Help picking out laptop? What brand and features?

[DynoTom]

Boss ( my nephew ) and I are looking for a laptop computer ( $750.00 + ) .....I really know VERY little about computers in general and I know nothing about laptop computers....


I wanted to see if you know what brands are good and easy to use?



We only really need it to tune our cars so I guess we would not need a super fancy one?


We looked through a Best Buy sale paper a while back and we could not figure out what brand and model was a good one?


Is there any brand or features you guys think are better than others?


Thanks for any help I just wanted to have some info before we go out to buy one as I hate walking into a store with no clue of what we really need.....

[BOSS LX]

We pretty much will only use windows xp. But durability and battery life is very important.

[DynoTom]

Good point since most of the time this laptop will be outdoors......


I did like that keyboard light we seen on that one......that would come in handy ......

We really could use a carry bag for it too then as transport of the laptop will happen pretty often......

[Myles]

Ok here is what i would need to know in order to help you.

What are you using to interface with your cars, USB port or serial COM port.

If its strictly just for the use of tuning the car, meet the specs according to the interface requirements, and in between minimum and recommended system specs.

Usually you will be able to get one one ebay for about 400.

[wikked]

Compusa also sells decent refurbished laptops (with XP installed) for around $400 if you don't trust eBay.
Depends on what the min/max system requirements are for your tuning software, which I imagine aren't toooo much.

[Greg@GLD]

Why buy a used laptop for $400? You should be able to find a brand-new one, with a lot of features and functionality for $500.

I prefer Toshiba laptops for reliability.

[Myles]

brand new laptops for 400 are just as powerful as the 400 dollar ebay ones. buy a cheap brand new laptop is buying crap they couldnt sell when it was new.

[wikked]

Yea... but you can't really find a brand new $400 laptop unless it's a black friday sale =P
Best Buy only has 2 laptops under $700, and they're both sold out.

[DynoTom]

The price range Boss and I are looking at for the laptop is $750.00 ( computer program through my employment sets that $750 min price ) sorry I did not post that in the first post but, I just found out today..



So far we got some real good ideas from this post......I will wait and see what Boss says.....It seems Boss will be using the laptop for more tuning than I will...My car only needs it for Wideband O2 software and AFR tuning......

[HRSEPLA]

Here are some carrying options...

http://ganley.org/bags/bags.html

[88Nightmare]

I like my sony viao laptop. dvd burner, 1 gig ram, 80gig HD, wireless network card built in. it was about 900.

[Nix]

I still have an old MAC that I bought from J about 2 years ago or so. I have NO idea if you could use that or not. Im not very computer savey either, but if anyone could use this gimme a hollar.

[Greg@GLD]

Yea... but you can't really find a brand new $400 laptop unless it's a black friday sale =P
Best Buy only has 2 laptops under $700, and they're both sold out.

Ok, yes that is true, but every once in awhile you do get lucky if you watch the sales. Ask Wayne (Moels) if he was satisfied with the lead I gave him on a "cheap" laptop... He got a Toshiba for $500.00, and it was a decent one, not a crappy one.

[wikked]

I believe ya :)
I just know that cheap & new don't mesh when it comes to laptops :D

Wish I woulda camped out for the $280 laptop on black friday :|