A thread in which I inquire about a suitable laptop.

Fellow Goodjers,

I've been shopping around for a laptop for a while but I'd like to get a few more opinions. Essentially I want to buy later in the summer, in time for school. I'm looking for a 12 in laptop/larger netbook or 13 inch if that's what it comes down to in terms of available products, but the lighter the better. I'd use it for school work/research, browsing and very minimal gaming (GOG, old stuff and maybe Civ).

So far the most interesting ones seem to be the ASUS UL20, which is almost a year old and just slightly out of my price range (hovering around 600 at most Canadian retailers), although I might just pull the trigger if I run out of options. Also their upcoming 1215-1218 line seems interesting but I have no idea when they're coming out. As much as I've looked, I've failed to find recent similar products in other companies... would Acer or say Toshiba have more suitable options? I've also been warned to avoid Dell/HP/MSI. If they have something I'm looking for, how much crapware/reliability issues should I expect to deal with? Thanks for your help!

Crapware shouldn't be an issue because the first thing you ought to do with an OEM machine is wipe it and install a fresh vanilla copy of the operating system. You haven't started using it yet, there's no data needing to be backed up, no installs to have to do over. Start fresh, start right.

Failing that, run PC DeCrapifier.

Avoid Acer, HP and Gateway (an Acer brand) like the plague. Garbage build quality, lots of pre-loaded crapware and lousy support. Dell systems are pretty good in my opinion, though I don't like their newer models from a design point of view. MSI laptops are good but often have really awful looks. My company has sold a number of Asus models and aside from one difficult unit, they've been very nice. My new laptop is a Toshiba and my girlfriend bought the bigger version recently and we're both quite satisfied with them as well. All the manufacturers put out new models frequently throughout the year so if you want to wait and see the newer ones, they'll probably be out sooner than you may think.

The UL20 is a good all-rounder but you're right, it is getting a little long in the tooth and if it hasn't been discounted, I'd probably wait a bit if you can. I'm currently running the Toshiba Satellite L510 and my girlfriend runs the Satellite L500. Strange I know that her model is bigger and more expensive but has a lower model number.

Parallax Abstraction wrote:

Avoid Acer, HP and Gateway (an Acer brand) like the plague. Garbage build quality, lots of pre-loaded crapware and lousy support. Dell systems are pretty good in my opinion, though I don't like their newer models from a design point of view. MSI laptops are good but often have really awful looks. My company has sold a number of Asus models and aside from one difficult unit, they've been very nice. My new laptop is a Toshiba and my girlfriend bought the bigger version recently and we're both quite satisfied with them as well. All the manufacturers put out new models frequently throughout the year so if you want to wait and see the newer ones, they'll probably be out sooner than you may think.

The UL20 is a good all-rounder but you're right, it is getting a little long in the tooth and if it hasn't been discounted, I'd probably wait a bit if you can. I'm currently running the Toshiba Satellite L510 and my girlfriend runs the Satellite L500. Strange I know that her model is bigger and more expensive but has a lower model number. :)

There is a deal on the L500 today - get it for 200 USD off. It's a 15" notebook, but that's a pretty good deal at 499 USD. See here.