Looking for all well rounded laptop up to $1,500 budget.

[Shadowprice]

I've made a few threads and I've purchased a few budget laptops in the past. I'm trying to find a good all purpose laptop that will fit my needs. I'm looking at just deciding to Apple up and get a MacBook Pro, but I'm still twisting and turning to paying that apple premium.

I mostly will use the laptop for general use. HD media content, office apps, pictures and video, maybe some very light gaming. Sometimes taking it to work (no real specific work done on it, just using it on my lunch break or doing searches to aide in my work. I do tech support right now.).. Taking my laptop to work isn't a huge factor, I will probably only do this very occasionally. It will mostly be a desktop replacement with occasional travel. So weight isn't a huge deal.

Obviously I want to try and keep the cost as low as possible, but I understand if I want something nice ill have to pay more money. At a point if I can't find a good windows laptop, ill go ahead and bite the bullet and Apple up with a MBP. But here is what I'm looking for:

- 15-17" screen preferably with a full HD display. This isn't a full on requirement but would be nice.
- Windows 7. I don't really want to buy a laptop with Windows 8 on it. I have no real interest in a touch screen, and I don't want to uninstall it and put my own copy of Win7 on it. I don't even have a key for it right now. Only way I would consider Win8 is if the laptop was amazing.
- Good keyboard / touchpad ergonomics. I realize this wont be like a MBP but at least decent.

My custom rig I've built is my main machine and will stay that way. I've always liked having a good laptop to use as my personal machine though. Here is a few models I've considered:

- Lenovo Y510p. I like this laptop for specs and price it's offered. I don't like the red keyboard bling and windows 8 though.

- Dell XPS 15 - love the design, full HD display and the fact it ships with Windows 7. Doesn't have as good specs as the Y510p but similar price. Also I've heard it's plagued with Wifi issues.

- Dell Inspiron special editions 15/17. A little more savings over the XPS and mostly same reasons. I probably won't go with this option though.

- Toshiba Qosmio X75 - Love the specs for the price it's offered. At $1,300 it offers a 1TB hybrid drive, strong GPU and i7 haswell processor. 17" full HD is always very nice. Windows 8 on it is a pain but I could maybe let it slide with these specs.

- Dell Latitude E5530 (may be wrong on model). I haven't had much experience with business laptops but I've heard they can be nice for consumer use too. This is obviously attractive as a low cost option. Windows 7, i5 processor, 15" matte screen (huge plus here) and a 7200RPM drive. Only concerns is low HD space (320Gb) but I could probably make it work, and the fact for a couple hundred more I could get something nicer, but this seems appealing.

- MacBook Pro 15" Retina/non-Retina - if price wasn't an issue, I will just apple up. Premium design and apple care and the ease of OSX appeals me to a MBP. Obvious reason I'm considering others is cost. Ill swallow it if I have too.

I'm pretty picky. I end up doing a lot of returns, but this is an idea of what is looking appealing to me. I'm looking for any insight of finding a good windows laptop, other wise ill just Apple up on this.

Thanks everyone.

 

[burritoincognito]

If you're looking at Latitudes, look at the E6500 series, rather than the E5500 series. Better build quality, 3 year warranty standard. You can put a second drive in them (swapping it out with the DVD)

 

[Shadowprice]

Looks pretty nice but not sure if I'd want to spend over 1 grand on a latitude. The one I was looking at was $720 and I would lessen that by digging around for a coupon.. They look pretty appealing though. Any other input I'd appreciate it.

I did see a Samsung ATIV Book that was a 15" 1080p display, discrete graphics 8770 AMD card, touch screen (not big into it but could maybe be a plus)... 1TB drive and 8GB RAM. This looks fairly appealing too at $1,100.

 

[mikey71497]

I got a brand new in box, Dell Latitude E6520 Corei7, 8Gb of Ram (since upgraded to 16Gb) and a 500Gb HDD. Backlit Keyboard, 1600x900 HD display etc...for 725.00 shipped to my door with a 3 year warranty from Dell. This was purchased off of Ebay. The deals are there, just have to keep looking for them. Like everyone else here said, stay far away from the Consumer, (inspiron) line of laptops and stick with the business line (latitude). Much better quality. Had this laptop for over a year now and not one hiccup, NONE! Been rock solid and this thing is a beast. Granted, heavy, bulky etc...but I purchased this knowing it was move of a desktop replacement rather than a device I would carry around with me on the go.

Now...having said all that, if I was to get another machine for "on the go", I would get the brand new 13" Mac Book Air. My work is a 50/50 Mac to Windows shop and I asked the IT dept if I could borrow a Mac since I never used one before. I was extremely impressed. The price tag is high, the one I borrowed was 1400 as configured with Corei7 Haswell, 256Gb SSD and 8Gb of Ram. But....you get what you pay for.

Good Luck with your decision.

 

[Deinos]

There is always the refurb route with mac as well. I've not used apple's refurb, but have only heard good things about it. You can still apply applecare to the purchase, good discount, and good quality. If I went mac, I don't know that I would buy brand new with the deals avaiable refurb.

 

[Shadowprice]

Thanks for the advice all.

I looked on ebay for some Latitudes and some good deals came up .. you mean deals like this? http://www.ebay.com/itm/LATITUDE-E6...56071139?pt=Laptops_Nov05&hash=item3f281f2be3


I'm probably considering digging around for a good deal on a latitude, a Lenovo Y510P, or a Apple MacBook Pro refurbished. The 15" non-retina goes for $1,449 right now in the refurb store and I can always add a SSD and RAM in it later. Or I could just go for a Retina and spend $1,599. Little outside my budget but it is a retina and a pretty good deal off retail. I just get nervous buying 1st generation products. I've heard the retinas can get hot, have fluidity issues in the UI (choppy scrolling) due to the HD 4000 graphics driving the retina display.