Hi All,

I've been out of the PC hardware market for quite some time, and I've always been much of a Desktop owner, and still am...

I was thinking of getting a budget friendly laptop to use when I'm downstairs at my house to just do tasks such as the following:

YouTube/Video Watching (TV Shows, Movies, Music Videos, etc.)
Music Streaming
Microsoft Excel Spreadsheets
Emails
Web Browsing

All pretty basic tasks, and it seems there's a TON of laptops in the $200-$300 price range...Does anyone have insight on any good models or things I should be looking out for? Certain processors? Amount of ram? etc.

I constantly see deals on BensBargains, SlickDeals, FatWallet etc. I just have no idea if there's anything in particular I should look out for. If I do anything more than usual, it would be multitask...

Here's an example of a recent random "deal" I found:
http://www.dell.com/us/p/inspiron-15...09196588215843

 

In that price range, they will all be about the same specs. In about 1-2 years any of them will feel pretty slow though. Im not saying not to get one, just look for something with at least 4GB Ram and some kind of intel processor. Although, I don't see much around the $200 mark unless you are talking about a Windows 8 tablet. I would stay away from Celeron and Atom as well. This isnt bad: click

 

They're all crap at that price range, you get what you pay for...

Don't expect much...

 

New Chromebooks from Samsung and Acer are due soon. I sill like my Samsung, been using it to watch Game of Thrones on HBO Go.

 

I'm looking for a similar device with the same requirements. Right now I have my eye on the ASUS Transformer Book T100. The 64 GB SSD model goes for $350 on Amazon. It's a 2-in-1 tablet convertible, so it's a little pricier - but hey, i'm looking for a tablet form-factor.

 

One day only: Just $199 for the ASUS X200MA touchscreen laptop
http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/...linkId=8156282

 

Anything that is NOT Toshiba will be fine

 

Any reason you say that? I just saw this deal pop-up today, and see A LOT of good reviews...What is wrong with Toshiba?

http://www.fatwallet.com/Best-Buy-co...a5105/70789-3/

On the Best Buy site it's mostly 5 and 4 star reviews?

 

Toshiba is fine. Dual Core Celeron is not.

 

I have a Toshiba Tecra that work gave me. It's about 2 years old now. I like it except for the fact that the hard drive has now been replaced twice. It's not a budget laptop though.

 

Currently on a 7-year-old Toshiba Satellite. Never had a single problem with it.

 

I picked up a nice Asus i3 laptop a couple years ago for $400 on sale at Sam's Club, and it does everything I need it to do. I would definitely step up from the $200 netbooks though

 

What do you guys think of this laptop:

http://www.dell.com/us/p/inspiron-15...spiron-15-3537

Right now Dell is offering mystery coupons, and after 15 tries, I was able to get a 30% off coupon. You can do it here - https://app.dell.com/consumer/cvm_ju...b6f7bbdd1945b7

Let me know if this is a good laptop for everyday use - Watching movies, tv shows, surfing the web, emails, excel, loading pictures, online streaming, etc.

I can get it today for $220 shipped including tax.

Thanks!

 

Wow that is a great deal. My inlaws have that laptop. I like it. If it were mine I would put an SSD drive in it and maybe more RAM.

 

$220 is a steal

 

I'm really just looking for something to surf the web, send emails, watch/stream tv shows and movies, jam music, and do some excel spreadsheets. Will this suffice? I've heard Windows 8, is weird without touch? Should I be concerned about that?

By the way, you guys can get the same deal with any Dell computer 30% off if you keep trying the Dell mystery coupons...if you have gmail, just do this youremail+dell@gmail.com, youremail+dell2@gmail.com, until you finally get a 30% off one.

 

Oh, FWIW the Inspiron 15 I have expiereince with doesn't have the Celeron. It has an i3 and an optical drive. It has Win8 and doesn't have touch.
This is it Wow, old version already

 

That's a very good price, though I would probably spend $20-$25 more for this one with the Pentium proc over your Celeron: http://www.dell.com/us/p/inspiron-15...spiron-15-3521

http://cpuboss.com/cpus/Intel-Pentiu...-Celeron-2955U


Oh, and your Dell coupon link says offer has ended.