywho they sent me the hd with great haste and I havn't had a problem since.

The acer with the closest spec to those two you showed is around 1500 bucks though. And the succesor to mine. The 8204 is pushing 2200 (mostly for the 2gb of ram and the x1600 gfx card).