Is the laptop worth buying?

[Vortigern]

The laptop you linked, Lenovo Ryzen 7 ticks all my boxes. The graphics is a little dissapointing but I could live with it. As a comparison I work with a desktop with Ryzen 5 and Geforce graphics. I use it to play WoW which is a demanding game computer wise. The most significant upgrade was memory speedwise. I put in 32Gb which noticably speeded things up. Don't forget to enquire about TPM. The S part of windows can be toggeld off which will be one of your first tasks on the all new singing dancing laptop.
As you hinted in previous post, you will be giving poor reviews if the laptop recommended is not up to scratch, let it be known;
I am not recommending a specific laptop. What I am offering is the component level tick boxes you should aim for. In the end caveat emptor!

 

[HappyHippyDad]

Sorry I can't contribute much here. I have 3 laptops and a big desktop PC. My pal fixes them for me. I am very lucky!
I did ask him to have a look at my intercom system...He shook his head and said "That's two Tate & Lyle syrup tins with a bit of string between them...try thicker string!"
PS: Nobody under the age of 50 will understand this, sorry!

Everyone needs 3 laptops... It's the norm. ;-)

 

[HappyHippyDad]

The laptop you linked, Lenovo Ryzen 7 ticks all my boxes. The graphics is a little dissapointing but I could live with it. As a comparison I work with a desktop with Ryzen 5 and Geforce graphics. I use it to play WoW which is a demanding game computer wise. The most significant upgrade was memory speedwise. I put in 32Gb which noticably speeded things up. Don't forget to enquire about TPM. The S part of windows can be toggeld off which will be one of your first tasks on the all new singing dancing laptop.
As you hinted in previous post, you will be giving poor reviews if the laptop recommended is not up to scratch, let it be known;
I am not recommending a specific laptop. What I am offering is the component level tick boxes you should aim for. In the end caveat emptor!

Thanks Vortigern, you've been very helpful in this thread (as others have).

Unfortunately i twiddled my thumbs too much and the clearance priced lenovo 7 in Argos disappeared.

I then went to buy the asus that @kropaske recommended as it does look good. However, i did a quick check of the retailer and they had very poor reviews...... so, i'm still looking. Cup of coffee and a Sunday browse on the randomly switching off old HP laptop.

 

[kropaske]

You may have been looking at wrong Box reviews:

www.box.co.uk is rated "Excellent" with 4.3 / 5 on Trustpilot

Do you agree with www.box.co.uk's TrustScore? Voice your opinion today and hear what 10,484 customers have already said.

uk.trustpilot.com

 

[plugsandsparks]

Or just go to a specialist retailer like pcspecialist.co.uk and you can fill your boots with any possible laptop. I can confirm they do exist, i have been there, they do what they say, the warranties and tech support are excellent. Spent about £7000 with them over the last year.

 

[Jim_e_Jib]

You may have been looking at wrong Box reviews:

www.box.co.uk is rated "Excellent" with 4.3 / 5 on Trustpilot

Do you agree with www.box.co.uk's TrustScore? Voice your opinion today and hear what 10,484 customers have already said.

uk.trustpilot.com

I'd agree - Box is a reputable retailer - I've bought things from them before, and wouldn't hesitate to again. Go for it @HappyHippyDad

 

[DefyG]

https://www.argos.co.uk/product/3088782

Is it robust enough for use on site? But Lenovo are Good enough for NASA!

 

[pc1966]

Everyone needs 3 laptops... It's the norm. ;-)

Er, would that be:

1. home
2. work
3. speciality videos

 

[pc1966]

Sadly the out of the box Windows experience gets worse all of the time, and the 'S' version was a horrible joke.

We were given a couple of laptops by a guy who kind of works with us and they have been "upgraded" to windows 11 and it sucked even more, so they were wiped, one was installed with w10 and then locked so no sneaky version "upgrades", then had Linux put on dual-boot so we can use w10 for any specific software that needs it, and have the less donkey-tasting experience when we don't need that.

In the past I would suggest PC Decrapifier but it seems to have been discontinued. Another option for those with patience is to get a copy of the windows installer from Microsoft (making sure it really is from them) and then installing from that so you get less of the irksome "free trial" of various scammy products. Sadly you now get the adverts and scammy trials directly from MS

But if you use the Rufus boot USB creator tool it has options where you can install Windows without needing to create a MS account (i.e. as your old style local user). It also allows you to disable some telemetry from the very start, etc.

We did not want the s-show of having to create MS account, give them a phone number, and all of the crap so we used that for our case, but for other folks who want to make use of the cloud storage / backup and similar that MS offer you the trade-off is probably the other way.

 

[kropaske]

Sadly the out of the box Windows experience gets worse all of the time, and the 'S' version was a horrible joke.

The clue is in the letter S - - - > "Sh..t"

But if you use the Rufus boot USB creator tool it has options where you can install Windows without needing to create a MS account (i.e. as your old style local user). It also allows you to disable some telemetry from the very start, etc.

You can bypass account creation with genuine windows boot usb. It's just couple of commands during install.

 

[pc1966]

The clue is in the letter S - - - > "Sh..t"

Indeed!

You can bypass account creation with genuine windows boot usb. It's just couple of commands during install.

Probably, its just MS don't seem to make it easy for various reasons. The Rufus tool probably just puts those commands in to the install execution environment but it has a couple of simple tick-boxes for you to make it really easy.

I avoids Windows as far as I can these days, though I have programmed for it in the past (along with DOS, VMS, Solaris & Linux for my sins). For the last 10 or so years I have rarely needed it at home or work, and have VMs with Windows (w2k, XP, 7) that serve for most occasions where I do need it.

 

[HappyHippyDad]

Many thanks to all who replied.

I have now bought a laptop and am very happy with it, straight from the word go.

You all gave lots of information and I used a mixture of it to end up with the Asus vivo book 16GB ryzen 7 £599 from john lewis. I'm sure I could have found it cheaper from another site, but I like the fact I can pop in to the store if need be.

I booted up both the new lap top and the old. I then clicked on chrome on both at the same time. My old HP took 13 seconds to load up my home page. The ASus took <1second!!! Very happy.

I realise I wont utilise anywhere near its full capability but it's making me smile looking at the spec rundown on the system... 16GB RAM, Ryzen 7, 8 cores etc etc...

 

[HappyHippyDad]

The clue is in the letter S - - - > "Sh..t"

You can bypass account creation with genuine windows boot usb. It's just couple of commands during install.

This asus didn't come in S mode, so no faffing around needed luckily.

 

[nicebutdim]

This thread might have concluded much sooner if you'd started by asking for help in finding a decent laptop under £600

 

[pc1966]

£599 from john lewis. I'm sure I could have found it cheaper from another site, but I like the fact I can pop in to the store if need be.

I have also bought stuff from John Lewis as either I was in the store, or I wanted to buy from somewhere that actually provides service if there is an issue.

Glad it has worked out well

 

[HappyHippyDad]

This thread might have concluded much sooner if you'd started by asking for help in finding a decent laptop under £600

Very true! I did kind of wander up in price with each post.

 

[nicebutdim]

Very true! I did kind of wander up in price with each post.

Good thing you pulled the pin before this cost you thousands!