Showing posts with label bound notebook. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bound notebook. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 25, 2014
Cheap Everex StepNote NC1510 VIA C7-M 1.5GHz 1GB 60GB DVD±RW DL 15.4"
The computer was promptly shipped and arrived safely, but it did not have enough ram and it operated slow. When I informed the seller that I liked to return the item because I needed more memory she refunded my money back to my credit card within four days with no hassle. Overall I would rate the seller service at 7.
Wednesday, October 15, 2014
Best Dell Latitude D620 14.1" Core Duo 60GB Notebook Deals
I received my laptop in a timely manner but the box was damaged when it arrived. It wasn't packaged very securely in the box. And I come to find out that the laptop is refurbished. Description never mentioned that detail. Would not have purchased if I had known.
Thursday, August 21, 2014
Reviews of Dell Inspiron i15-2729BK 15.6-inch Laptop - 4GB Memory - 500GB Hard
List Price: $699.99
Sale Price: $479.99
Today's Bonus: 31% Off
I find that the cursor jumps around when I'm typing and messes up my text. It is very annoying. I think the pad is too sensitive when my hand brushes it. There needs to be a way to adjust the sensitivity.
Monday, August 11, 2014
Discount Apple Ibook G4 1 Ghz 512mb 30gb Dvd/cdrw 12" LCD with Airport
The laptop is not half bad. It's the first mac I've ever used, so it took a couple of days to get the hang out it. It's relatively easy to use and I can see why mac user prefer it over Windows. It does get a little hot though. The memory is small so flash videos don't play smoothly, but I hear you can upgrade the memory somehow.
My only criticism is that it gets a little warm so I keep it on top of a clipboard when holding it in my lap. No viruses, no crashes, no worries.
When netbooks started becoming popular a couple of years ago, I had to laugh because I already have a lightweight, handy netbook. In fact, I'm using it right now to write this review. Given a choice between a new Asus or Dell netbook or a used iBook G4 for the same price, I would take the G4 without thinking about it for a second.
Click Here For Most Helpful Customer Reviews >>
the used i book we purchased was a great bargain. we are VERY satisfied with our purchase.Best Deals for Apple Ibook G4 1 Ghz 512mb 30gb Dvd/cdrw 12" LCD with Airport
I've had a 12" iBook G4 since 2005 and it's still my favorite notebook for browsing the internet, writing letters, and even reading pdf's. It's very lightweight and I consider the screen the perfect size. It's held up very well. One of the keys has a hairline crack and one of the rubber feet on the bottom fell off but I clean it every month or so and it still looks almost new.My only criticism is that it gets a little warm so I keep it on top of a clipboard when holding it in my lap. No viruses, no crashes, no worries.
When netbooks started becoming popular a couple of years ago, I had to laugh because I already have a lightweight, handy netbook. In fact, I'm using it right now to write this review. Given a choice between a new Asus or Dell netbook or a used iBook G4 for the same price, I would take the G4 without thinking about it for a second.
Honest reviews on Apple Ibook G4 1 Ghz 512mb 30gb Dvd/cdrw 12" LCD with Airport
This computer is my new best friend. You don't even understand :o I've always been a Mac person but thought they'd be too expensive. When I learned about the iBook I thought it'd be old and obsolete, but it is not whatsoever.Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for Apple Ibook G4 1 Ghz 512mb 30gb Dvd/cdrw 12" LCD with Airport
I needed a notebook for college this semester that wasn't too expensive and can last a long time. What really sold me about this thing was the fact macs last years longer than PCs and they don't get pc viruses. I have had this for months and it works great!
Sunday, August 10, 2014
Discount ASUS VivoBook S400CA-RSI5T18 14-Inch Touchscreen Laptop (Black
List Price: $699.99
Sale Price: $548.00
Today's Bonus: 22% Off
This laptop is very light and easy to transport. It's the perfect size! Love the touch screen, which is very responsive, and the display is wonderful. Still getting used to windows 8 though.
Sunday, July 27, 2014
HP ENVY 14-1010NR 14.5" Laptop (2.40GHz Intel Core i5-450M Reviews
If I were a professor grading papers and if notebooks were research papers, the very first Envy 15 which debuted over a year ago definitely deserved a C+ grade. Imagine that the Envy 15 1st generation is a 5-8 page paper. A typical prof would give HP that very grade for good effort and creativity, but poor organization, sentence structure, and grammar and thus a rather low level of coherence altogether. The Envy 15 2nd Gen which came out less than a year after that corrected most of the infamous problems such as heating issues, creaky palmrests, and a jumpy touchpad. This refresh (or rewrite?) raised HP's grade to a B+. But while some may celebrate over a "most improved award," just as people tend to be more critical of a BMW 7-series than of your average, run-of-the-mill Corolla, the bar is set rather high for the luxury notebook segment that notebooks like the Envy and Macbook Pro fall into.
Now onto the Envy 14. This time around, the grade for this notebook is rather controversial and definitely open to debate.
The Envy 14 was released on June 27th. It was advertised as sporting HP's edge-to-edge 1600x900 Radiance Display which would afford the user better color reproduction and brightness than most if not all notebooks out there, yes, even better than the Macbook Pro's, ATI infin
Without the (continually updating) Google touchpad software that can be found in the Trackpad Discussion thread of Notebookreview, this notebook IMO stays on the accursed borderline 89.5% which for many teachers can be a B+ grade or an A-. But with a 3rd party touchpad software written by a few good souls on notebookreview forums that leads to greatly improved two-finger scrolling, the Envy 14 gets a 93%. Just shy of Abut still in straight A territory. Toss in the Radiance display and you indeed get a potential top of the class paper not to mention another reason(with others to follow) for the professor to hand HP a letter of recommendation.
NOTE: If anyone wants the Google software in question, go to notebook review forums (notebookreview.com), go to the HP section, and visit the HP Envy 14 Owners' lounge. The first page will have a link that takes you to the touchpad software lounge. Make an account and ask people to redirect you to the software because my goodness, you WILL want the drivers designed by reil for smooth 2-finger scroll! Ask someone there for reil's Google touchpad software.
There's also a way to configure bottom left, bottom right and upper right as deadzones. I've configured the top right as right-click, the bottom left as go back a browser page, and the bottom right zone as go forward a browser page. Ask people on the Envy 14 notebook owners' lounge how to configure it!
To HP: Great job. You not only get the most-improved award in my grade book. You get a 93%, which rounds up to an A. Not a strong A, mind you, but an A nonetheless. Keep up the good work, and work on those lingering issues. I expect to see great things from you in the future.
What I liked:
(1) Edge-to-edge screen. I don't mind for now that it's not genuine glass. Still have to admit the edge-to-edge black border gives the screen a nice look.
(2) Radiance Display Bravo. Need I say more? If this screen isn't good enough for photographers, I don't know WHAT is!
(3) Keyboard It's simply fantastic. It's a joy to type on. The LED backlit keyboard may not be bright as the Macbook Pro's, but it's still bright enough to use at night time when there's low or no light.
(4) Aesthetics I've already drawn many glances with this notebook. Also to those who're concerned with how "fruity" the design looks, the laser etchings really grow on ya. The thin/light form factor and the laser-etched drawings really ooze of quality and refinement when you hold it.
(5) Specs With the i5 processor and the ATI 5650, you can game on StarCraft 2 easily at medium settings. My suggestion is still to get a cooling pad as thin and light notebooks CAN get hot.
A few critiques on areas which upon consideration and improvement will put the Envy 14 closer to A+ territory:
(1) Keep working on the touchpad software and install a real clickpad. Work with Synaptics on improving it so that we don't have to rely on the good will and charity of software coders in the NBR community. Improve 2-finger scroll and toss in inertial scrolling, 3-finger swipes, and 4-finger swipes.
(2) Consider doing away with the optical drive when the time is right. I understand some people need their DVD drive. That's fine. But in the future, if it'll shave off a lot of weight and allow for the installation of a 3rd fan, I'm willing to pay the usual $40 for an external optical drive. (Yes, it's true. The HP Envy 15 comes with 3 fans because the absence of an optical drive creates enough real estate for the 3rd fan)
(3) Backlit keyboard This isn't really a criticism. But making the brightness adjustable would certainly tempt me to toss in another % point to your grade.
(4) Build Construction I had an argument with the other "professors" over this. A tiny bit of keyboard flex which I myself barely noticed is fine for now. A little flex with an optical drive to boot is understandable. I gave you a high score in this area, but try to get rid of the flex. Until then, repeat after me: Perception. Matters. Take this from someone who worked several months at Subway serving some really particular customers!.
(5) Find a way to get rid of that God-awful CPU whine. I know this isn't HP-specific, but if HP could find a way to reduce the sound or get rid of completely, that would be a Godsend!
************UPDATE FOR SEPTEMBER 9, 2010************
It's been about a month and a half since I first bought and started using the Envy 14. I have to say that two issues really bothered me:
(1) Synaptics engineers decided to be a bunch of lazy jerks by omitting the option to turn off the touchpad while typing. I mean, seriously? If you're going to specialize in something, the least you can do is do the job right!
(2) The screen touches the keyboard when closed. The interesting part is it doesn't leave behind any permanent scratches. It just leaves smudges.
The first problem was easily solved by installing a third party software called "Paradisoft Touchpad Locker. Google it and you will find it. It is free and easy to install.
I've found that my touchpad problems have been reduced by at least 90% as a result of the software.
The Envy is sleek and powerful pretty much handles anything I throw at it. Instead of pros/cons I'm just going to list some gotchas so that people are aware of some of the quirks of this product
Build quality I've read about issues with build problems with the chassis but my own laptop is perfect. No issues with dead pixels, bent frames or misaligned trackpad.
Alignment of ports Unlike my old laptop, the Envy has no ports on the back. They are all on the sides. This is only really an issue if you have a million USB devices and connect to a monitor. It will tend crowd out the sides of the laptop with cables. Even the power cable connects from the side. Doesn't really bother me but might bother folks used to having everything organized behind the laptop.
Display The Radiance display is no longer available. I think they went out of business. I am happy with the Brightview its clear and sharp so it meets my needs. If I need something more dramatic, I just link my Envy to my HDTV via HDMI and use that as a gigantic monitor.
Video card If you get anything other then then i7 you will have the ability to switch between the integrated graphics and the discrete graphics card. This is great for battery life as the ATI is a power hog. However, this is controlled by software so you are more or less bound to the HP drivers. If you are doing a clean install, you need to install the HP drivers first don't just put the ATI drivers in or you lose the switching ability. While this laptop isn't designed as a gaming rig, the ATI Radeon can handle its own. I'm able to get SC2 to run on medium high with no issues.
Pre-installed Software Some people really dislike all the stuff that come preloaded with the laptop. You can do a clean install (follow the instructions on NBR) but I wouldn't recommend this unless you comfortable tinkering with OS installs. You can run into odd stuff related to drivers and the like. Another option (which I did), is to just go to the control panel and uninstall the software you don't like. I kept the HP webcam and Wireless Assistant since I found them useful. Mine also came with Adobe Elements and Premiere which isn't bad for pre-installed software.
CPU choice I was initially tempted to the get the i7 for the raw power but instead opted for the i5 once I learned that it came with integrated graphics. This helps conserve battery life when off the A/C and runs cooler overall. This laptop wasn't going to be near an outlet at all times so I needed something that could balance power with battery life so I found the i5 to be perfect for that use. The i7 has to use discrete graphics all the time.
Trackpad I use a mouse so I don't use it much. However, I wish that it was more offset to the left. If you want to disable the trackpad (from responding if your palm brushes against it while typing), double tap the upper left corner. An orange light goes off indicating that the trackpad is off.
Bluetooth This is really a software issue but I will note it here since it really bugged me until I figured it out. Sometimes my mouse would lose connectivity to my laptop randomly. I thought it was a battery issue but then discovered that it was the driver doing something odd. If you go to the properties of the Bluetooth radio (not the enumerator), there is a tab called Power Management. Unclick the option that says "Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power". Viola problem solved!
Overall, I'm pleased with my purchase. I guess I was lucky not to get the odd build issues that others have reported. In terms of what I use it for, it works perfectly.
Battery Life: I purchased this laptop primarily for use in school. I use it about 3 hours every day I have classes and the battery will last when switched to on board graphics if it is fully charged the night before. I would say it has about 3 hours of battery life. Obviously this is depending on your brightness settings and what you are doing on the laptop at the time. With the 5650 turned on the battery life is poor at best. If your an IT major I would say to not get this laptop and instead go one with similar specs without switchable graphics since you will most likely have a plug near by.
Grahpics: The 5650 is a good all around card that will still allow you to get up to about 2 hours of battery life. With this card you can easily play starcraft 2 on medium high settings. You can easily watch 1080P videos with the dedicated card as well. If you turn on the on board intel gma graphics, you will experience choppyness on high quality videos on youtube. Skype video calling and basic flash sites will run fine though.
Performance: I am extremely happy with the core i5 in this build. It is a very powerful duel core with hyper threading. I almost prefer it to my Athlon X4 on my desktop build. 6GB of DDR3 is more than enough for a year or two to come. I never cap out. The 500gb 7200 HDD is fast enough to handle anything you can throw at it an SSD would be nice but whats in there is not noticeably slow at all.
Software: ATTENTION!!!! If you buy this laptop DO NOT WORRY ABOUT BLOATWARE! Immediately after I turned it on I booted into HP Recovery and did a minimal recovery. This got rid of EVERYTHING except the drivers. The HP Cam software and the HP update/warranty software. Simply amazing. Sony offers this feature for $50 when you purchase a laptop from them. So happy that HP included this. That is probably why mine is running so fast is due to the lack of bloatware :)
Other thoughts: The Keyboard is great. At first I thought it was a little too small but its perfect. I was originally attracted to a Vaio because of the huge nice keyboard. This one is pretty darn good.
The track-pad sucks. Buy a mouse..
Back lit keyboard is very nice and is pretty classy :)
quick brightness controls work well and effectively.
DVD Drive works great and speakers are great sounding compared to other laptops.
Pros: Speed and screen display
Cons: Lot heavier than I expected, short battery life, and I had to purchase a VGA converter cable (I present and I was sorry to see that it didn't come with the machine).
Over-all I would purchase the machine again for use at home, and would recommend to anyone who wants a good laptop for home use, too heavy for business trips and conferences.
Now onto the Envy 14. This time around, the grade for this notebook is rather controversial and definitely open to debate.
The Envy 14 was released on June 27th. It was advertised as sporting HP's edge-to-edge 1600x900 Radiance Display which would afford the user better color reproduction and brightness than most if not all notebooks out there, yes, even better than the Macbook Pro's, ATI infin
Without the (continually updating) Google touchpad software that can be found in the Trackpad Discussion thread of Notebookreview, this notebook IMO stays on the accursed borderline 89.5% which for many teachers can be a B+ grade or an A-. But with a 3rd party touchpad software written by a few good souls on notebookreview forums that leads to greatly improved two-finger scrolling, the Envy 14 gets a 93%. Just shy of Abut still in straight A territory. Toss in the Radiance display and you indeed get a potential top of the class paper not to mention another reason(with others to follow) for the professor to hand HP a letter of recommendation.
NOTE: If anyone wants the Google software in question, go to notebook review forums (notebookreview.com), go to the HP section, and visit the HP Envy 14 Owners' lounge. The first page will have a link that takes you to the touchpad software lounge. Make an account and ask people to redirect you to the software because my goodness, you WILL want the drivers designed by reil for smooth 2-finger scroll! Ask someone there for reil's Google touchpad software.
There's also a way to configure bottom left, bottom right and upper right as deadzones. I've configured the top right as right-click, the bottom left as go back a browser page, and the bottom right zone as go forward a browser page. Ask people on the Envy 14 notebook owners' lounge how to configure it!
To HP: Great job. You not only get the most-improved award in my grade book. You get a 93%, which rounds up to an A. Not a strong A, mind you, but an A nonetheless. Keep up the good work, and work on those lingering issues. I expect to see great things from you in the future.
What I liked:
(1) Edge-to-edge screen. I don't mind for now that it's not genuine glass. Still have to admit the edge-to-edge black border gives the screen a nice look.
(2) Radiance Display Bravo. Need I say more? If this screen isn't good enough for photographers, I don't know WHAT is!
(3) Keyboard It's simply fantastic. It's a joy to type on. The LED backlit keyboard may not be bright as the Macbook Pro's, but it's still bright enough to use at night time when there's low or no light.
(4) Aesthetics I've already drawn many glances with this notebook. Also to those who're concerned with how "fruity" the design looks, the laser etchings really grow on ya. The thin/light form factor and the laser-etched drawings really ooze of quality and refinement when you hold it.
(5) Specs With the i5 processor and the ATI 5650, you can game on StarCraft 2 easily at medium settings. My suggestion is still to get a cooling pad as thin and light notebooks CAN get hot.
A few critiques on areas which upon consideration and improvement will put the Envy 14 closer to A+ territory:
(1) Keep working on the touchpad software and install a real clickpad. Work with Synaptics on improving it so that we don't have to rely on the good will and charity of software coders in the NBR community. Improve 2-finger scroll and toss in inertial scrolling, 3-finger swipes, and 4-finger swipes.
(2) Consider doing away with the optical drive when the time is right. I understand some people need their DVD drive. That's fine. But in the future, if it'll shave off a lot of weight and allow for the installation of a 3rd fan, I'm willing to pay the usual $40 for an external optical drive. (Yes, it's true. The HP Envy 15 comes with 3 fans because the absence of an optical drive creates enough real estate for the 3rd fan)
(3) Backlit keyboard This isn't really a criticism. But making the brightness adjustable would certainly tempt me to toss in another % point to your grade.
(4) Build Construction I had an argument with the other "professors" over this. A tiny bit of keyboard flex which I myself barely noticed is fine for now. A little flex with an optical drive to boot is understandable. I gave you a high score in this area, but try to get rid of the flex. Until then, repeat after me: Perception. Matters. Take this from someone who worked several months at Subway serving some really particular customers!.
(5) Find a way to get rid of that God-awful CPU whine. I know this isn't HP-specific, but if HP could find a way to reduce the sound or get rid of completely, that would be a Godsend!
************UPDATE FOR SEPTEMBER 9, 2010************
It's been about a month and a half since I first bought and started using the Envy 14. I have to say that two issues really bothered me:
(1) Synaptics engineers decided to be a bunch of lazy jerks by omitting the option to turn off the touchpad while typing. I mean, seriously? If you're going to specialize in something, the least you can do is do the job right!
(2) The screen touches the keyboard when closed. The interesting part is it doesn't leave behind any permanent scratches. It just leaves smudges.
The first problem was easily solved by installing a third party software called "Paradisoft Touchpad Locker. Google it and you will find it. It is free and easy to install.
I've found that my touchpad problems have been reduced by at least 90% as a result of the software.
Click Here For Most Helpful Customer Reviews >>
I purchased the Envy 14 to replace an old Dell 6400 which was crashing and overheating constantly. Vista is probably the cause of all its woes but I needed new hardware anyway. The Envy runs considerably cooler despite the more advanced hardware (used HWMonitor to compare) it was easily a 40 degree difference.The Envy is sleek and powerful pretty much handles anything I throw at it. Instead of pros/cons I'm just going to list some gotchas so that people are aware of some of the quirks of this product
Build quality I've read about issues with build problems with the chassis but my own laptop is perfect. No issues with dead pixels, bent frames or misaligned trackpad.
Alignment of ports Unlike my old laptop, the Envy has no ports on the back. They are all on the sides. This is only really an issue if you have a million USB devices and connect to a monitor. It will tend crowd out the sides of the laptop with cables. Even the power cable connects from the side. Doesn't really bother me but might bother folks used to having everything organized behind the laptop.
Display The Radiance display is no longer available. I think they went out of business. I am happy with the Brightview its clear and sharp so it meets my needs. If I need something more dramatic, I just link my Envy to my HDTV via HDMI and use that as a gigantic monitor.
Video card If you get anything other then then i7 you will have the ability to switch between the integrated graphics and the discrete graphics card. This is great for battery life as the ATI is a power hog. However, this is controlled by software so you are more or less bound to the HP drivers. If you are doing a clean install, you need to install the HP drivers first don't just put the ATI drivers in or you lose the switching ability. While this laptop isn't designed as a gaming rig, the ATI Radeon can handle its own. I'm able to get SC2 to run on medium high with no issues.
Pre-installed Software Some people really dislike all the stuff that come preloaded with the laptop. You can do a clean install (follow the instructions on NBR) but I wouldn't recommend this unless you comfortable tinkering with OS installs. You can run into odd stuff related to drivers and the like. Another option (which I did), is to just go to the control panel and uninstall the software you don't like. I kept the HP webcam and Wireless Assistant since I found them useful. Mine also came with Adobe Elements and Premiere which isn't bad for pre-installed software.
CPU choice I was initially tempted to the get the i7 for the raw power but instead opted for the i5 once I learned that it came with integrated graphics. This helps conserve battery life when off the A/C and runs cooler overall. This laptop wasn't going to be near an outlet at all times so I needed something that could balance power with battery life so I found the i5 to be perfect for that use. The i7 has to use discrete graphics all the time.
Trackpad I use a mouse so I don't use it much. However, I wish that it was more offset to the left. If you want to disable the trackpad (from responding if your palm brushes against it while typing), double tap the upper left corner. An orange light goes off indicating that the trackpad is off.
Bluetooth This is really a software issue but I will note it here since it really bugged me until I figured it out. Sometimes my mouse would lose connectivity to my laptop randomly. I thought it was a battery issue but then discovered that it was the driver doing something odd. If you go to the properties of the Bluetooth radio (not the enumerator), there is a tab called Power Management. Unclick the option that says "Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power". Viola problem solved!
Overall, I'm pleased with my purchase. I guess I was lucky not to get the odd build issues that others have reported. In terms of what I use it for, it works perfectly.
Best Deals for HP ENVY 14-1010NR 14.5" Laptop (2.40GHz Intel Core i5-450M
If your graphics is switched to on board you will experience choppyness in 1080p videos on youtube. You do not get this issue when the 5650 is switched on. I cay play starcraft 2 comfortably on medium high settings.Battery Life: I purchased this laptop primarily for use in school. I use it about 3 hours every day I have classes and the battery will last when switched to on board graphics if it is fully charged the night before. I would say it has about 3 hours of battery life. Obviously this is depending on your brightness settings and what you are doing on the laptop at the time. With the 5650 turned on the battery life is poor at best. If your an IT major I would say to not get this laptop and instead go one with similar specs without switchable graphics since you will most likely have a plug near by.
Grahpics: The 5650 is a good all around card that will still allow you to get up to about 2 hours of battery life. With this card you can easily play starcraft 2 on medium high settings. You can easily watch 1080P videos with the dedicated card as well. If you turn on the on board intel gma graphics, you will experience choppyness on high quality videos on youtube. Skype video calling and basic flash sites will run fine though.
Performance: I am extremely happy with the core i5 in this build. It is a very powerful duel core with hyper threading. I almost prefer it to my Athlon X4 on my desktop build. 6GB of DDR3 is more than enough for a year or two to come. I never cap out. The 500gb 7200 HDD is fast enough to handle anything you can throw at it an SSD would be nice but whats in there is not noticeably slow at all.
Software: ATTENTION!!!! If you buy this laptop DO NOT WORRY ABOUT BLOATWARE! Immediately after I turned it on I booted into HP Recovery and did a minimal recovery. This got rid of EVERYTHING except the drivers. The HP Cam software and the HP update/warranty software. Simply amazing. Sony offers this feature for $50 when you purchase a laptop from them. So happy that HP included this. That is probably why mine is running so fast is due to the lack of bloatware :)
Other thoughts: The Keyboard is great. At first I thought it was a little too small but its perfect. I was originally attracted to a Vaio because of the huge nice keyboard. This one is pretty darn good.
The track-pad sucks. Buy a mouse..
Back lit keyboard is very nice and is pretty classy :)
quick brightness controls work well and effectively.
DVD Drive works great and speakers are great sounding compared to other laptops.
Honest reviews on HP ENVY 14-1010NR 14.5" Laptop (2.40GHz Intel Core i5-450M
No one can dispute the HP Envy 14's Radiance Infinity LED display is the best display on any laptop in this class. It's 50% brighter than anybody else's. (Sorry Mac Book Pro users) Unfortunately that isn't the display for sale with the system listed here. This is just to give anyone checking out this system the information to make them an informed consumer. (By the way, the Radiance Infinity display will set you back $200 additional.)Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for HP ENVY 14-1010NR 14.5" Laptop (2.40GHz Intel Core i5-450M
Overall I love this laptop, the screen display and back lit keyboard are wonderful, can't be beat. The processor is fast and the machine is beautiful to look at. Not too much bloatwhere came with it. Didn't have any keyboard issues.Pros: Speed and screen display
Cons: Lot heavier than I expected, short battery life, and I had to purchase a VGA converter cable (I present and I was sorry to see that it didn't come with the machine).
Over-all I would purchase the machine again for use at home, and would recommend to anyone who wants a good laptop for home use, too heavy for business trips and conferences.
Friday, June 13, 2014
Review of Acer Aspire NX.M34AA.005;ASV3-731-4634 17.3-Inch Laptop
List Price: $547.65
Sale Price: $469.99
Today's Bonus: 14% Off
I purchased this computer , because I had a windows 8 computer that was confusing to use.
This laptop has a nice keyboard that is quiet, and the keys are smooth. The screen is bright
with a sharp picture. The thing I like most, is the card reader works with xd memory cards. I have
a Fuji Film camera that uses this card. Windows 8 does not work for me. I was happy to find this laptop.
I am going to hold on to it as long as I can.
Click Here For Most Helpful Customer Reviews >>
You can buy the same computer with Windows 8 for considerably less. There is a reason why. Microsoft 8 is killing the PC market. I bought an HP laptop with Windows 8 several months ago and it is a horror. I hate the computer. I have researched and Windows 8.1 does not appear to be much better and it is not even available yet. And so I just ordered 2 of these laptops to get Windows 7 while they are still available. It is difficult to find them in stores. My software is not compatible with Windows 8, many files do not work, my scanner did not work, my printer is agonizingly slow. It is a HORROR. Microsoft should recall all of the Windows 8 computers it sold.Best Deals for Acer Aspire NX.M34AA.005;ASV3-731-4634 17.3-Inch Laptop
I'm mostly very pleased with this laptop. The big screen and the performance are great.The big 17.3 inch screen comes at a price for portability. It weighs 7 pounds. That's a bit much to carry in my hand or on one shoulder but not as bad in a backpack. I've been using a backpack on little luggage cart. That may seem like a lot of bother but I really like this big screen.
This past week I tried to use my USB3 Toshiba 1 TB portable hard drive on each of the USB3 ports. But it kept disconnecting & reconnecting making it unusable. I tested other USB3 portable drives and had the same spontaneous disconnect problem. These drives work fine on the USB3 ports of my Win8 Samsung laptop & my Win7 Dell desktop. These portable USB3 drives get power from the USB3 port.
Acer recommended reinstalling the USB3 driver and that fixed things for 3 of my 4 USB3 portable drives. But not the Toshiba 1TB drive, it still disconnected occasionally.
From Googling I found the disconnecting problem is common & vexing with USB3 portable drives on a lot of Win 7 & Win 8 computers. I tried turning off Win7's USB power control but it didn't help. Both my portable drives work fine on the Acer's USB2 ports but not at USB3 speed.
I read that the disconnecting problem might be due to the drives starving for power so I ordered a HooToo USB3 hub with its own power supply. That fixed it, the Toshiba USB3 drive now works reliably.
I hope other reviewers will comment on their experiences using portable USB3 hard drives on the Acer's USB3 ports.
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On 11 July I commented on someone else's review:
I just got mine and had to check on your comment about the one RAM slot. I took off the bottom cover and found one slot with a 4GB SODIMM, and a separate second RAM slot that's empty. I expected it to have two 2GB RAM sticks. Having just one 4GB stick and an empty slot is much better because upgrading only required buying one stick. Alas upgrading to 8GB didn't noticeably change performance. It was already doing fine with 4GB. If you do upgrade RAM use CPU-Z to check the specs of the supplied 4GB stick. I had to look around to find another that matched it. I bought CORSAIR Vengeance 4GB PC3 12800, Model CMSX4GX3M1A1600C9 and that works. It has the same high performance as the original RAM.
I was shocked to find this laptop has an empty bay for a second hard drive. There's no "caddy" to secure a second drive inside the bay but having the space and the SATA+power ports is very cool. (I found the caddy for $30 w/shipping at itec4less.com)
I also found the supplied 500GB hard drive is a Seagate Momentus Thin ST500LT012 5400 RPM with 16MB Cache. 16MB HDD cache in an inexpensive laptop is an unexpected nice surprise. Every laptop in this price range I've seen have HDD's with 8mb cache. The extra drive cache will be a welcome little performance boost.
Honest reviews on Acer Aspire NX.M34AA.005;ASV3-731-4634 17.3-Inch Laptop
I got this laptop for use as a full-time RV'er. It has Windows7!!! I already increased the RAM to 8gb (the max). I mainly use the computer for web browsing and record keeping; no games or video processing. Everything on the computer has worked great, so far. The built-in wifi is fast. I don't use the touch pad, I have a trackball which I use on the right side, where I am constantly bumping into the headphone plug-in. It would be nice to have some of the ports (USB, Mic, Headphones, etc) in the back and out of the way. Overall a nice computer for a good price.Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for Acer Aspire NX.M34AA.005;ASV3-731-4634 17.3-Inch Laptop
I purchased my Acer Aspire through Amazon for less than $500 and have no regrets, as it's well designed and even has a 'reader' slot for SD & other cards, to download photos, etc. I chose this Acer with Windows 7 (Premium Home edition) as it's far easier to navigate than Windows 8! I especially like the fact that it has LED backlighting for super sharp resolution. I chose this brand after talking to some computer specialists who believes this is one of the more reliable laptops on the market. So far so good, as I bought it early June. If you have the room, pay a little more than a smaller screen and get the 17.3-inch screen, as it's awesome.Tuesday, May 20, 2014
Alienware M14X 14" Laptop (2.0 GHz Intel Core i7-2630QM Processor Review
Alienware seems to have gotten all the "little things" right with this laptop. The form factor is large enough to game or do "real work," yet it is small enough to be portable. The strange-looking beveled keyboard is actually very pleasant to type on fewer errant keystrokes and better speed. The trackpad has discrete buttons with nice tactile feedback. There is no annoying bloatware (trial AV, toolbars, etc) like you might find on an HP. I was worried that the styling would be garish and distracting/embarassing, but it really isn't that bad.
The components, are, of course, top notch. You could probably get them in other computers as well, though.
Overall, no complaints.
All these things kept me wanting to like or, or even to use it, but the ONLY thing stopping me, was the fan. Any other review that you read, if someone says the fan isn't that bad, is lying or borderline deaf. I'm sorry. I've been building and repairing computers for at least 15 years now, and never have I heard any fan that gets THIS loud. I understand that things need to be kept cool, but things also need to be designed better to keep the airflow going. The fan noise was unbearable playing a game to the point you had to use headphones just to hear what you were doing, even just browsing webpages in chrome fired the fan up and got it spinning, albeit not as loud as when gaming.
I tried everything I could to get the fan down to a comfortable level. Updating the BIOS to the latest one (which dell wrote specifically for the fan complaints), flashing an unlocked BIOS from the guys over at bios-mods, changing fan heat thresholds, propping it up on a book, using a laptop cooler. I even went as far as ripping the ENTIRE laptop apart and re-applying the best thermal grease I could find. The old stuff that I cleaned off looked like colgate. That was actually the only thing that showed any significant improvement, it actually dropped the temperature down by about 5-7 degrees celsius at idle and 10-15 degrees celsius at load.
Bottom line, this laptop needs two fans, or a shorter heat pipe to the CPU/GPU. the heatpipe had to be at least 6 or 7 inches, and for this dinky little fan to keep up it has to spin like a 737 taking off.
So after my issues with the fan I decided to return it using my "30 day money back guarantee" which turns out to cost about $250... those idiots at dell sell you a laptop with an obvious design flaw, and then tell you "oh, yeah, just box it up, pay for shipping, then we'll just go ahead and charge you an additional 15% restocking fee"
I will NEVER recommend this laptop to anyone, and probably tell people to just stay away from dell completely. That re-stocking fee is just plain robbery.
Just sold this laptop on craigslist about an hour ago, so technically, Dell still has my money, how depressing.
All in all, the laptop performs well. I did have an issue with Windows no longer being able to install drivers, which led to my graphics card no longer having a driver, which led to me having to respawn the system to factory settings to fix the problem after Dell's tech support was unable to correct the problem. However, all that is really due to problems with Windows rather than the laptop itself.
Pros:
Excellent performance, and the price isn't too steep for what you get.
The m14x is a nice looking laptop, and garners quite a few envious glares from people who see it.
The keyboard feels great, but bears a certain issue I will touch upon in the cons.
The touch pad is good, and has a lot of customization built into the Alienware control center software, from touch
sensitivity, to settings that help mitigate accidental palm grazes.
The keyboard back-light customization is a nice touch, though it can be so distracting I usually have most of the lights
off.
The screen is crisp and performs well.
Cons:
The screen has a very high gloss. I've gotten used to it a bit, but I can literally use it as a mirror in even low-
light conditions.
The keyboard, while it feels nice and responsive, squeaks a lot while typing. Yes, squeaks, like a bunch of little
rusty hinges. It isn't a deal breaker, but it is an oddity one doesn't usually see in keyboards.
It's a laptop, so it doesn't perform like a desktop gaming rig will. You'll find plenty of games that run at their
highest settings, but most newer games won't.
Since Alienware specialized in gaming PCs, I feel their laptops should come with a mouse. Mousepads aren't even
adequate for flash games.
All that being said, it is still an excellent laptop for those who want to be able to game, but need a laptop. The larger versions have some nice options on them, and prices to match, but the m14x nails the combination of balance and portability nicely.
The build may seem bulky but it is very portable and if you adjust your power settings correctly, you can squeeze about 6 hours of battery life out of this machine in power saver mode. I use this when I go to class all day and my machine still performs very well despite being on reduced performance settings.
Gaming and entertainment wise this machine is amazing. F.E.A.R 3 runs perfectly on max settings, and when using auto-settings for Battlefield 3 the game sets all settings on medium quality with texture quality on Ultra and the game runs perfect. The machine is fast, portable, and even without the HD screen games are still very clear and very easy to play.
Then the fans became very loud and provided a high whistling sound.
The hard drive is very slow, taking the software minutes to respond to commands.
I, at this time, have had the system for 2 months. I contacted Dell within 21 days and they will NOT provide a refund or take the system back.
The LCD screen has imprints from the keys on the keyboard. I was told it was a design flaw. The touch pad quit working.
I am now, finally after two months of trying, getting them to repair it, but they will not exchange or refund, and I bought a NEW system, now I will have a refurbished lemon.
They are replacing the LCD screen, the keyboard, the frame around the keyboard, the touchpad and buttons, the fans, the hard drive, the battery and charger. I think with all of this additional cost to replace these things, and frustrate a customer, that they should just refund and let me wipe my hands of this.
THIS IS NO WAY TO TREAT CUSTOMERS!
The components, are, of course, top notch. You could probably get them in other computers as well, though.
Overall, no complaints.
Click Here For Most Helpful Customer Reviews >>
I really wanted to love this laptop, I really did. The AlienFX thing is pretty cool with the whole keyboard lights and the rest, the screen was great (1600x900). It was nice and fast, although, booting it up took about 4 minutes before you could actually do anything on it, and that's WAY too long for a brand new top of the line computer. The video card (GT555m) was great and games looked great and the frame rate even at high detail never really took a nosedive. The klipsch speaker set up in this thing was awesome too, had a tiny little woofer in it that brought some great sound with it.All these things kept me wanting to like or, or even to use it, but the ONLY thing stopping me, was the fan. Any other review that you read, if someone says the fan isn't that bad, is lying or borderline deaf. I'm sorry. I've been building and repairing computers for at least 15 years now, and never have I heard any fan that gets THIS loud. I understand that things need to be kept cool, but things also need to be designed better to keep the airflow going. The fan noise was unbearable playing a game to the point you had to use headphones just to hear what you were doing, even just browsing webpages in chrome fired the fan up and got it spinning, albeit not as loud as when gaming.
I tried everything I could to get the fan down to a comfortable level. Updating the BIOS to the latest one (which dell wrote specifically for the fan complaints), flashing an unlocked BIOS from the guys over at bios-mods, changing fan heat thresholds, propping it up on a book, using a laptop cooler. I even went as far as ripping the ENTIRE laptop apart and re-applying the best thermal grease I could find. The old stuff that I cleaned off looked like colgate. That was actually the only thing that showed any significant improvement, it actually dropped the temperature down by about 5-7 degrees celsius at idle and 10-15 degrees celsius at load.
Bottom line, this laptop needs two fans, or a shorter heat pipe to the CPU/GPU. the heatpipe had to be at least 6 or 7 inches, and for this dinky little fan to keep up it has to spin like a 737 taking off.
So after my issues with the fan I decided to return it using my "30 day money back guarantee" which turns out to cost about $250... those idiots at dell sell you a laptop with an obvious design flaw, and then tell you "oh, yeah, just box it up, pay for shipping, then we'll just go ahead and charge you an additional 15% restocking fee"
I will NEVER recommend this laptop to anyone, and probably tell people to just stay away from dell completely. That re-stocking fee is just plain robbery.
Just sold this laptop on craigslist about an hour ago, so technically, Dell still has my money, how depressing.
Best Deals for Alienware M14X 14" Laptop (2.0 GHz Intel Core i7-2630QM Processor
I purchased this laptop through Dell's website. I have a 6gb ram, 1.5gb graphics card configuration.All in all, the laptop performs well. I did have an issue with Windows no longer being able to install drivers, which led to my graphics card no longer having a driver, which led to me having to respawn the system to factory settings to fix the problem after Dell's tech support was unable to correct the problem. However, all that is really due to problems with Windows rather than the laptop itself.
Pros:
Excellent performance, and the price isn't too steep for what you get.
The m14x is a nice looking laptop, and garners quite a few envious glares from people who see it.
The keyboard feels great, but bears a certain issue I will touch upon in the cons.
The touch pad is good, and has a lot of customization built into the Alienware control center software, from touch
sensitivity, to settings that help mitigate accidental palm grazes.
The keyboard back-light customization is a nice touch, though it can be so distracting I usually have most of the lights
off.
The screen is crisp and performs well.
Cons:
The screen has a very high gloss. I've gotten used to it a bit, but I can literally use it as a mirror in even low-
light conditions.
The keyboard, while it feels nice and responsive, squeaks a lot while typing. Yes, squeaks, like a bunch of little
rusty hinges. It isn't a deal breaker, but it is an oddity one doesn't usually see in keyboards.
It's a laptop, so it doesn't perform like a desktop gaming rig will. You'll find plenty of games that run at their
highest settings, but most newer games won't.
Since Alienware specialized in gaming PCs, I feel their laptops should come with a mouse. Mousepads aren't even
adequate for flash games.
All that being said, it is still an excellent laptop for those who want to be able to game, but need a laptop. The larger versions have some nice options on them, and prices to match, but the m14x nails the combination of balance and portability nicely.
Honest reviews on Alienware M14X 14" Laptop (2.0 GHz Intel Core i7-2630QM Processor
Like with anything you buy, you should do plenty of research about it BEFORE you buy so there are no surprises. People who leave poor reviews about this product obviously did not look into it very much. Yes the fan is noisy during gaming... many laptop fans are. But it really is not that bad. Also 90% of people who are gaming either have on their speakers or headphones. And let me tell you the speakers on this machine are absolutely amazing... crisp and very loud. The audio jacks are very good as well, both of which can very easily cover the fan noise while you are gaming. Other than that the fan is almost silent during normal day use. And I have yet to find the machine getting very hot while playing BF3, F.E.A.R 3, or other games for an extended period of time.The build may seem bulky but it is very portable and if you adjust your power settings correctly, you can squeeze about 6 hours of battery life out of this machine in power saver mode. I use this when I go to class all day and my machine still performs very well despite being on reduced performance settings.
Gaming and entertainment wise this machine is amazing. F.E.A.R 3 runs perfectly on max settings, and when using auto-settings for Battlefield 3 the game sets all settings on medium quality with texture quality on Ultra and the game runs perfect. The machine is fast, portable, and even without the HD screen games are still very clear and very easy to play.
Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for Alienware M14X 14" Laptop (2.0 GHz Intel Core i7-2630QM Processor
I ordered a new Dell laptop. I received it and the hard drive could not be found. Called Dell and after several attempts it booted up.Then the fans became very loud and provided a high whistling sound.
The hard drive is very slow, taking the software minutes to respond to commands.
I, at this time, have had the system for 2 months. I contacted Dell within 21 days and they will NOT provide a refund or take the system back.
The LCD screen has imprints from the keys on the keyboard. I was told it was a design flaw. The touch pad quit working.
I am now, finally after two months of trying, getting them to repair it, but they will not exchange or refund, and I bought a NEW system, now I will have a refurbished lemon.
They are replacing the LCD screen, the keyboard, the frame around the keyboard, the touchpad and buttons, the fans, the hard drive, the battery and charger. I think with all of this additional cost to replace these things, and frustrate a customer, that they should just refund and let me wipe my hands of this.
THIS IS NO WAY TO TREAT CUSTOMERS!
Monday, May 19, 2014
Buy Sony VAIO SVS13A18GXB 13.3" Notebook PC - Black
This Sony SVS13A18GXB replaced a Samsung Q430 with a second generation Intel Core i5 and GeForce 310M discrete graphics which has been a good laptop but is now overheating frequently even after cleaning the vent and fan. I use this laptop for work and play and the real test for me is game-play. I am running my favorite game with no hiccups and much faster than on the Samsung laptop. The 1600 x 900 resolution is far superior to the 1366 x 768 for detail and blu-ray movies look superb though I know it would be better on a full HD. The built-in widi solves that problem by being able to display the full HD on my large screen television wirelessly through the aftermarket adapter.
I like the fingerprint swipe instead of logging in every time I boot and speaking of boot time... it's almost instantaneous after opening the lid if you don't power down. Just close the lid instead of powering down and when you re-open... there it is within 2 seconds. You can literally go days by just closing the lid instead of powering down. Even running full brightness with the discrete graphics card I get almost twice the battery life than on the old Samsung. This computer is lighter, faster and the battery lasts longer. This was nearly twice the price of the Samsung but the performance is so much better it was worth it.
My rating is 4 stars because it is a bit pricey in comparison but there aren't many laptops this light with these features. I looked at the ultra-books but the graphics performance just isn't there yet with maybe one exception.
I like the fingerprint swipe instead of logging in every time I boot and speaking of boot time... it's almost instantaneous after opening the lid if you don't power down. Just close the lid instead of powering down and when you re-open... there it is within 2 seconds. You can literally go days by just closing the lid instead of powering down. Even running full brightness with the discrete graphics card I get almost twice the battery life than on the old Samsung. This computer is lighter, faster and the battery lasts longer. This was nearly twice the price of the Samsung but the performance is so much better it was worth it.
My rating is 4 stars because it is a bit pricey in comparison but there aren't many laptops this light with these features. I looked at the ultra-books but the graphics performance just isn't there yet with maybe one exception.
Friday, May 2, 2014
Acer C7 Chromebook 11.6" Intel Dual Core B847 1.1 GHz 2GB DDR3 Reviews
The Acer C7 has a very upward battle to fight among the Google community and in people's mind. The Samsung that just came out before it has been getting excellent reviews and has been labeled the better computer, but is it really?
I was a bit shocked when I got my Acer at the small size of the product. Let it be stated that these are possibly the most portable computers when it comes to wanting a real keyboard. This computers weighs in at a little over 3 lbs but honestly you wouldn't think so as my wife can lift it easily with one hand. The overall casing is solid enough to give you enough confidence to carry it around without the feeling of breaking it but still not a full laptop/macbook quality when it comes to overall durability.
What stands out when you open it first is the keyboard. People have made this statement over and over but this little $200 system has the keyboard of a decent laptop. The keys are really responsive and nicely spaced, honestly it feels like a full keyboard most of the time. Two of the place where the laptop falls short is the track-pad and camera. The camera is very good compared to the Samsung but really doesn't give you any options when taking pictures (adjusting brightness, contrast, etc) this can be done on the back end with a photo editing program but not during. The track-pad is okay at best. You won't be raving over it but your not going to be giving it praise either. The screen resolution is overall very good, I watched Netflix this morning on it and I was very happy with the overall look and sharpness of the screen.
Differences between this and the Samsung are simple. This computer carries a 320 gig spinning hard drive and the Samsung has a solid state 16 gig hard drive. Both come with 2 years of Google Drive 100 gig service for free which is more than enough for most people. The Google community as a whole prefers a solid state as it has no moving parts and it follows Google's overall vision of the machine. But unlike the Samsung the Acer has a removable hard drive and can be installed with an SSD (same with ram and battery).
This computer also uses and Intel chip which means it can run things that the Samsung can not just yet. Example NETFLIX. The Samsung machine will eventually be able to but currently can not. This computer also has a fan as the ARM process runs cool enough to not need it, however if you are used to the fan of a full sized laptop then unless you are in a completely quiet place you'll never notice this fan.
The Google's OS works about as good as expected. There are many things that you will not be able to do that you could do on a Windows/Mac/Linux Machine that is a given. They are working very hard on resolving these issues. Right now I would say you if you buy this machine you are pretty much a beta tester. I could easily recommend Google chrome for writers, children, people who travel a lot, and people who generally work on the web (you know who you are). I am happy enough with the OS as it's fast and just works. I use it for both personal and business and I have encountered very few issues that couldn't be resolved with a Google Search.
PRO's
Removable RAM, Hard drive and Battery which can lead to replacements or upgrades after/during warranty cycle.
Glossy Screen (better for movies not better for outside)
Ethernet and VGA ports (the Samsung does not have this it is only WIFI/3g)
Quick Start-up (22 seconds on average for me not as fast as the Samsung but Windows users know this is fast!)
Netflix works (Samsung still being worked on)
Con's
Not the fastest Chromebook (Samsung is faster start up, 550 is the best performance.)
Small Webstore (Chrome's web store is pretty small with that being said they still have many programs that you would normally find on windows. Quality will get better as more people purchase the systems.)
Netbook Size (this computer is small, that doesn't mean it's bad but I'd like to see a big computer down the road)
OS Development (The OS is still being worked out so you should be prepared for things to change however if you like change there is nothing more exciting than being part of the process.)
Battery (4 hours max 3:30 to 3 on average needs better battery life or extended battery option)
This is offered by Google on their Play store, and will undoubtedly be offered directly by Amazon later, at a list price of $199. When it is offered by Amazon directly, you will save on shipping since Google charged me roughly $13 for shipping. That's cheap.
Unlike the original CR48 "googlers only" Chromebook, and the first Samsung and Acer Chromebooks which ran Intel Atom chips, a truly mouse-power processor, this one runs on a much, much more powerful in both CPU and GPU terms Celeron processor based on former "Core" technology ("Sandy Bridge" generation) and in fact has been rebranded by Intel recently as a "Core" processor, even though it is based on the prior generation design and has most advanced "Core" "Ivy Bridge" functions disabled. Nevertheless this is a pretty good processor with pretty good graphics (for streaming video, not for games), and is supposedly marginally faster than the ARM processor in the equivalent Samsung "fast and cheap" Chromebook introduced last month but that Samsung "ARM" Chromebook has an SSD (solid state drive instead of spinning mechanical platters) and SSD's have been known to perk up overall system performance by a substantial margin. But all you need to _really_ know is that this isn't the slug that the Atom-powered Chromebooks were, and that with either the new Samsung or this one, you will have a good browser and streaming video experience.
Since this Acer runs a "standard" Intel chip instead of the "smartphone" chip found in the new Samsung Chromebook, software doesn't have to be "ported over" from "Intel code" to "ARM code." This means you can run Netflix etc. out of the box, right now. However, most pundits believe ARM chips are the wave of the future (some forecasting them even for entry level MacBook Airs) since they are much, much more power efficient than anything Intel offers of similar processing and graphics power. What this means today, is that the Samsung Chromebook on the ARM chip can run for roughly twice as long as this one, based on published manufacturer specs, and given Google's good history of updating the Chrome operating system automatically, any application hiccups should be sorted out quickly.
Samsung's last generation Chromebook (12.1") runs an even faster Intel chip, and has an SSD. It is unlikely it will stay in the market place since it is not nearly as thin and light as the new Samsung Chromebook and costs roughly twice as much.
Where this Acer excels over the Samsung is in its "upgradeability" if you are willing to deal with potential warranty issues. It only takes a single screw to remove the bottom panel to access memory and hard drive. I have already placed a second 2gb memory stick in mine to bring memory up to 4gb DDR3, PC 10600, 1333, 204 pin. A commenter on an earlier review states that the maximum memory the machine can accept is 4gb total, but I have no way to confirm this. Their are published reports of users swapping hard drives on Chromebooks (by first making a recovery USB) and so at some point I may replace the conventional hard drive with an SSD but I am not sure how much incremental speed I would get since I now have 4gb of memory and will only be using the Chromebook for relatively light web tasks and occasional streaming video.
I have made good use of the large hard drive, loading (very easy to do) 100 gb of videos (instructional dvd's ripped with Handbrake to h.264 for Apple devices) and 40 gb of music. So the Chromebook won't just be a "brick" when I am away from wifi (since any writing I do is online anyway, the ability to write in Google Docs offline is nice, but not part of what I use a computer for).
So all in all, this Acer Chromebook is "fast and cheap" and, in addition, has a nice screen and good keyboard. It is a real travel/cafe/kitchen computer (or workshop, or anyplace you want to haul a small laptop around to watch YouTube instructions etc.).
Very Secure with a caveat:
Google is pretty renowned for their attention to security, and it shows in the Chromebook. All user information is encrypted, so short of NSA level decryption it is unlikely anyone can "brute force" your hard disk to read off passwords. There is an admin procedure for gaining access to a locked device, but when it is used, user data is first erased. In addition, the Chrome browser safe-lists websites, and spots and warns you of compromised websites faster than any other browser (thanks to Google's constant web-crawling). Chrome is also sand-boxed, etc. etc. boring technical details, but experts seem to agree that the Chrome browser on any platform is the most secure, and Chrome OS is perhaps the most secure operating system out there. So yes you can use the Chromebook for your banking.
The problem I have with Google's security system is that you use your Google Gmail/Chrome password to log onto the laptop. This means physical surveillance could grab your password, and if your email account is known, any computer could be used after that to access your email. Since many people store passwords in their archived emails, and since email is the first route for password recovery, and since Chrome kindly remembers passwords for you (if you let it), this is a potential big security risk. The only two solutions that come to mind are carefully shielding the keyboard when you first log in, and not letting Google remember any banking or other sensitive passwords for you.
A perhaps better solution is to have two Gmail accounts, and log in under two different accounts for your Chromebook. One Gmail address for banking and only use that log in for banking; and one Gmail address for social and everything else, and use that log in for everything but banking.
The Chromebook settings, which are easy to find and change, allow you to freely let other Gmail users log into your Chromebook, or lock down the Chromebook to only the previous people logging in. You can also allow, or turn off, the Guest account. You may wish to lock down the Chromebook in settings if you are worried about other people using it. Remember, unlike other computers, the only credentials required to log onto any Chromebook are a Gmail account you don't set up accounts in the conventional sense, the Chromebook is a lot like a public library terminal, open to everyone if you don't lock it down. This isn't a big negative for your personal security, since your information is always in the cloud not on the computer (except for downloaded or very limited local files which are encrypted anyway), but I wouldn't want a Bad Egg using my laptop. For a purely home computer, not a problem, for a travel computer, lock down the users.
All in all, it is really, really hard to mess up a Chromebook. It updates itself automatically and antivirus is built in. It is encrypted. Enough said! You can't find a more secure laptop for travel or cafes, for banking. If you go to "bad" websites you are less likely to get your computer infected than under any other operating system.
Excellent Browser:
Before you buy one of these, you should really spend a few days or even a week and analyze what you use your computer most for. If you live in the browser, as I do, if you have immersed yourself in the Google-verse, as I have, it's a little scary but once you take the step there is no problem at all. I use Google Docs for all my created documents; Google+ Hangout for video chats; Google Voice (free telephone number, place calls from the Gmail window); all my music was uploaded to Google Pay for free and can be played anywhere I have a browser and wifi (including on tablets). Netflix works. In terms of non-Google stuff, I shop a lot on Amazon, I post a lot on FaceBook, and I read newspapers and articles online. My browser of choice on Windows, Mac, iPad, and Nexus 7 is Chrome, my mail is Gmail.
So far the only negative I have encountered is the inability to use iTunes and FaceTime. FaceTime has become enormously popular with my family. My kid is on her iPad and my wife has an iPhone, so while I don't have an iPhone, when I travel I use an iPod Touch to FaceTime home. It will ring my wife's phone, which is always on, or my kid's iPad, which is usually on, so reaching them is easy. It is less easy to reach them on Google+ Hangouts unless I send them a text first, it either doesn't have, or I haven't learned how to use, or I don't want to leave it on (and suck resources) Google + all the time.
Note that if you are Skype user, Chromebook does not have a Skype app. This isn't a Google problem, so much as a Skype problem when Skype first came out, it decided to market itself as a stand-alone application, not as a web application. They chose to do this so they could run in the background so you could get calls on your computer all the time if it had been browser based, it would have only been available when you had a browser window opened to their website. (It is actually HARD to turn Skype off, once you log in unlike other programs that terminate by clicking the x in the corner of the app window, it keeps running unless you figure out how to really, really close it). For security reasons, Google naturally prefers to run EVERYTHING in its very secure browser, because to run in a browser window, a web-based app has to conform to web standards and Google can scan that website for malware. It Google were to allow Skype and other companies to write stand-alone apps for Chrome OS like Skype, or Adobe Acrobat they would open their very secure OS to security issues for the past several years, for example, Adobe Acrobat has been one of the biggest security holes on Mac and Windows computers. Flash and Java follow closely (Java was even a problem for Apple this years). Google includes Flash directly in Chrome, and Java as well, but Google vets all that code and updates it immediately. So given the security issues with Skype (or any other 3rd party app) and the fact that Google has its own videoconferencing solution, it is unlikely Skype will come to Chrome OS or Chromebooks.
Right now Google is pitching Chrome OS and Chromebooks as the "simple" solution because its hard for the average user to understand the importance of security. The average user pays lip service to security (mainly by hobbling their machines with resource hungry overblown 3rd party antivirus programs), but at the end of the day they want Flash to run their video content and commercials, Adobe to read documents, Word (which had many security exploits over the years) to process documents, etc. If you really want a secure device, though, Google and Chrome OS are the best on the marketplace, and the Chrome browser works fine.
BTW if your grandmother is looking for secure email yes this will run Comcast and other ISP emails, Microsoft Outlook, Hotmail, Yahoo Mail, etc. Not just Gmail. No, if they open a Gmail account to use a Chromebook, they DON'T have to really use that for their email. They can keep using their regular old email. Short of "phishing" attacks which use psychological ploys, not computer hacking, to gain personal information, it is next to impossible to infect a Chromebook by opening a bad email or downloading a bad attachment or by visiting a "bad" website. In short, this is a perfect granny (and kids) web browsing computer.
As for the 320 gb hard drive on this vs. the 16gb on the Samsung and "traditional" Chromebooks -
given that Google is uploading all my photos taken with my Android phone (Galaxy Nexus) and wants to download them to my other Google connected devices (besides keeping them in the cloud) it is probably a good thing to have 320 gb of Chromebook space instead of 16gb. That allows some room for saving all those pictures! (My Apple devices have been trying to "push" my photos taken with my Touch to ALL my Apple devices nice for access, but not all my devices have the same amount of memory nor so I want this seemingly senseless duplication.)
If you absolutely, positively need the lightest, thinnest (MacBook Air territory) Chromebook, get the new Samsung (Samsung Chromebook (Wi-Fi, 11.6-Inch)). But I think this Acer is a better buy, and I like the large local hard disk.
BTW one reviewer felt the trackpad wasn't very responsive. In the Settings section, I just increased the trackpad speed and it made a great improvement in "feel". Much closer to MacBook Air standards (I am using a Mac mini with a Magic TrackPad to type this tonight so I know how good a trackpad should be). Also I "reversed" the scroll direction on the Chromebook to match the swipe-to-scroll direction on the Apple TrackPad a neat adjustment.
Hope you enjoy your future Chromebook. Buy it for minimalist efficiency, and enjoy the security. Or buy it for the security, and be amazed by how much you have been doing all along, just in a browser window.
The easiest way to explain a Chromebook is: it's a tablet with a built in keyboad. Yes it doesn't have Android OS and it's got a web store instead of Google Play, but it's close. Or you could call it a light computer without program functionality, sounds bad, but I like that it's not bogged down.
I've been dealing with tablets for the past year or so and it's always come down to the same problem for me--no keyboard. The keyboard stands out there never fit right for typing on my lap. I love tablets, I've had a few different ones before I settled. I enjoy Android, but since I'm a big one for typing--whether it's reviews, emails, or anything else-nothing makes up for the lack of keyboard.
I needed something with a keyboard that was smaller and lighter than my heavy Acer Aspire. I fully intended to replace that laptop with whatever I purchased. Also, it needed to be relatively cheap since I'm one of the many people not made out of money.
I thought about what I needed the device to be capable and what I could live without. I checked out Chrome's web store and was surprised at the options (compared to the Play store it's lacking, but it has some useful stuff if you weed through the not-so-useful). I don't have a need for Microsoft Office Word, I find it to be a very expensive frustration, and I didn't have many other programs installed in my laptop. The one program I thought I'd miss was a photo editing one, but they've got alternatives at the web store.
I was looking into the Samsung Chromebook just a day before Google announced the Acer C7. Not being a full convert to Cloud storage I quickly decided that saving $50 and getting 320GB was a fair exchange for slightly slower boot time and slightly more weight (unlike many people, I've never had a problem with Acer products).
I purchased it directly from Google (where it is $199 plus shipping) and received it the next day (I had been informed that I paid $13 dollars for 2 day shipping).
I unboxed it, turned it on, and logged in. I haven't touched my old laptop since. Though to be perfectly honest my household has another computer, which I have used a couple of times for non personal things.
First off your touchpad will probably be slow and need to be adjusted, mine was way too slow.
If you rely on Office or Paint, Photoshop or any other program--you don't want this device to be your sole computer. But if you've got the $200 and you don't think tablets are for you, maybe you'd like to have a keyboard, or you'd just like something lighter to carry around, this baby is well worth the money.
I'd read about the battery performance before I'd purchased and it doesn't feel like it's as bad as they say, though I haven't timed it. Plus the power cord is pretty long--unlike the itty bitty one that came with my tablet, so if I go to another room and there's an outlet nearby I can just plug it in. I've always kept my Aspire plugged in (it hasn't moved from my room since I purchased it). I suppose if you're on a long flight you might be out of luck...
My Drive suits my needs just fine when it comes to typing--I love the awesome auto save--and I appreciate the screen size versus my 7 inch tablet when I'm shopping on Amazon or going through forums.
Like many others, I've had a hard time adjusting to the location of the page up and down buttons and the home and end buttons, it is a little annoying, but I don't find myself using those keys very often.
I still prefer my tablet for reading, I'll check my email on it, and other simple tasks, but this little machine is better than I'd hoped.
So the biggest thing to keep in mind is that, for most of you, this will not work as a replacement for your computer-it could be an alternative to a tablet, for someone too young to have their own computer, someone's first computer, for a writer who doesn't need major formatting at their finger tips, a big blogger, a perfect traveling device...
Just do a little thinking about what you need out of it before making the decision to buy.
If there are any questions I'd be happy to try to answer them.
UPDATE Jan. 5th:
The 3.5mm headphone jack doesn't consistently work, it appears to be an annoying problem for many of the c7 chromebooks. People have suggested wiggling your headphone plug until it works, I've found the only solution for me is a mixture of; unplug and replug/ mute and umute (sometimes switching to different headphones/earbuds makes it work also). It's a little time consuming, but once the audio comes through your headphones it should stay that way until you unplug them.
Printing: I've hit a dead end here. Which is a bummer since the major reason I bought the C7 was for a light, typing machine. If you've got a Google Cloud Print Ready Printer you should be good (although I've read that you may need a computer for a firmware update?), otherwise it seems you have to be signed in on Chrome with a computer that's already got a printer. That kind of set up doesn't work for me since the available computer is a shared one. So, taking the long route, I've found myself either logging in to Google Drive on the REAL computer (being sure to sign out after) and printing docs from there, or emailing things to myself so that I can print later. It's a little time consuming, but it works. If you use a shared computer--and are printing Top Secret documents--make sure you clear the clipboard if you've used it.
I think the printer issue highlights the fact that a Chromebook is not a FULL computer, but if you have access to a real computer you should be able to work around it.
Here is my review:
This little computer is fantastic. We purchased it for my mother in law who is not great with computers. All she cares about is going online to shop and play facebook games and sometimes video chat.
Speed:
The computer is very very fast with everything it does. Web sites load fast.
The comuter boots up and is ready to surf the web in 30 seconds or less.
Opening pictures and other files go very fast as well.
Chrome Operating System:
Yes it will take a little getting used to if you use windows every day, but trust me its not bad.
I was able to hook up my external Hard drive and copy over some family pictures very easily and quickly. You just have to use the "files" app.
There is no support for Skype, however, this is a google computer, so you will need a G mail account which means you can use Google Hangouts to video chat, I actually like it better than skype. (skype will eventually launch a chrome app).
Other notes:
The battery is very small, around 3 hours of usage, so make sure you are someone who is always going to have it plugged in, if not, you may need to spend the extra $50 and get the Samsung Chromebook which has a 6 hour battery.
The computer comes free with 100GB of google drive cloud storage which is great if you are an Android device user.
supports normal plug and use USB mice and other devices. I purchased a $15 wireless mouse and it works without any set up or tinkering.
Summary:
If you are someone who needs a simple laptop to do video chatting, web surfing, shopping, and play online games, this is perfect for you. I cannot over-state how fast this computer is at everything it does, its amazing. There is no waiting (provided you have a decent internet speed).
What more needs to be said? If you need a cheap computer which is blazing fast, buy this thing!!
First: Chrome OS is fantastic. It's a very elegant OS with few features, which I feel is the exact opposite of Android. It's almost iOS-like in its purposeful simplicity. In its simplicity, it's lacking some features that I'm used to but it remains to be seen whether they're deal-breakers or if they're mostly things I can get used to doing without. It's mostly minor-ish things I wish I could do, like being able to upload mp3s to Google Music, which requires the Music Manager application. Or maybe just zoom-in on a downloaded photo in the Files utility. For the most part though, getting used to Chrome OS feels similar to using OS X for the first time.
As for the C7, if you're coming from a cheap windows computer to begin with, or if you're not very picky about computers, you'll probably be satisfied with the quality of the machine. However, if you're used to more expensive computers, you may find the C7 to seem downright cheap. The major gripes I have with the C7 are the keyboard and the screen.
My primary computer is a white 2010 Apple Macbook and it was the cheapest laptop that Apple sold and thus had the lowest quality screen of all of Apple's computers. But even that screen is lightyears ahead of the C7 and to be fair, a majority of windows computers. If there's one thing that Apple unequivocally does correctly, it is the screen. The screen on C7 on the other hand looks a bit washed out, blue, and dull. It has poor vertical viewing angles and I can see faint vertical lines between adjacent pixels. To be frank, it just looks cheap to me. I realize this is THE budget machine and that there are people out there that find no issues with this screen but I'm just not sure I'll ever get used to this screen. As for the keyboard, it's sized correctly and doesn't feel cramped but the keys feel very mushy to me.
As for the rest of the machine, the performance feels perfectly acceptable and the claimed 4hr battery life is adequate in my opinion. In comparison to the Samsung, I've seen complaints about the fan noise but so far, they haven't been that much of a bother. The fan is definitely spinning most of the time but I wouldn't say it's as bad as some of the other laptops I've seen.
All in all, I think the C7 is great deal for the price point. I think current chromebooks compete with tablets like the Microsoft Surface and even the iPad extremely favorably for many use-cases because of price, full keyboard, and full-fledged Chrome browser.
I was a bit shocked when I got my Acer at the small size of the product. Let it be stated that these are possibly the most portable computers when it comes to wanting a real keyboard. This computers weighs in at a little over 3 lbs but honestly you wouldn't think so as my wife can lift it easily with one hand. The overall casing is solid enough to give you enough confidence to carry it around without the feeling of breaking it but still not a full laptop/macbook quality when it comes to overall durability.
What stands out when you open it first is the keyboard. People have made this statement over and over but this little $200 system has the keyboard of a decent laptop. The keys are really responsive and nicely spaced, honestly it feels like a full keyboard most of the time. Two of the place where the laptop falls short is the track-pad and camera. The camera is very good compared to the Samsung but really doesn't give you any options when taking pictures (adjusting brightness, contrast, etc) this can be done on the back end with a photo editing program but not during. The track-pad is okay at best. You won't be raving over it but your not going to be giving it praise either. The screen resolution is overall very good, I watched Netflix this morning on it and I was very happy with the overall look and sharpness of the screen.
Differences between this and the Samsung are simple. This computer carries a 320 gig spinning hard drive and the Samsung has a solid state 16 gig hard drive. Both come with 2 years of Google Drive 100 gig service for free which is more than enough for most people. The Google community as a whole prefers a solid state as it has no moving parts and it follows Google's overall vision of the machine. But unlike the Samsung the Acer has a removable hard drive and can be installed with an SSD (same with ram and battery).
This computer also uses and Intel chip which means it can run things that the Samsung can not just yet. Example NETFLIX. The Samsung machine will eventually be able to but currently can not. This computer also has a fan as the ARM process runs cool enough to not need it, however if you are used to the fan of a full sized laptop then unless you are in a completely quiet place you'll never notice this fan.
The Google's OS works about as good as expected. There are many things that you will not be able to do that you could do on a Windows/Mac/Linux Machine that is a given. They are working very hard on resolving these issues. Right now I would say you if you buy this machine you are pretty much a beta tester. I could easily recommend Google chrome for writers, children, people who travel a lot, and people who generally work on the web (you know who you are). I am happy enough with the OS as it's fast and just works. I use it for both personal and business and I have encountered very few issues that couldn't be resolved with a Google Search.
PRO's
Removable RAM, Hard drive and Battery which can lead to replacements or upgrades after/during warranty cycle.
Glossy Screen (better for movies not better for outside)
Ethernet and VGA ports (the Samsung does not have this it is only WIFI/3g)
Quick Start-up (22 seconds on average for me not as fast as the Samsung but Windows users know this is fast!)
Netflix works (Samsung still being worked on)
Con's
Not the fastest Chromebook (Samsung is faster start up, 550 is the best performance.)
Small Webstore (Chrome's web store is pretty small with that being said they still have many programs that you would normally find on windows. Quality will get better as more people purchase the systems.)
Netbook Size (this computer is small, that doesn't mean it's bad but I'd like to see a big computer down the road)
OS Development (The OS is still being worked out so you should be prepared for things to change however if you like change there is nothing more exciting than being part of the process.)
Battery (4 hours max 3:30 to 3 on average needs better battery life or extended battery option)
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Fast & Cheap:This is offered by Google on their Play store, and will undoubtedly be offered directly by Amazon later, at a list price of $199. When it is offered by Amazon directly, you will save on shipping since Google charged me roughly $13 for shipping. That's cheap.
Unlike the original CR48 "googlers only" Chromebook, and the first Samsung and Acer Chromebooks which ran Intel Atom chips, a truly mouse-power processor, this one runs on a much, much more powerful in both CPU and GPU terms Celeron processor based on former "Core" technology ("Sandy Bridge" generation) and in fact has been rebranded by Intel recently as a "Core" processor, even though it is based on the prior generation design and has most advanced "Core" "Ivy Bridge" functions disabled. Nevertheless this is a pretty good processor with pretty good graphics (for streaming video, not for games), and is supposedly marginally faster than the ARM processor in the equivalent Samsung "fast and cheap" Chromebook introduced last month but that Samsung "ARM" Chromebook has an SSD (solid state drive instead of spinning mechanical platters) and SSD's have been known to perk up overall system performance by a substantial margin. But all you need to _really_ know is that this isn't the slug that the Atom-powered Chromebooks were, and that with either the new Samsung or this one, you will have a good browser and streaming video experience.
Since this Acer runs a "standard" Intel chip instead of the "smartphone" chip found in the new Samsung Chromebook, software doesn't have to be "ported over" from "Intel code" to "ARM code." This means you can run Netflix etc. out of the box, right now. However, most pundits believe ARM chips are the wave of the future (some forecasting them even for entry level MacBook Airs) since they are much, much more power efficient than anything Intel offers of similar processing and graphics power. What this means today, is that the Samsung Chromebook on the ARM chip can run for roughly twice as long as this one, based on published manufacturer specs, and given Google's good history of updating the Chrome operating system automatically, any application hiccups should be sorted out quickly.
Samsung's last generation Chromebook (12.1") runs an even faster Intel chip, and has an SSD. It is unlikely it will stay in the market place since it is not nearly as thin and light as the new Samsung Chromebook and costs roughly twice as much.
Where this Acer excels over the Samsung is in its "upgradeability" if you are willing to deal with potential warranty issues. It only takes a single screw to remove the bottom panel to access memory and hard drive. I have already placed a second 2gb memory stick in mine to bring memory up to 4gb DDR3, PC 10600, 1333, 204 pin. A commenter on an earlier review states that the maximum memory the machine can accept is 4gb total, but I have no way to confirm this. Their are published reports of users swapping hard drives on Chromebooks (by first making a recovery USB) and so at some point I may replace the conventional hard drive with an SSD but I am not sure how much incremental speed I would get since I now have 4gb of memory and will only be using the Chromebook for relatively light web tasks and occasional streaming video.
I have made good use of the large hard drive, loading (very easy to do) 100 gb of videos (instructional dvd's ripped with Handbrake to h.264 for Apple devices) and 40 gb of music. So the Chromebook won't just be a "brick" when I am away from wifi (since any writing I do is online anyway, the ability to write in Google Docs offline is nice, but not part of what I use a computer for).
So all in all, this Acer Chromebook is "fast and cheap" and, in addition, has a nice screen and good keyboard. It is a real travel/cafe/kitchen computer (or workshop, or anyplace you want to haul a small laptop around to watch YouTube instructions etc.).
Very Secure with a caveat:
Google is pretty renowned for their attention to security, and it shows in the Chromebook. All user information is encrypted, so short of NSA level decryption it is unlikely anyone can "brute force" your hard disk to read off passwords. There is an admin procedure for gaining access to a locked device, but when it is used, user data is first erased. In addition, the Chrome browser safe-lists websites, and spots and warns you of compromised websites faster than any other browser (thanks to Google's constant web-crawling). Chrome is also sand-boxed, etc. etc. boring technical details, but experts seem to agree that the Chrome browser on any platform is the most secure, and Chrome OS is perhaps the most secure operating system out there. So yes you can use the Chromebook for your banking.
The problem I have with Google's security system is that you use your Google Gmail/Chrome password to log onto the laptop. This means physical surveillance could grab your password, and if your email account is known, any computer could be used after that to access your email. Since many people store passwords in their archived emails, and since email is the first route for password recovery, and since Chrome kindly remembers passwords for you (if you let it), this is a potential big security risk. The only two solutions that come to mind are carefully shielding the keyboard when you first log in, and not letting Google remember any banking or other sensitive passwords for you.
A perhaps better solution is to have two Gmail accounts, and log in under two different accounts for your Chromebook. One Gmail address for banking and only use that log in for banking; and one Gmail address for social and everything else, and use that log in for everything but banking.
The Chromebook settings, which are easy to find and change, allow you to freely let other Gmail users log into your Chromebook, or lock down the Chromebook to only the previous people logging in. You can also allow, or turn off, the Guest account. You may wish to lock down the Chromebook in settings if you are worried about other people using it. Remember, unlike other computers, the only credentials required to log onto any Chromebook are a Gmail account you don't set up accounts in the conventional sense, the Chromebook is a lot like a public library terminal, open to everyone if you don't lock it down. This isn't a big negative for your personal security, since your information is always in the cloud not on the computer (except for downloaded or very limited local files which are encrypted anyway), but I wouldn't want a Bad Egg using my laptop. For a purely home computer, not a problem, for a travel computer, lock down the users.
All in all, it is really, really hard to mess up a Chromebook. It updates itself automatically and antivirus is built in. It is encrypted. Enough said! You can't find a more secure laptop for travel or cafes, for banking. If you go to "bad" websites you are less likely to get your computer infected than under any other operating system.
Excellent Browser:
Before you buy one of these, you should really spend a few days or even a week and analyze what you use your computer most for. If you live in the browser, as I do, if you have immersed yourself in the Google-verse, as I have, it's a little scary but once you take the step there is no problem at all. I use Google Docs for all my created documents; Google+ Hangout for video chats; Google Voice (free telephone number, place calls from the Gmail window); all my music was uploaded to Google Pay for free and can be played anywhere I have a browser and wifi (including on tablets). Netflix works. In terms of non-Google stuff, I shop a lot on Amazon, I post a lot on FaceBook, and I read newspapers and articles online. My browser of choice on Windows, Mac, iPad, and Nexus 7 is Chrome, my mail is Gmail.
So far the only negative I have encountered is the inability to use iTunes and FaceTime. FaceTime has become enormously popular with my family. My kid is on her iPad and my wife has an iPhone, so while I don't have an iPhone, when I travel I use an iPod Touch to FaceTime home. It will ring my wife's phone, which is always on, or my kid's iPad, which is usually on, so reaching them is easy. It is less easy to reach them on Google+ Hangouts unless I send them a text first, it either doesn't have, or I haven't learned how to use, or I don't want to leave it on (and suck resources) Google + all the time.
Note that if you are Skype user, Chromebook does not have a Skype app. This isn't a Google problem, so much as a Skype problem when Skype first came out, it decided to market itself as a stand-alone application, not as a web application. They chose to do this so they could run in the background so you could get calls on your computer all the time if it had been browser based, it would have only been available when you had a browser window opened to their website. (It is actually HARD to turn Skype off, once you log in unlike other programs that terminate by clicking the x in the corner of the app window, it keeps running unless you figure out how to really, really close it). For security reasons, Google naturally prefers to run EVERYTHING in its very secure browser, because to run in a browser window, a web-based app has to conform to web standards and Google can scan that website for malware. It Google were to allow Skype and other companies to write stand-alone apps for Chrome OS like Skype, or Adobe Acrobat they would open their very secure OS to security issues for the past several years, for example, Adobe Acrobat has been one of the biggest security holes on Mac and Windows computers. Flash and Java follow closely (Java was even a problem for Apple this years). Google includes Flash directly in Chrome, and Java as well, but Google vets all that code and updates it immediately. So given the security issues with Skype (or any other 3rd party app) and the fact that Google has its own videoconferencing solution, it is unlikely Skype will come to Chrome OS or Chromebooks.
Right now Google is pitching Chrome OS and Chromebooks as the "simple" solution because its hard for the average user to understand the importance of security. The average user pays lip service to security (mainly by hobbling their machines with resource hungry overblown 3rd party antivirus programs), but at the end of the day they want Flash to run their video content and commercials, Adobe to read documents, Word (which had many security exploits over the years) to process documents, etc. If you really want a secure device, though, Google and Chrome OS are the best on the marketplace, and the Chrome browser works fine.
BTW if your grandmother is looking for secure email yes this will run Comcast and other ISP emails, Microsoft Outlook, Hotmail, Yahoo Mail, etc. Not just Gmail. No, if they open a Gmail account to use a Chromebook, they DON'T have to really use that for their email. They can keep using their regular old email. Short of "phishing" attacks which use psychological ploys, not computer hacking, to gain personal information, it is next to impossible to infect a Chromebook by opening a bad email or downloading a bad attachment or by visiting a "bad" website. In short, this is a perfect granny (and kids) web browsing computer.
As for the 320 gb hard drive on this vs. the 16gb on the Samsung and "traditional" Chromebooks -
given that Google is uploading all my photos taken with my Android phone (Galaxy Nexus) and wants to download them to my other Google connected devices (besides keeping them in the cloud) it is probably a good thing to have 320 gb of Chromebook space instead of 16gb. That allows some room for saving all those pictures! (My Apple devices have been trying to "push" my photos taken with my Touch to ALL my Apple devices nice for access, but not all my devices have the same amount of memory nor so I want this seemingly senseless duplication.)
If you absolutely, positively need the lightest, thinnest (MacBook Air territory) Chromebook, get the new Samsung (Samsung Chromebook (Wi-Fi, 11.6-Inch)). But I think this Acer is a better buy, and I like the large local hard disk.
BTW one reviewer felt the trackpad wasn't very responsive. In the Settings section, I just increased the trackpad speed and it made a great improvement in "feel". Much closer to MacBook Air standards (I am using a Mac mini with a Magic TrackPad to type this tonight so I know how good a trackpad should be). Also I "reversed" the scroll direction on the Chromebook to match the swipe-to-scroll direction on the Apple TrackPad a neat adjustment.
Hope you enjoy your future Chromebook. Buy it for minimalist efficiency, and enjoy the security. Or buy it for the security, and be amazed by how much you have been doing all along, just in a browser window.
Best Deals for Acer C7 Chromebook 11.6" Intel Dual Core B847 1.1 GHz 2GB DDR3
The major problems that this device seems to face aren't that it doesn't live up to it's potential, it's that most people seem to get stuck on 'but for a couple hundred more dollars I could get a real computer'. Or 'get a tablet'. Google probably should have rethought their marketing (from what I've seen they present the Chromebooks as being capable of 'everything' when that's not quite true). And not everyone jumped on board the tablet train.The easiest way to explain a Chromebook is: it's a tablet with a built in keyboad. Yes it doesn't have Android OS and it's got a web store instead of Google Play, but it's close. Or you could call it a light computer without program functionality, sounds bad, but I like that it's not bogged down.
I've been dealing with tablets for the past year or so and it's always come down to the same problem for me--no keyboard. The keyboard stands out there never fit right for typing on my lap. I love tablets, I've had a few different ones before I settled. I enjoy Android, but since I'm a big one for typing--whether it's reviews, emails, or anything else-nothing makes up for the lack of keyboard.
I needed something with a keyboard that was smaller and lighter than my heavy Acer Aspire. I fully intended to replace that laptop with whatever I purchased. Also, it needed to be relatively cheap since I'm one of the many people not made out of money.
I thought about what I needed the device to be capable and what I could live without. I checked out Chrome's web store and was surprised at the options (compared to the Play store it's lacking, but it has some useful stuff if you weed through the not-so-useful). I don't have a need for Microsoft Office Word, I find it to be a very expensive frustration, and I didn't have many other programs installed in my laptop. The one program I thought I'd miss was a photo editing one, but they've got alternatives at the web store.
I was looking into the Samsung Chromebook just a day before Google announced the Acer C7. Not being a full convert to Cloud storage I quickly decided that saving $50 and getting 320GB was a fair exchange for slightly slower boot time and slightly more weight (unlike many people, I've never had a problem with Acer products).
I purchased it directly from Google (where it is $199 plus shipping) and received it the next day (I had been informed that I paid $13 dollars for 2 day shipping).
I unboxed it, turned it on, and logged in. I haven't touched my old laptop since. Though to be perfectly honest my household has another computer, which I have used a couple of times for non personal things.
First off your touchpad will probably be slow and need to be adjusted, mine was way too slow.
If you rely on Office or Paint, Photoshop or any other program--you don't want this device to be your sole computer. But if you've got the $200 and you don't think tablets are for you, maybe you'd like to have a keyboard, or you'd just like something lighter to carry around, this baby is well worth the money.
I'd read about the battery performance before I'd purchased and it doesn't feel like it's as bad as they say, though I haven't timed it. Plus the power cord is pretty long--unlike the itty bitty one that came with my tablet, so if I go to another room and there's an outlet nearby I can just plug it in. I've always kept my Aspire plugged in (it hasn't moved from my room since I purchased it). I suppose if you're on a long flight you might be out of luck...
My Drive suits my needs just fine when it comes to typing--I love the awesome auto save--and I appreciate the screen size versus my 7 inch tablet when I'm shopping on Amazon or going through forums.
Like many others, I've had a hard time adjusting to the location of the page up and down buttons and the home and end buttons, it is a little annoying, but I don't find myself using those keys very often.
I still prefer my tablet for reading, I'll check my email on it, and other simple tasks, but this little machine is better than I'd hoped.
So the biggest thing to keep in mind is that, for most of you, this will not work as a replacement for your computer-it could be an alternative to a tablet, for someone too young to have their own computer, someone's first computer, for a writer who doesn't need major formatting at their finger tips, a big blogger, a perfect traveling device...
Just do a little thinking about what you need out of it before making the decision to buy.
If there are any questions I'd be happy to try to answer them.
UPDATE Jan. 5th:
The 3.5mm headphone jack doesn't consistently work, it appears to be an annoying problem for many of the c7 chromebooks. People have suggested wiggling your headphone plug until it works, I've found the only solution for me is a mixture of; unplug and replug/ mute and umute (sometimes switching to different headphones/earbuds makes it work also). It's a little time consuming, but once the audio comes through your headphones it should stay that way until you unplug them.
Printing: I've hit a dead end here. Which is a bummer since the major reason I bought the C7 was for a light, typing machine. If you've got a Google Cloud Print Ready Printer you should be good (although I've read that you may need a computer for a firmware update?), otherwise it seems you have to be signed in on Chrome with a computer that's already got a printer. That kind of set up doesn't work for me since the available computer is a shared one. So, taking the long route, I've found myself either logging in to Google Drive on the REAL computer (being sure to sign out after) and printing docs from there, or emailing things to myself so that I can print later. It's a little time consuming, but it works. If you use a shared computer--and are printing Top Secret documents--make sure you clear the clipboard if you've used it.
I think the printer issue highlights the fact that a Chromebook is not a FULL computer, but if you have access to a real computer you should be able to work around it.
Honest reviews on Acer C7 Chromebook 11.6" Intel Dual Core B847 1.1 GHz 2GB DDR3
I have no idea why Amazon is charging so much money for this thing, I got mine for the Google advertised price of $199 at Best Buy.Here is my review:
This little computer is fantastic. We purchased it for my mother in law who is not great with computers. All she cares about is going online to shop and play facebook games and sometimes video chat.
Speed:
The computer is very very fast with everything it does. Web sites load fast.
The comuter boots up and is ready to surf the web in 30 seconds or less.
Opening pictures and other files go very fast as well.
Chrome Operating System:
Yes it will take a little getting used to if you use windows every day, but trust me its not bad.
I was able to hook up my external Hard drive and copy over some family pictures very easily and quickly. You just have to use the "files" app.
There is no support for Skype, however, this is a google computer, so you will need a G mail account which means you can use Google Hangouts to video chat, I actually like it better than skype. (skype will eventually launch a chrome app).
Other notes:
The battery is very small, around 3 hours of usage, so make sure you are someone who is always going to have it plugged in, if not, you may need to spend the extra $50 and get the Samsung Chromebook which has a 6 hour battery.
The computer comes free with 100GB of google drive cloud storage which is great if you are an Android device user.
supports normal plug and use USB mice and other devices. I purchased a $15 wireless mouse and it works without any set up or tinkering.
Summary:
If you are someone who needs a simple laptop to do video chatting, web surfing, shopping, and play online games, this is perfect for you. I cannot over-state how fast this computer is at everything it does, its amazing. There is no waiting (provided you have a decent internet speed).
What more needs to be said? If you need a cheap computer which is blazing fast, buy this thing!!
Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for Acer C7 Chromebook 11.6" Intel Dual Core B847 1.1 GHz 2GB DDR3
I just got mine yesterday so I'll add some thoughts.First: Chrome OS is fantastic. It's a very elegant OS with few features, which I feel is the exact opposite of Android. It's almost iOS-like in its purposeful simplicity. In its simplicity, it's lacking some features that I'm used to but it remains to be seen whether they're deal-breakers or if they're mostly things I can get used to doing without. It's mostly minor-ish things I wish I could do, like being able to upload mp3s to Google Music, which requires the Music Manager application. Or maybe just zoom-in on a downloaded photo in the Files utility. For the most part though, getting used to Chrome OS feels similar to using OS X for the first time.
As for the C7, if you're coming from a cheap windows computer to begin with, or if you're not very picky about computers, you'll probably be satisfied with the quality of the machine. However, if you're used to more expensive computers, you may find the C7 to seem downright cheap. The major gripes I have with the C7 are the keyboard and the screen.
My primary computer is a white 2010 Apple Macbook and it was the cheapest laptop that Apple sold and thus had the lowest quality screen of all of Apple's computers. But even that screen is lightyears ahead of the C7 and to be fair, a majority of windows computers. If there's one thing that Apple unequivocally does correctly, it is the screen. The screen on C7 on the other hand looks a bit washed out, blue, and dull. It has poor vertical viewing angles and I can see faint vertical lines between adjacent pixels. To be frank, it just looks cheap to me. I realize this is THE budget machine and that there are people out there that find no issues with this screen but I'm just not sure I'll ever get used to this screen. As for the keyboard, it's sized correctly and doesn't feel cramped but the keys feel very mushy to me.
As for the rest of the machine, the performance feels perfectly acceptable and the claimed 4hr battery life is adequate in my opinion. In comparison to the Samsung, I've seen complaints about the fan noise but so far, they haven't been that much of a bother. The fan is definitely spinning most of the time but I wouldn't say it's as bad as some of the other laptops I've seen.
All in all, I think the C7 is great deal for the price point. I think current chromebooks compete with tablets like the Microsoft Surface and even the iPad extremely favorably for many use-cases because of price, full keyboard, and full-fledged Chrome browser.
Saturday, March 29, 2014
Buy Acer Aspire E1-572-6870 15.6-Inch Laptop (Clarinet Black)
List Price: $579.99
Sale Price: $459.78
Today's Bonus: 21% Off
First off, let me say that the experience with this laptop and this manufacturer has been overall stellar...it is a great buy @ 449 and is pretty darn fast with the Haswell chip they've included...slide a small SSD in place of the 500GB 5400rpm drive and this thing will sail...very pleased...
with that said, i ordered this at 449 and got 2 (CAMELCAMELCAMEL)...then once i got them, i realized that i assumed it came with a DVD drive (like most laptops that are not super thin) and it does NOT...i contacted Acer and they said to get an external drive...
i did a little more looking and the place for the drive exists...there is a "filler" piece of plastic they have slid in there as a placeholder...i unscrewed the retaining screw on the bottom and slid out the "filler" and shined a flashlight inside to see if a connection exists...it does...the Acer techinician i chatted with refused to admit that i could put a drive in it...
GOOD LUCK FINDING A D**N DRIVE WITH THE CORRECT BEZEL...IT'S TOO NEW...I CANNOT FIND SOMEONE SELLING IT ANYWHERE...
so...if you need a DVD drive of any kind, deal with its absence or get an external one...or wait for 6-12 months for the aftermarket to catch up and maybe pick one up on ebay...
Click Here For Most Helpful Customer Reviews >>
This brand new laptop arrived in late June 2013 and upon unpacking I was in love. It did have a dead battery but worked on the power brick while charging. That day was my first time using Win8 I was not impressed at all with the stupid changes by Microsoft and wished I had the very same machine with Win7 instead. After a few hours I learned what I needed to mostly turn off the new features from Microsoft so it worked like Win7. However I then had to go online to download a tiny bit of software from PC World magazine that enabled me to add an icon to the taskbar that was labeled "Shutdown PC". That worked great. So far this computer has performed much better (except for the crappy Win8) than my old laptop and cost just over half as much. If Acer would offer an option to order this unit with Win7 installed I would have given it the highest rating available. My favorite thing about it is the price.Best Deals for Acer Aspire E1-572-6870 15.6-Inch Laptop (Clarinet Black)
Fast, attractive, lightweight. Glad I took PC magazine's advice.Had a portable DVD drive, so I did not miss it
Honest reviews on Acer Aspire E1-572-6870 15.6-Inch Laptop (Clarinet Black)
My daughter needed a laptop for college but didn't have a ton of money to spend. This Acer fit the bill. We did our homework and found PC Mag rated it as number one for the price. Good enough for us!Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for Acer Aspire E1-572-6870 15.6-Inch Laptop (Clarinet Black)
Not much I can say here other than I got what I bought. It's an Acer, it has everything I need, and it works. If these are the specifications you are looking for in a laptop then you will be happy with this one, provided you don't get a lemon which seems to happen with all manufacturers these days. I would recommend this product to anyone.Thursday, March 27, 2014
Reviews of ASUS A53Z-AS61 15.6-Inch Laptop (Mocha)
I ordered this laptop and it was quite well packed in a huge box with massive amount of padding. Out of the box, it runs like a charm, fast and no issues whatsoever. It is NOT a gaming laptop, but you are able to play games on it like Starcraft 2 or league of legends on lower settings.
The Windows Experience Index results are...
Processor : 6.7
Memory(RAM): 5.9
Graphics: 4.5
Gaming Graphics: 6.1
Primary Hard Disk: 5.9
It plays HD videos quite well, obviously as it should...
Pros: Fast, cheap, best for the price, HDMI, USB3, Bright LED screen, easily upgradable to 8GB RAM, Large HDD, 1 year accidental warranty.
Cons: Speakers are a bit quiet, low resolution, I do not like the touchpad's functionalities for scrolling and zooming, which uses 2 fingers like apple products.
I HIGHLY recommend this laptop. I will update the review if anything goes wrong with it or I ever have any problems. In addition, I will answer any comments.
TL;DR At the current price, 500 bucks, I think it's too expensive. I got it for $429 which was much more reasonable. It's better than an Ipad and has more functionality at that price. For people who want a basic machine that does everything, this is it. Get it at around 400 or less and it's a great laptop for anyone from grandma and grandpa to a new college student. Your Mom and Dad should be buying laptops like this, not whatever garbage best buy is selling. Anyone who just wants to do the basic web browsing and email, they will get a great machine that has power to spare for when they do run into some kind of multimedia usage. This will not replace my desktop gaming rig under any circumstances, but it has enough functionality for when I am traveling or want to veg on the couch.
Oh and the "ice cool" feature really works. my laptop is not burning my hands, its very cool
Unfortunately after 2 days the wireless NIC just stopped working. I know this a hardware issue because all my other wireless devices have no problem connecting to my network. I am also very familiar with computer hardware since I have built a few in my day and thought it would be an easy fix to get back up and running. I reset the router, modem, wireless card to no avail. Then I made sure the card was on at all times through the power management option. I also took the time to reinstall the drivers for the wireless card and still nothing.
Next, I contacted ASUS support through the Asus members website. Support to over over 2 days to respond and told me to try the options I already tried. I am now in support limbo and have a computer that doesn't do what I purchased it for. I am very disappointed with the response so far by Asus and would definitely hesitate purchasing from them again. Hopefully I will be able to update with a better review once they make things right.
Update
Finally got this thing to work and I am glad that I took the time to have it fixed. ASUS support was great after dealing with my early frustrations. This thing is a huge value for the price and my wife loves it for general use like pictures, web browsing, and Office applications. I would purchase again in heartbeat for $400. Great value for non power users. Thanks ASUS.
The Windows Experience Index results are...
Processor : 6.7
Memory(RAM): 5.9
Graphics: 4.5
Gaming Graphics: 6.1
Primary Hard Disk: 5.9
It plays HD videos quite well, obviously as it should...
Pros: Fast, cheap, best for the price, HDMI, USB3, Bright LED screen, easily upgradable to 8GB RAM, Large HDD, 1 year accidental warranty.
Cons: Speakers are a bit quiet, low resolution, I do not like the touchpad's functionalities for scrolling and zooming, which uses 2 fingers like apple products.
I HIGHLY recommend this laptop. I will update the review if anything goes wrong with it or I ever have any problems. In addition, I will answer any comments.
Click Here For Most Helpful Customer Reviews >>
This laptop, at the right price, is a great machine. Asus is a quality manufacturer and it shows in this product. The build is solid, though could be considered a bit plastic-ish. They keyboard feels great and is responsive. I'm not in love with the touch pad and the clicking buttons, but they are acceptable. The screen is glossy so you will get glare, otherwise it seems nice and bright, colors seem true. Having a full sized keyboard is great. It has all the ports you'd want including hdmi and usb 3. The speakers are not good at all. Barely audible at full volume. I don't know many people who expect much from their laptop speakers but these are pretty abysmal. This laptop would have been massively improved with a 7200rpm hard drive, but surprisingly the slower 5400rpm doesn't seem too bad. Ram is fine for me right now and can be easily upgraded. Like others I'll eventually got to 8 gigs of ram and put in a 120 g SSD. The bloatware is a bit excessive but not bad enough that I felt it warranted a clean install. If you know what you are doing and uninstall the right things, it's no problem.TL;DR At the current price, 500 bucks, I think it's too expensive. I got it for $429 which was much more reasonable. It's better than an Ipad and has more functionality at that price. For people who want a basic machine that does everything, this is it. Get it at around 400 or less and it's a great laptop for anyone from grandma and grandpa to a new college student. Your Mom and Dad should be buying laptops like this, not whatever garbage best buy is selling. Anyone who just wants to do the basic web browsing and email, they will get a great machine that has power to spare for when they do run into some kind of multimedia usage. This will not replace my desktop gaming rig under any circumstances, but it has enough functionality for when I am traveling or want to veg on the couch.
Best Deals for ASUS A53Z-AS61 15.6-Inch Laptop (Mocha)
Laptop feels solid, keypad feels very robust. I love that this model comes with usb3 support. I have no intention of running demanding 3d games on this laptop but it runs my productivity tasks very very well. the bloatware that comes with it slows it down so i will have to format this machine eventually. Overall, this is a great laptop, its quad core, 750 GB hard drive and the radeon graphics rns hd videos effortlessly. i highly recommend it.Oh and the "ice cool" feature really works. my laptop is not burning my hands, its very cool
Honest reviews on ASUS A53Z-AS61 15.6-Inch Laptop (Mocha)
Bought this for a friend, the 6520G graphics blows Intel HD 3000 out of the water. MW3 runs @720p no lag medium high settings. Tested NFS The Run (Frostbite 2 engine) works on medium low settings. Its not a gaming laptop but its excellent for the price. 750GB HDD is plenty of space. Steal of a deal for such a price. Build quality is solid.. looks great.. ASUS enough said. Best laptop in its price range.Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for ASUS A53Z-AS61 15.6-Inch Laptop (Mocha)
I am currently very disappointed with this purchase. This a great looking value computer that was purchased for my wife who needed something simple for surfing the web and editing family pics. Based on these needs it was a great fit at an awesome price, $399! All was well out of the box and the initial usage was a breeze.Unfortunately after 2 days the wireless NIC just stopped working. I know this a hardware issue because all my other wireless devices have no problem connecting to my network. I am also very familiar with computer hardware since I have built a few in my day and thought it would be an easy fix to get back up and running. I reset the router, modem, wireless card to no avail. Then I made sure the card was on at all times through the power management option. I also took the time to reinstall the drivers for the wireless card and still nothing.
Next, I contacted ASUS support through the Asus members website. Support to over over 2 days to respond and told me to try the options I already tried. I am now in support limbo and have a computer that doesn't do what I purchased it for. I am very disappointed with the response so far by Asus and would definitely hesitate purchasing from them again. Hopefully I will be able to update with a better review once they make things right.
Update
Finally got this thing to work and I am glad that I took the time to have it fixed. ASUS support was great after dealing with my early frustrations. This thing is a huge value for the price and my wife loves it for general use like pictures, web browsing, and Office applications. I would purchase again in heartbeat for $400. Great value for non power users. Thanks ASUS.
Tuesday, March 11, 2014
MSI G Series GT60 2OC-022US 15.6-Inch Laptop (Black) Reviews
Pros
Plays any current game you want at ultra settings with great fps. (runs wow 25man on ultra at great FPS because of the ridiculous fast i7-4700)
-Look amazing. Backlit keyboard is awesome and the quality of the build of the laptop is outstanding.
Great Screen, awesome sound and very helpful buttons, for instance, can turn super cooling feature on that will keep the laptop very cool.
i7-4700mq and gtx 770m extremely powerful.
Overall amazing, portable and extremley powerful gaming laptop that gives the most bang for your buck.
Cons
-Slow HD but has to be to keep the price down so they can put the powerful gpu and cpu in. You can always add an ssd or upgrade later if you want
-Windows 8 sucks but you'll get used to it (should be their motto)
-Lots of updates at first that take a long time to install so be prepared for lots of restarting and updating that takes a long time. Once you get past all the windows updates you are golden though.
In conclusion, this is most powerful, beautiful, well built, with the most features for a gaming laptop that you can get at this price point.
Pros:
-Runs many of my games smoothly. (Neverwinter,League of Legends, Minecraft (Shaders+High res Texturepack) and
Splintercell:Blacklist Deluxe(got this for free because of the promotion.))
-Really cool backlit keyboard.
-Useful and easy to access touch controls near the power button.
-Useful indication light on the power button. (White = integrated Orange = dedicated graphics card)
-Amazing sound system.
Cons:
-Windows 8. (too many buggy features, one where the shutdown takes FOREVER because windows is configuring the update, but would happen randomly on shutdowns all the time. Solution: run cmd as admin and type "sfc /scannow")
-Updating driver issues. (I spent a good 6+ hours trying to get my wifi to work after updating to the latest driver. The first problem was the wifi randomly disconnecting (and yes it is the system's fault because my other devices connected to the same network still works. I reinstalled the drivers again using the drivers/utility disk that came with it, and after a restart, wifi driver becomes unrecognized by windows. Solution: install the latest drver, then uninstall the wifi drver, and scan for hardware changes and then update the driver by browsing to a wifi driver only patch found at MSI forums.)
-CD Drive is EXTREMELY Loud.
-Only 3 of the 4 sound jacks are gold plated. Unless one fell out during shipping/manufacturing.
-5400RPM Hard drive, but its to keep price low on this machine.
-The laptop was poorly manufactured, the hinged to the back of the laptop isn't completely in, one of the edges was sticking out and i had to push it back in.
Plays any current game you want at ultra settings with great fps. (runs wow 25man on ultra at great FPS because of the ridiculous fast i7-4700)
-Look amazing. Backlit keyboard is awesome and the quality of the build of the laptop is outstanding.
Great Screen, awesome sound and very helpful buttons, for instance, can turn super cooling feature on that will keep the laptop very cool.
i7-4700mq and gtx 770m extremely powerful.
Overall amazing, portable and extremley powerful gaming laptop that gives the most bang for your buck.
Cons
-Slow HD but has to be to keep the price down so they can put the powerful gpu and cpu in. You can always add an ssd or upgrade later if you want
-Windows 8 sucks but you'll get used to it (should be their motto)
-Lots of updates at first that take a long time to install so be prepared for lots of restarting and updating that takes a long time. Once you get past all the windows updates you are golden though.
In conclusion, this is most powerful, beautiful, well built, with the most features for a gaming laptop that you can get at this price point.
Click Here For Most Helpful Customer Reviews >>
Overall this is a great product, everything''s amazing, it's fast, it's quick, it runs like a Lamborghini. But the problem is it's WAY too heavy. The laptop itself is like a 7-pound monster, and the charger also weights about 3 pounds. So unless you are a super indorrsy gaming guy, don't buy this; cause it's just TOO heavy.Best Deals for MSI G Series GT60 2OC-022US 15.6-Inch Laptop (Black)
Really nice system but windows 8 killed it, also poorly manufactured. Here are the pros and cons.Pros:
-Runs many of my games smoothly. (Neverwinter,League of Legends, Minecraft (Shaders+High res Texturepack) and
Splintercell:Blacklist Deluxe(got this for free because of the promotion.))
-Really cool backlit keyboard.
-Useful and easy to access touch controls near the power button.
-Useful indication light on the power button. (White = integrated Orange = dedicated graphics card)
-Amazing sound system.
Cons:
-Windows 8. (too many buggy features, one where the shutdown takes FOREVER because windows is configuring the update, but would happen randomly on shutdowns all the time. Solution: run cmd as admin and type "sfc /scannow")
-Updating driver issues. (I spent a good 6+ hours trying to get my wifi to work after updating to the latest driver. The first problem was the wifi randomly disconnecting (and yes it is the system's fault because my other devices connected to the same network still works. I reinstalled the drivers again using the drivers/utility disk that came with it, and after a restart, wifi driver becomes unrecognized by windows. Solution: install the latest drver, then uninstall the wifi drver, and scan for hardware changes and then update the driver by browsing to a wifi driver only patch found at MSI forums.)
-CD Drive is EXTREMELY Loud.
-Only 3 of the 4 sound jacks are gold plated. Unless one fell out during shipping/manufacturing.
-5400RPM Hard drive, but its to keep price low on this machine.
-The laptop was poorly manufactured, the hinged to the back of the laptop isn't completely in, one of the edges was sticking out and i had to push it back in.
Honest reviews on MSI G Series GT60 2OC-022US 15.6-Inch Laptop (Black)
one of my friend told me laptop of msi is very good, and I play Crysis 2 for Windows and it is very good! this is one of the best gaming laptop, 90% game can work on this computer!Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for MSI G Series GT60 2OC-022US 15.6-Inch Laptop (Black)
this laptop is about the best your going to get for this price. the only bad thing like the others have said is the hdd is a 5400 rpm.Wednesday, February 12, 2014
Discount Amd Athlon II Dual-core P320/2.1GHZ/4G(2GX2)/320G(5400)/15.5LCD/ATI
This computer came defective. First, Sony's support told that was a BIOS setup problem. The computer had a lot of crashes (blue screen) and seemed to be not reliable to work with. I sent it back to Amazon.
320 gb hard drive big but not huge, and hey its a laptop
Cons: video card is great for everything but pushing polygons.
shared video memory is the lose would like some on board gddr5 even 128 mb only would be a huge increase than shared ddr3 ( at least its better than shared ddr2 )
Click Here For Most Helpful Customer Reviews >>
ddr3 ram is nice320 gb hard drive big but not huge, and hey its a laptop
Cons: video card is great for everything but pushing polygons.
shared video memory is the lose would like some on board gddr5 even 128 mb only would be a huge increase than shared ddr3 ( at least its better than shared ddr2 )
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