[Patriot_Vishwas]

Originally Posted by NetfreakBombay

Getting rid of McAfee is the first thing I do on Dell laptops. It slows down laptops because of bloat. Better to install MicroSoft's free anti virus.

On top of that, run de-crappifier on a brand new laptop and performance would improve significantly Dell dock and other crapware that loaded by default eats up lots of RAM and thus battery.

So the McAfee option is out.
Is the Microsoft AV free over extended periods so that i can just update it,when it should be updated.
Also,where should I buy the laptop computer?
I called Dell and they told me to buy them from their website but my father is against it and told them the same so they asked me to come to their store.
I was thinking about buying this at Reliance Digital/Croma but I do not know whether the "add-on's" are still available there(upgrade to Home premium,office student).
Another question-Should I go for the Dell maintainence upgrade to 3 years?
Sorry for so many questions

[vikash49]

Originally Posted by Patriot_Vishwas

Any suggestions for a laptop computer in the price range of 40-45K?
Requirements-1)i5 core
2)500GB HDD
3)4GB of RAM
4)1GB Graphic card(preferably from NVidia)
5)Windows 7 Home premium.

I'm also curious about the... Lenovo products.

Originally Posted by Patriot_Vishwas

Sir,I managed to convince my Father about a slight Budget increase.
The upper limit is 52K.

Got two options for you..

NEW LENOVO Z570 59-0315955
Intel Core i5 2430M (2nd Gen)
4GB x1 DDR3 Ram
750gb 5400 HDD
nVidia GT520 2gb
15.6" HD LED Screen
Win7 Premium 64
Gun Metal Grey Color
Glossy Metallic Finish
Chicklet Kbd
Dolby Audio
Rs. 45,990+ taxes


NEW LENOVO Z570 59-0315953
Intel Core i7 2630M (2nd Gen)
4GB x1 DDR3 Ram
750gb 5400 HDD
nVidia GT520 2gb
15.6" HD LED Screen
Win7 Premium 64
Gun Metal Grey Color
Glossy Metallic Finish
Chicklet Kbd
Dolby Audio

Rs. 49,990+ taxes

By taxes I mean the local VAT which could be 4% or 5% depending on the tax rate in your location.

[NetfreakBombay]

Originally Posted by Patriot_Vishwas

Is the Microsoft AV free over extended periods so that i can just update it,when it should be updated.

Yes it is completely free.

Microsoft Security Essentials - Free Antivirus for Windows

Originally Posted by Patriot_Vishwas

Also,where should I buy the laptop computer?

Preferably from website + call center. You can get better deals that way.

Originally Posted by Patriot_Vishwas

Another question-Should I go for the Dell maintainence upgrade to 3 years?

This is essential regardless of the brand you buy (Dell/HP/etc...). Laptops are expensive to repair and hard to find parts for.

[vasudeva]

Originally Posted by Patriot_Vishwas

Sir,I managed to convince my Father about a slight Budget increase.
The upper limit is 52K.
So,I'm thinking about the Dell Inspiron 15R n5110 with Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium,36 months McAfee Subscription and Microsoft Office Student.
The specifications are as mentioned in the link below.
The Dell Online Store: Build Your System
I thought about Sony Vaio but it comes with 512MB GPU and my pal's vaio heats up faster than a HP laptop computer and it cannot play a Kannada movie without it's battery getting discharged(3+ hours)
BTW,can you please tell me why I should avoid the 36month subscription for McAfee?
Currently,my PC runs on McAfee Sunday Bazaar Edition.Hence,I have to uninstall and re-install once every 90 Days!

Actually with a budget of 50-52K, get an XPS 15 within your range. Better hard disk, good i5 processor, and overall better build.

You may go with 6GB RAM and later on based on what you want, replace with 8GB (remove 2GB and insert 4 GB).

I bought an XPS 15 in Sep and the first thing I did was delete everything (removed all partitions, made the disk unallocated, and then created system and 3 other partitions on 750 GB) and installed win 7 enterprise (technet), office 2010 and other software. I use Microsoft security essentials and find it good. It is free in perpetuity for genuine windows versions. Other good free solutions are Avira, AVG, etc; but I find MSE to be lighter (been using it since 2009 with no issues). Drivers are on dell website and not an issue. Also get acronis free for wd/seagate. building your own is a far superior option than going with OEMs perinstalled. Dell's 3 year warranty is very expensive and I did not go for it. My choice.

[akshay4587]

I am in the process of ordering a Dell XPS 15
In the quotation,it has been mentioned that they are going to add JBL 2.1 Speakers,does anyone know,what model are they,since i was planning to pick extra speakers.

[Warwithwheels]

Originally Posted by akshay4587

I am in the process of ordering a Dell XPS 15
In the quotation,it has been mentioned that they are going to add JBL 2.1 Speakers,does anyone know,what model are they,since i was planning to pick extra speakers.

Hey Akshay.... the JBL 2.1 Speakers is the inbuilt one. Two 4 Watt speakers on the sides, totaling to 8W and one 12W sub - woofer at the bottom. That's 20W in toto. Hope you are not asking about the model of the internal speakers.... Eh?

[akshay4587]

Originally Posted by Warwithwheels

Hey Akshay.... the JBL 2.1 Speakers is the inbuilt one. Two 4 Watt speakers on the sides, totaling to 8W and one 12W sub - woofer at the bottom. That's 20W in toto. Hope you are not asking about the model of the internal speakers.... Eh?

Ohh is it.
Silly me.
I thought they were external,as they had written 2.1 in quotation.

[Jeeper1941]

Wow, this is such an awesome, useful thread! Good stuff.

I need some help though. Any Mac users here? I've used a Mac before, but never owned one. I think it is time to finally make the switch, as I am getting sick and tired of crappy Windows PCs, especially HP and Dell. My current laptop (Dell XPS 15z) is not even a year old and has given me numerous problems already. The hinge broke - had to send it for repairs, the DVD drive had some issues - sent it for repairs again and now it is giving me the BSOD. I can't even start up in safe mode and I'm getting sick of hearing the standard Dell call centre response which is "reinstall Windows". I have a ton of stuff on my laptop including medical books and lots of great TV shows. I have backed most of them up, but looks like at this stage there is no other option, but to re-install Windows. In any case I am planning on getting rid of this computer soon as it has given me nothing but problems. Had very similar issues with my old HP laptop also.

I've got friends/family who use Macs and none of them seem to have any issues with their machines..so I am thinking of switching to the new MacBook Pros, which were released last month.

Just wanted to know if any of you guys use a Mac and if so how has the experience been? Thanks!

[Sn1p3r]

Originally Posted by Jeeper1941

Just wanted to know if any of you guys use a Mac and if so how has the experience been? Thanks!

A Mac user since long but I have been using PC as well in parallel. Go for it, at first it will be a steep learning curve with keyboard layout and shortcuts and sometimes with the design layout but you will love it. Windows is great but it is open to other programs messing it a lot, OS X is a bit strict but then if you want to also have windows on your computer to work with different softwares (the ones that run purely on Win) then make use of paralllels or boot camp and enjoy the dual OS. It's very easy.

Don't mind paying the Apple tax it's worth the quality of machines. note: Macs are not 100% either, so don't go with it blindly.

Cheers!

[sgiitk]

The agony & the ecstasy: Finding & Installing drivers onToshiba C640-X4013

I bought a Toshiba Satellite X4013 and decided to Install Win7-64 on our academic license. Windows installed easily, then the fun started. As is normal the drivers were the default drivers and even the network was not working.

So I decided to look for them. On Toshiba-India.com I saw C650 and C660 but no C640 for Satellite. Did find some stuff under Satellite Pro. Looked all over and foud some on the .de site. It was working but errors were there. The LANs started working. (Easy to check on System Information > Components > Problem Devices). Then you can use PCI Vendor and Device Lists to identify the chip and device source.

So I contacted my vendor who gave me the id of the Delhi chief.

I got a call from Toshiba Support a couple of days later. It seems that C640 is there on the Satellite area on Toshiba-India. Only the computers are listed almost at Random. So I went there and to cut a long story short downloaded as much as 1.1GB of stuff, and installed them. The sequence has to be Chipset, Intel Management and then the rest. Also, for graphics, udio, network etc you have to find which chipset is used.

I must say that Toshiba drivers have far better installers than many others. They went and upgraded/replaced all the stuff I had installed on their own without having to remove them manually. The total download was almost 1.1GB!

[vista_qjd]

Recently got the Lenovo Z370 for abt 32K. i3 processor and about 2GB RAM and 13.3" screen.Decent build and works fine for home use. Other option I was looking at was the HP G4, but the build quality put me off, even though it was a better config.

[libranof1987]

Fellas, I need help urgently with this - I have an almost 2-yr old Dell Inspiron 1525. The wi-fi has become a problem of late. If I use the wi-fi on the laptop sitting a few rooms away from the router; the internet just doesn't work. It works good on another laptop placed right next to mine though. The internet works well if I use the laptop placing it next to the modem.

So, seems to be some issue with the wireless LAN card.

Anyone with any diagnosis?

[S_U_N]

Originally Posted by Jeeper1941

W
I need some help though. Any Mac users here?
.....
Just wanted to know if any of you guys use a Mac and if so how has the experience been? Thanks!

There is another thread for Macs.. http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/gadget...pians-mac.html

[Aroy]

Originally Posted by libranof1987

Fellas, I need help urgently with this - I have an almost 2-yr old Dell Inspiron 1525. The wi-fi has become a problem of late. If I use the wi-fi on the laptop sitting a few rooms away from the router; the internet just doesn't work. It works good on another laptop placed right next to mine though. The internet works well if I use the laptop placing it next to the modem.

So, seems to be some issue with the wireless LAN card.

Anyone with any diagnosis?

1. Check the WiFi signal on the Laptop. There is normally some software which indicates the signal strength or percentage (On the IBM/Lenovo there is one). Start from the router and slowly move to the location where there is a problem. You will now know the useful range of WiFi for your laptop. If it started misbehaving recently, the built in antenna may be loose.

2. May be malaware in your computer. Check if your computer connects to File Sharing Networks. If not configured these can launch hundreds of threads in background, and choke the internet connection, especially if the signal strength is low. I had this problem when one of the computers at home had a wrongly configured Torrent client, which would keep spawning threads/connection and choke the connection. After reconfiguring all was back to normal.

3. May be virus infection which is hogging your WAN, which can again hog the bandwidth at low signal strength. Run a free online virus checker to detect it.

[libranof1987]

Originally Posted by Aroy

1. Check the WiFi signal on the Laptop. There is normally some software which indicates the signal strength or percentage (On the IBM/Lenovo there is one). Start from the router and slowly move to the location where there is a problem. You will now know the useful range of WiFi for your laptop. If it started misbehaving recently, the built in antenna may be loose.

The signal strength has dropped by 1 bar since a few weeks.

2. May be malaware in your computer. Check if your computer connects to File Sharing Networks. If not configured these can launch hundreds of threads in background, and choke the internet connection, especially if the signal strength is low. I had this problem when one of the computers at home had a wrongly configured Torrent client, which would keep spawning threads/connection and choke the connection. After reconfiguring all was back to normal.

I've run a Symantec virus scan as well as Windows Defender.

Also, I've disabled File Sharing.

3. May be virus infection which is hogging your WAN, which can again hog the bandwidth at low signal strength. Run a free online virus checker to detect it.

Only my laptop is having problems with wi-fi connectivity.

I updated the BIOS and Wireless card software today; hardly any improvement.

In a day or two, I'll restore the laptop to factory setting (complete restore); hoping things set right.