Quote from: Paddy on November 19, 2013, 08:23:52 AM
Hi Neil,

We recently bought Mollie the following laptop for 6th Form and she loves it.  Runs Windows 8.1 well and has a good screen/keyboard.  For the price it is a steal.  Although it says "refurbished" it comes like new.

http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/computing/laptops/refurbished-laptops/acer-aspire-v5-171-refurbished-11-6-laptop-silver-21302079-pdt.html

Hope this helps.

Paddy

Paddy,

Many thanks for that link, I did look at that but sort of dismissed it, due to the lack of an optical drive.

Does the lack of an optical drive cause any issues?? How do you install any software?? or even, dread the thought, rebuild it when Windows comes crashing to a halt 

Cheers

Neal.

Quote from: Calnefoxile on November 19, 2013, 08:44:13 AM

Quote from: Paddy on November 19, 2013, 08:23:52 AM
Hi Neil,

We recently bought Mollie the following laptop for 6th Form and she loves it.  Runs Windows 8.1 well and has a good screen/keyboard.  For the price it is a steal.  Although it says "refurbished" it comes like new.

http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/computing/laptops/refurbished-laptops/acer-aspire-v5-171-refurbished-11-6-laptop-silver-21302079-pdt.html

Hope this helps.

Paddy

Paddy,

Many thanks for that link, I did look at that but sort of dismissed it, due to the lack of an optical drive.

Does the lack of an optical drive cause any issues?? How do you install any software?? or even, dread the thought, rebuild it when Windows comes crashing to a halt 

Cheers

Neal.

Hi Neal,

There is a rebuild image on the hard disk if required.  As for the optical drive, 95%+ of the software Mollie needs is downloadable.  The only thing I had to install was Microsoft Office and I accessed the CD from my wife's laptop over the network.  If you don't have that capability then an external USB drive can be bought.

Mollie wanted the portability as she has so much to carry at 6th Form.  As for Curry's I have only used their after sales service once on a TV stand we bought and they were excellent.  In terms of PC support I have worked in that field all my life so do this myself.  Mind you Mollie is studying ICT so she is my iPadiwyn! :-)

Paddy

Quote from: newportnobby on November 18, 2013, 10:14:27 PM
Dunno much about 'puters but the I.T. guy at our company said that Toshibas were best so that's what I am using (Satellite model) with AMD and Windows 7

I used to swear by Tosh's ... got one from work, and these days I swear at it ... keeps locking up for no reason; colleagues have the same issue, some not as much, some a lot worse.

Never had this level of aggro with <gasp> Dell ... !!!

Quote from: Calnefoxile on November 18, 2013, 11:27:11 PM
But on the other hand, is that a false economy?? I mean buying her a refurb'd one and then in 2 -3 years having to replace that one as well 

Frankly - if it's lasted 3 years it's due to be replaced ...

Quote from: Calnefoxile on November 19, 2013, 08:44:13 AM
I did look at that but sort of dismissed it, due to the lack of an optical drive.

It has USB ports - what's the problem    If she needs a CD/DVD drive, get a USB 3 one ...

Its about £15 for a USB DVD writer these days.

They are not really that relevant - they only store 4GB, they take ages to write, they are slow and USB sticks are cheaper. I very very rarely use mine nowdays.

What you do want to invest in is some kind of backup arrangement, especially if the laptop has an SSD (solid state drive), the SSD drives tend to die without warning unlike hard disks where you often get some clue of impending failure. Cloud based, USB sticks, USB hard drive - whatever.

And check the backups work!

Steer clear of Sony Viaos, I had one a few years ago, absolute rubbish. I should have spotted the warning signs when I opened the box, all the enclosed bumph referred to "your new computer", the Sony name wasn't mentioned anywhere. I have had Sony shortwave radios which were pretty good, but the Sony branded laptop was junk.

Quote from: EtchedPixels on November 19, 2013, 11:49:42 AM
Its about £15 for a USB DVD writer these days.

They are not really that relevant

I know where you're coming from, and agree USB memory drives are better for storage - but I was thinking reading from CD/DVD ... installing stuff.

Mike

Quote from: MikeDunn on November 19, 2013, 12:13:15 PM

Quote from: EtchedPixels on November 19, 2013, 11:49:42 AM
Its about £15 for a USB DVD writer these days.

They are not really that relevant

I know where you're coming from, and agree USB memory drives are better for storage - but I was thinking reading from CD/DVD ... installing stuff.

Mike

How quaint

The windows model has gone strongly download based of late. Steam for games, Windows 8 store etc (which is mandatory for some types of app install), downloads for a lot of other software. Last time I was unfortunate enough to have to help with a Windows box it even knew how to make recovery media on USB sticks.

But really
- OS comes on the box
- Libreoffice is a download
- Chromium is a download
- Firefox is a download
- Skype is a download
- Adblockers are downloads
- Anti-virus is a download

and everything else is web based.

You might I suppose get a CD with a printer, but you'd normally ignore that and plug it in so that it gets the latest drivers off the internet.

Alan

Don't trust Steam (or other providers) for being able to re-install things; if it doesn't come with a CD/DVD or I can't archive the installer - I don't particularly want it ...

I'm not a fan of Win 8; if I am unfortunate enough to get a PC with that in the future, I'll blatt it back to Win 7 ... And not everything in life is web-based ... 

But hey, none of this is helping the OP.

Quote from: MikeDunn on November 19, 2013, 12:44:13 PM
Don't trust Steam (or other providers) for being able to re-install things; if it doesn't come with a CD/DVD or I can't archive the installer - I don't particularly want it ...

I'm not a fan of Win 8; if I am unfortunate enough to get a PC with that in the future, I'll blatt it back to Win 7 ... And not everything in life is web-based ... 

But hey, none of this is helping the OP.

Not a fan of Windows 8 either although 8.1 is an improvement - it needs a touch screen though which feels so awkward on a laptop.  Plus metro is so boring - bring back 3D and textures! :-)

Paddy

I'm with Alan on the general lack of need for an optical drive for most things day to day, where they can still be useful is for media (either playing or ripping to a HDD), but that tends to be a once-only/infrequent task.

Cheers, Mike

Quote from: MikeDunn on November 19, 2013, 12:44:13 PM
I'm not a fan of Win 8; if I am unfortunate enough to get a PC with that in the future, I'll blatt it back to Win 7 ...

Don't expect to be able to for much longer (or indeed right now for some devices). Quite a bit of the legacy support has exited this generation of hardware at the laptop/tablet end of things.

Alan

Quote from: EtchedPixels on November 19, 2013, 09:27:15 PM

Quote from: MikeDunn on November 19, 2013, 12:44:13 PM
I'm not a fan of Win 8; if I am unfortunate enough to get a PC with that in the future, I'll blatt it back to Win 7 ...

Don't expect to be able to for much longer (or indeed right now for some devices). Quite a bit of the legacy support has exited this generation of hardware at the laptop/tablet end of things.

Alan

I agree Alan, love for loath Windows 8 it is the future of that OS.

Paddy

Quote from: EtchedPixels on November 19, 2013, 09:27:15 PM
Don't expect to be able to for much longer (or indeed right now for some devices). Quite a bit of the legacy support has exited this generation of hardware at the laptop/tablet end of things.

I work in the IT field so am aware of what MS (and various hardware companies) are doing.

Regarding future support - the problem is a number of items I have and will want to continue using are not supported past Windows 7 - indeed, some never went past XP ...  So for specific tasks and computers, I'll be sticking to hardware that can roll back; it's just far too expensive to get new items.

Right thanks for all the advice chaps & chapessess.

I did ask my daughter whether she wanted an optical drive or not and she said yes, she also wanted the larger screen size, so in the end we've plumped for this one http://www.ebuyer.com/543489-asus-x550ca-laptop-x550ca-xo266h

If it was for me I'd have gone for this one from morgan computers that Alan pointed out http://www.morgancomputers.co.uk/product_detail/14520/Toshiba-Portege-R700-13-3-Ultrabook-i5-520M-2-4Ghz-4GB-RAM-320GB-HDD-Win7-Pro-DVD-RW/ but she didn't want a 2nd hand one and didn't like the look of it

Oh well teenage girls is all I can say 

Once again thanks for all the great advice anyway.

Cheers

Neal.

Hi Neal,

I am sure she will be very pleased with it.  If you need to expand the RAM then I can recommend Crucial as a supplier.

Have a lovely Christmas.

Paddy