Compaq Presario CQ60-420US 15.6-Inch Laptop

Great specs and performance for the price. System is very responsive and I haven't had a hiccup yet. Only thing missing for me would be an integrated webcam and dedicated graphics memory but you get what you pay for and those features usually cost extra.

I do a lot of writing, email, and a little video work. This machine is perfect. There's a wide screen, so that I can see two pages when working on a book page layout. It's very fast compared with my old Pentium 4 laptop. The biggest question to ask is what you want out of your laptop. If you want high end fast gaming, this is not your PC. If you want quick word processing, email, facebook, etc... this one's incredible. I got this on sale at Staple's this week for $349, which is a crazy low price and I'm thrilled. As the earlier reviewer noted, MS Office is not included. I really don't know of any computers where it's included. There is a 60 day trial of Office 2007. If you want office, pick up the home and student edition at the same time you buy the computer for around $79-$99.

Things in the computer world move fast. A year or so ago, this laptop would have rated at the top of the rankings for speed, memory, HD Size, etc. Now, it's lower in the rankings. So what? It's still a very fast computer at an incredible price and will serve my needs well over the coming 3-5 years.

Hope this helps :-)

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Had a CQ60 computer for a little over a year and the battery gets to 40% and the computer dies. Warranty expired 2 weeks ago and HP can't help me. I went online to buy a new battery and surprise, everyone says the battery sucks. My previous Compaq, the AC adapter died after 2 weeks and HP sent a replacement. My brother's Compaq, the battery died after a year and he bought a new one after his wireless card died too. This is the last Compaq I buy ever.

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Bought this from one of the "office supply" stores at about the price the CQ60-410 is going for elsewhere, was actually cheaper than the 410 in this store.

Screen is very nice. For the keyboard, the 10 key is very cramped, I think I would have preferred it just not be there and a bit of a wider normal keyboard, although the keyboard spacing does seem fine other than the 10 key.

The processor is the very capable T4200 (Core Duo), which is great for something at this price point, as netbooks and many other "value" notebooks are shipping with either the Atom or Celeron single core chips.

A lot of trialware, as I suspect most laptops have: Trail of office, trail of Norton, pre-installed Compaq branded Microsoft Bing toolbars, etc.

This laptop does qualify for a free upgrade to Windows 7 and uses the Windows Home Premium version of Vista. Hopefully the Windows 7 disc won't come with all of the trialware.

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Went into a big box office supply store to look at netbooks and saw this on sale for $378 minus $30 mail-in rebate for price of $348, the same price as a netbook. Great machine for the price however it is a basic machine. 3GB of memory, 250gb hard drive, dvd burner, windows Vista Premium (eligible for Windows 7 upgrade for shipping charge), vga connector, 3usb ports, modem, wireless and wired lan connections, memory card reader, trial versions of MS Office and Norton Security, DOES NOT have HDMI connector, Express card slot, bluetooth or webcam. The 15.6 screen is bright and clear, has a numeric keypad, battery life is about 3 hours and I like this clam shell design that doesn't have any latches to open the cover of it. The quality seems awesome, I've owned Dell, Toshiba, IBM and Acer machines and this machine is as sturdily built as any of them. No I can't go 6 hours without plugging in like I wanted with a netbook but I am happy I bought this.

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Samsung - Laptop R480 / Intel Pentium Processor / 14" Display / 4GB Memory / 320GB Hard Drive / BLU

Incredible laptop with blue ray and LED 16:9 wide angle screen. The look is hot red ceramic with a touch of purple.

The blue ray is incredible. It's fast and feels very well made and solid in your hands. Great keyboard and the picture

is astounding. For the price and the features it beats Apple hands down. Buy this, it will be superior for years to come.

I only got mine for 260 bucks and its not bad. The bluray drive is nice and its a reliable pc. Its pretty fast and it looks sleek, just dont expect much out the graphics card other then that its fine with a solid build.

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This is a nice Product.. I'm Using it for past 4 months.. Graphic quality is superb.. And its really nice to have a High end Blue ray disk driver for this prize. But I'm Not happy with the webcam quality..

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I purchased this laptop from Best Buy on Black Friday in 2010 for $400 ($150 off special), the laptop is fairly reliable, it has nice features such as:

Blu-Ray

Sleek design

Island keyboard

Great screen

The downside:

On the slow side

Crashes sometimes

Charger broke on me

Bad HDMI connection

After two years the charger broke on me and I had to get a new one...I also want to make mention of the HDMI connection, it sometimes takes some finagling to get it to work with the TV...sometimes it comes on, sometimes not..very annoying connection and setup for HDMI. Still, it has been over three years now and it is still going strong and I am about to use it when I go back to school. Probably a strong three and a half stars, would have been four if not for the charger.

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This is a great computer! The blu ray is nice and love the speed of everything. The only drawback was adding kaspersky. It caused my computer to go blue screen of death for over 3 months. I finally fixed it, no thanks to kaspersky.

Get one!

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HP Pavilion dv6z Notebook PC With Blu-ray, 6GB DDR3 Memory, Quad-Core A6-3400M Accelerated Processo

Super power laptop ran Crysis on full settings and didn't even blink. I've never seen Windows boot up so fast seems like just a second or two!

Has pretty much everything I could want on it fingerprint reader, bluetooth, HDMI, quad processor, 6 gigs of memory .. Should last at least for a few years!

I gave 1 star for each of five reasons:

1)Fast shipping Arrived the very first day Amazon estimated

2)Price I was going to build a PC from scratch but found this laptop an excellent bargain with the parts I wanted

3)CPU speed This computer is lightning fast, and runs very cool.

4)Graphics/Gaming Epic visuals for movies and games. Powerful enough to play very demanding games without lag

5)Accessories Built in webcam right up above the monitor where it belongs. Fingerprint scanner is AWESOME. Rather than typing in passwords over and over you simply swipe a finger. You can set up multiple users, so I can save my own passwords to my fingerprint, while my brother can save his passwords to his fingerprint. You can even assign each finger a different website, so swiping that finger when on the desktop will open up that page. Built in wi-fi picks up great signal. The touch pad can be turned off just by double-tapping the corner, very handy if using a USB mouse. Clear sounding audio.

The only downside I can possibly think of is the case, a shiny metallic black, shows fingerprints if you touch it a lot. But those wipe off easy enough. Overall I'm extremely pleased with this buy. Definitely recommend it!

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This little laptop has everything you need to do anything you want with lightning fast speed! Hook it up to your flat-screen, and stream movies, or use the TV as a monitor! This thig is great! Excellent support through HP as well!!!

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Very impressed with this laptop, fast boot and shutdown times, doesn't seem to lag even when running multiple programs. If you're unsure what the beats audio part of the laptop entails, I go through it in detail on my blog: howwehear DOT blogspot DOT com

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I have been a long-time HP fan. I'm an IT tech and know my way around a computer. I am a Mac user now because of my job, but I like HP. I've owned an HP Pavilion DV6458se machine for the last 5 years, and it's a tank.Even with the Turion TL-60 dual core chip and Nvidia 6150 graphics and 2 GB RAM, it's quick. I upgraded to a 7200 RPM hard drive and it's even better. I used it for online school, so it was in use for hours and hours a day nonstop for 4 years. The parts that wore out were the keyboard, and I just replaced the hard drive, but it still runs great (the only glaring fault was it came with Vista...ugh).

Some friends of mine have this, and I got the chance to use it for a bit, and came away impressed. This is a very nice machine! The Dv6z Quad-Edition's whole chassis and screen lid are clad in brushed anodized aluminum that's a dark brown color that looks great. Lot's better than my MacBook Pro unibody which is very plain. It has a 15.6 inch LED-backlit screen with 1366x786 resolution (not quite HD) and a glossy surface (not matte or anti-glare). It has all current-tech, including the latest CPU from AMD with built-in (on chip) graphics processing unit (GPU). The A6-3400M Llano is a quad-core unit with 4MB of L2 cache that runs at 1.4 GHz and can throttle up to 2.3 GHz when CPU requirements increase with AMD's Turbo Core process similar to Intel's Turbo Boost. You get 6 GB DDR3 RAM (upgradeable to 16), and a 640 GB 3 GB/s SATA II HDD. The integrated Radeon graphics also works very good. You can play some pretty graphics-demanding games on this like Skyrim or Diablo 3, or even Battlefield 2 on pretty high settings no problem. The hardware in this machine makes it faster and more powerful than my MacBook with has an onboard GPU and discrete GPU.

The battery is a 6-cell lithium ion cell that is supposed to last for 5 or 6 hours. You get a Lightstribe capable DVD supermulti drive that will burn read and write just about any silver discs and HD DVD and Bluray discs. Very nice.

Other goodies include Bluetooth, B/G/N Wifi, a webcam, mini HDMI port, 2 USB 3.0 ports, VGA D-sub out, biometrics fingerprint reader, and premium Beats Audio speakers with built-in subwoofer. The OS is Windows 7 Home Premium, not the greatest OS, but fine for most users.

All this makes for a nice machine. It's pretty snappy thanks to the 6 GB RAM, and will handle just about anything you throw at it. The AMD chip does fall short of the Intel CPU's though. The Core i3 3rd Gen. is faster than this one when doing CPU intensive tasks, but unless you do a lot of audio or video encoding/decoding, image rendering in Photoshop (especially CS6 which is a graphics/CPU hog) it will be hard to notice.

The asthetics are nice. Gone are the blue-led's and in are the cool white ones, which I like better. The touchpad is multi-touch capable (pinch to zoom, rotate, flip, scroll) and has a cool glowing trim around it. The buttons are easy to press and don't require too much pressure, but enough to prevent them from being pushed accidentally. The keyboard has a nice feel to it and the keys are easy to press. It has a full 10-key pad to the right which adds to the width and offsets the touchpad, which I don't like. The biometrics works great and is easy to set up. You can program in multiple users for each user account on the machine as well, which is nice. Despite being Beats Audio, the speakers aren't fantastic like I expected. The onboard sound is nice though, even when hooked up to cheap speakers. The sound is nice a loud, but muffled at times and don't produce the sharp highs of some music. I am sure you can compensate for that with a media player that has a equalizer.

I'd give this 5 stars if it weren't for some things...First it's expensive. For almost $800-$900 you can get a superior laptop with better specs (maybe not as pretty), faster CPU, more RAM, bigger faster hard drive (even an SSD) and 17 inch HD screen. You can get it on sale though, but here it's to much. Second, the screen is good, but not great for a machine like this. I was expecting a dazzling screen but didn't get one. Third, and not really a fault of the machine itself, is it came absolutely loaded with HP-branded bloatware that will probably never get used and is hard to get rid of without possibly breaking things in the OS. You'd almost need an IT tech to clean it up. The hard drive is "only" 640 GB and 5400 RPM, and while that's a lot, it would be nice to have a faster hard drive with more storage especially if this is used for movies, games, or other media. Lastly, maybe my preference, but there's no backlighting for the keyboard.

Other than that, I really like it. The battery does last for quite a while, but plan on 4 hours or less when using it for movies or games.

So...

Pro's

Well-built, good-looking aluminum cladding

Latest AMD CPU

6 GB fast RAM upgradeable to 16

Beats Audio sound

Good battery life

Snappy performance

Can play the latest graphics demanding games great

Con's

Expensive at retail

Screen is not HD or anti-glare

Hard drive could be bigger

No backlit keyboard

Loaded with annoying bloatware

So that's the Dv6z. I like it a lot but I don't love it. I'm an IT professional and appreciate a nice machine, and this one fits the bill. If it were cheaper, I'd rate it higher, but HP shouldn't put a Quad-Edition brand on it and charge an extra $200 for it. I give it my recommendation, but there are better machines out there for the same price, or even cheaper. If you don't mind the price, or can get it on sale (I've seen them for under $700), grab it. It's a competent performer (not an i7 or i5 though) in a field littered with Ivy and Sandy-bridged machines!

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Toshiba - Satellite L755-S5216 Laptop / Intel Pentium Processor / 15.6" Display / 4GB DDR3 Memory /

i did get a bad hard drive after 1 month. which took about 2-3 weeks to fix. it did not come with a recovery disk and i did not create one, so i had to order it from toshiba for $25 and wait 1 week to get it. best buy did change the hard drive for free, offered to install window 7 from the recovery disk, and gave me a lowner laptop you actually pay for it, but have an extended period to returm it so unless something happens to it, u do get your money back i did.

other than that this laptop is 5-star/great very quite, does not heat up, excellent track pad, screen, fast boot, somewhat light ... and cheap ...

i am comparing it to a previous hp dv4 with win vista. that laptop was solid built (dropped it few times, ... never had any hardware issue for 2 years) but did not run smoothly had many issues like noisy fan, heat, badly located track pad which made typing realy hard, needed frequent reboots and slow to reboot ...

Worked ok for a week or two, then started acting kinda strange. 2 months later, no boot. I will send it in for repair, sell it and buy something else. I also bought from people in blue shirts, and it was a bad buy. I will never buy another toshiba product. Although their customer service is good, I have found that manufactures with bad products tend to have really good service.

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My Mom purchased this laptop for me from Best Buy after my 8-year old desktop desktop. Fortunately, the Geek Squad were able to transfer all the info from my hard drive to the laptop. That was a relief because I have thousands of songs and thousands of pictures that I was so worried about losing.

It does last about 4 hours when not plugged up. I guess that's good for a laptop; I'm just not used to it. However, I love the speed. The keyboard took some getting used to, but I think I have it mastered. The touchpad mouse was also a new experience, but it's become second nature. If it becomes too difficult, you can always purchase a physical mouse. The separate number keypad was also a plus.

It also comes with a built-in microphone and web camera. I like being able to change the settings so it powers on as soon as I lift up the screen. I do wish that the speakers would get louder when I want someone else to hear something. However, it's adequate for when I'm alone. If you're at all saavy with a computer, this computer isn't difficult to figure out. On a long trip, I would suggest purchasing a compatible car charger.

Overall, it's an awesome computer!

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I did not buy from Amazon but it was less than $400 at a local brick and mortar with blue shirts. Thought this laptop was a terrific deal.

After a little over 2 weeks, it wouldn't boot up. Just a black screen. Called Toshiba to send it for repairs. The local store only had a 2 week return policy, which sucks too. (Never buying anything from them again.) Toshiba's option was 1) wait a couple of days for a free UPS box, shipping back is free too, or 2) go to a UPS store today to send but I have to pay $15 shipping. I decided to wait for the free box.

Packed everything, filled out the form, sent it via 2nd day UPS. It took over a month to repair and get it back. You can get the repair status online.

Got it back, booted up fine now. But after 30 seconds, "problem with system cooling, shut down immediately and send in for repair." WTF??? Called tech support and asked to send me another box. It's on its way back to repair again. Probably another month til I get it back.

When it worked, I liked it. Nice screen, big keyboard. I didn't like the trackpad as it was too small and can't tell where the edge is. Battery life was pretty good, over 4 hours.

Did I get a lemon or did I get what I paid for?

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Sony VAIO VGN-FW490JEB 16.4" Notebook (2.53GHz Core 2 Duo P8700 4GB RAM 320GB HDD Blu-ray Read/Writ

At 6.5 pounds, the FW isn't the lightest laptop on the market, but it is probably the best value out there. Sony allows you to select a pre-built model or customize one yourself. My machine is customized:

1080p LCD Screen

ATI 4650 1gb Graphics Card

2.53ghz Intel Core 2 Duo (3mb L2 Cache)

4gb DDR2 @ 800mhz

320gb Hard drive @ 7200rpm

Blu Ray Player (Read only)

Windows 7 64bit (came with Vista 64, but I upgraded when 7 came to campus)

This machine is great for everything. Gaming, image editing, word processing, you name it, it can do it. It does get a bit hot, so lap use should be limited to the length of battery life which is roughly 2 to 2.5 hours. The keyboard is chiclet style and is unfortunately not back-lit. The speakers could be better, but I am usually wearing my MDR-500 Sony headphones (which I also recommend for people who like pop/rock music).

The only complaints I have are centered around weight and placement of ports. Like I said, it is fairly heavy. I have a messenger bag that I used my first semester this year at Indiana University, and it got extremely heavy when dragging it around campus. I am going to find a backpack so that it is not as much of an issue. It is also worth noting that its 16.4 inch screen makes this thing fairly large so it take up a lot of real estate on your desk. VGA, HDMI, Ethernet, Firewire and Express Card slot are on the left side, and the tray loading Blu Ray drive and three USB ports are on the right. I would prefer if the USB ports and Blu Ray drive switched positions (drive moves forward and USB ports move backward), however, they work where they are.

Build quality is pretty good. I always seem to compare any laptop against the unibody Macbook Pro, and the FW holds its own. Even though it is entirely made of plastic, it looks great and is of solid build quality.

I chose the FW because it was the best deal on the market. I looked at every major brand and I could not find a cheaper computer with the same specs. In fact the only one that came close was, I believe, a Dell XPS. It was almost $200 more! The FW is a mulitmedia/gaming machine. It will play Crysis at 720p medium settings at 40 fps. All other games are playable at 1080p and high settings. It can also do some pretty hard core image editing. This a great all around computer.

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Acer Aspire E1 15.6" Core i3 500GB HDD Notebook

This is the best laptop available for the price. I initially bought an HP laptop for 599 and I had it for a week when I saw that Samsung had a comparable laptop on sale for 498 at Walmart, so I returned my HP and bought the Samsung. The Samsung was complete junk. I'm guessing that it had defective hardware because Samsung products are usually good. Anyway, I ended up with this Acer (based on recommendation from a friend) and I couldn't be happier. You just can't beat the specs for the price. If you are looking for a laptop in the 500 dollar range, I can't imagine getting a better deal than this Acer laptop.

I wanted this notebook because I have a desktop with the same processor and it is great. The notebook is great Fast & seemingly reliable(had it a short time). I would recommend it.

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Solid computer. Does the job pretty well. Other than that word limit word limit word limit this is absolutely ridiculous.

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Apple MacBook White - 2.1GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4GB DDR2 , 160GB SATA HD, (DVD-ROM/CD-RW), Intel GMA

I'm very pleased with my 13" MacBook, It can handle all media operations, and most music functions as well. I'm very pleased with it, I do a lot of music on this one, I want to add more memory if possible. This computer can handle many operations at one time,the duel core processor is awesome and if you had a tera byte of storage you wouldn't have to upgrade for a long time. I recommend this computer for students and home production as well. ( MARVIN C. GREEN ).

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HP Pavilion dv6t Select Edition 15.6" Laptop - Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit, 2nd Generation Intel

I love this computer. I decided to switch back to HP after my Sony drove me nuts. This laptop is easy to use and really fast. The fingerprint ID is very handy because I am constantly forgetting passwords.

This was my second HP laptop, first one was pretty good so I bought this one some months ago, I used it once a week barely for an hour or two for checking my emails. I left it in a hibernate status once for a couple of days and then when I tried to restart it, it wouldn't start. It just died, talked to HP, they looked at it and they said it was a system failure and they could not replace it. I am very glad it happened within the first year and it was under warranty.HP staff was kind enough to replace it with another new laptop(different model). I think this issue has been happening with a large number of DV6 laptops so I would think twice before buying it. Also make sure you have extended warranty on this laptop.

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I bought this laptop as a main computer. It works great and I love every second i spend on it... Great deal also.

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Well, this computer is good enough. It has its quirks... It works well enough, I am having issues with the network adapter but not that bad. For $400 off I can't complain too much. Screen is beautiful. BluRay looks great! Very fast. More power than I will ever need.

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I purchased this HP Pavilion dv6t, special edition about an year ago. It seems that this HP product is good in built quality. I am traditionally a fan of Dell and used/using at least four Dell laptops (for personal use only). I had a great expectation from this HP notebook, my first HP product in any category. But I am highly disappointed. I tend to believe that the issues I face is not very specific case for my particular unit but general problem with HP laptops.

My first set back when I discovered that this HP product does not offer different color management, specifically Adobe RGB. I have all my photography equipment set at Adobe RGB, all my Dell notebooks offer many color management schemes, including Adobe RGB. So I can use this Pavilion dv6t for my photo need but with severe limitations. HP technical help could not offer any help.

The main trouble started around 8 months after I purchased it. The computer became too slow and started hanging over frequently, leaving me frustrated. I lost many valuable data and research work due to that rampant and random hang ups. HP technical team diagnosed that it has bad hard drive. HP refused to replace the defective unit but repaired it. That took about a week.

But the problem came back within a couple of months of repair. Again I am having the problem. A new problem also arosethe sound quality started deteriorating. Even at the highest volume, it is not much audible.

Probably this is my last HP hardware.

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Inspiron 15R Notebook 5520

I purchased this laptop during the Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals. I paid $498.94 after tax.

I have the model with 8GB of DDR3 memory and the Intel Core i5-3210 @ 2.5Ghz CPU.

Everything on this laptop works great with the exception of the slow hard drive @ 5400rpm. It's a great amount of space, but I want my operating system and applications to load faster, so I'll be throwing in a Solid State Drive in this thing.

Through some research I've found that this particular model typically does not have support for mSATA devices, but there is a part # from Dell that you can order for around $15 that will allow you to install a SSD without removing the primary hard disk or the CDROM drive. The part number is N7JHH (Daughterboard w/ mSATA port) from Dell. Once you've installed this part, you can install an mSATA drive to the board to host your operating system, and leave the 1TB 5400RPM drive to host your data.

If you don't like the idea of buying the daughterboard from DELL and installing it, you can also buy a "2nd HDD Caddy" or a new "Disk Bay Adapter" for the laptop, which just replaces the CD-ROM drive with a SATA drive (its okay, you can use an external cdrom drive or just use USB drives for everything). A good place to look is newmodeus.com

I love how all of the USB ports are now 3.0 and it has the 3rd Gen Intel Chip w/ graphics.

I dislike how the power port and RJ45 now on the sides instead of the back like in the older models, but its a minor flaw.

I've had this laptop since Christmas of last year, and I really like it, but, it can be a bit slow at times, plus it takes me about about 10 minutes to get it into a useable state after already logging on, that may be just me, but I think it has something to do with the laptop.

Pros:

Good for students

relatively small

not windows 8 ;)

Cons:

a bit slow

pretty bad display

low battery life

loaded with useless dell media drivers that slow it down further

I'd recommend it if your on a budget, other than that... no.

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Dell Inspiron 17R Core i7-3632QM Quad-Core 2.20GHz 8GB 1TB DVD±RW 17.3" Win 8 Laptop w/Webcam, Blu

I bought this laptop mostly based on the 3rd generation i7 processor, 8 GB of memory, and Terabyte drive. However, I made some assumptions that came back to bite me. Since this model is primarily sold as a home/entertainment computer and includes an HDMI port to directly connect to a TV, as well as Intel's WiDi to wirelessly connect to a TV, you would think it was optimized to download and stream movies. But you would be wrong, because it has both obsolete wired and wireless networking connections which is so surprising to me that I didn't even think to investigate them before buying this device. I did not buy from Amazon, but they should be commended for making it very clear in the first bullet points on the page: "Integrated 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth, 10/100 Ethernet LAN". The current standard for Ethernet LANs is Gigabit (1000 megabit), and has been for some years, which is why it is difficult to find devices with the obsolete 10/100 ports anymore. Most current WiFi devices use the dual band N standard, which this laptop does not support. Many current computers support the newer dual band AC standard, for which routers are readily available. So far, no upgrade path is available for this computer to use the higher speed networks, other than buying external adapters and using up the precious USB ports, of which there are only 4, 2 USB3 and 2 USB2 ports. This brings up another question why aren't they all USB3 ports? USB3, dual band N WiFi and Gigabit Ethernet are basics that should be included on all laptops today, especially a higher end unit like the 17R. The performance of the wireless and wired networks on this computer can only be described as frustratingly and disappointingly slow.

This computer also is lacking a TPM chip which makes it a lot harder to encrypt the hard drive using the BitLocker software included in Windows 8. Without the TPM chip, encryption and decryption is slower, and you have to hack the registry and use an external memory card or jump drive to store the keys, which can be lost, forcing a total erasure of the hard drive to use the computer.

This particular i7 processor is not the most powerful either. Because it has quad cores and a turbo mode, you would expect it to power through any frozen screen moments. But it doesn't seem to work that way. My experience includes the computer freezing several times a day, usually when I am doing nothing more than web browsing. The 64 bit Windows 8 doesn't seem to help much with that, either.

Also, if you are expecting a backlit keyboard that is frequently advertised for the 17R, it is not included on this model. The mouse pad does not work particularly well with Windows 8 and does not seem to support gestures. It also has the common problem of most mouse pads, it causes the cursor to jump all over the place when you are trying to type, frequently causing whole blocks of text to be selected and replaced by what you are typing, or to jump into other programs entirely. Most of the time I use an external keyboard and mouse. Hours spent adjusting settings have been futile.

The display is quite nice, but nothing spectacular, and at 3.3 pounds it is a heavy laptop that is too large to fit into most carrying cases.

It does support a second drive that can be used for a solid state drive that may shorten boot times and increase speed. The battery is OK, generally lasting about 3 hours when not plugged in.

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HP Envy dv6-7220us 15.6-Inch Laptop

Quick summary First PC I got had problems. Did get another one and it seems to be fine so far. I have left the review below since it is an honest account of what I went through with the first one.

I have been buying PCs since the early 1980s and this is BY FAR the WORST out of box experience I have had. The PC had 5 hours of critical updates from HP and Microsoft that did not go through correctly. 18 hours later still getting errors on the PC, from HP and Windows. I have called HP customer support three times so far, have reformatted PC with customer support on the line and still am having problems.

The HP support has been horrific. The HP support is from India and once you get to a live person the support is subpar. My main HP tech support person was down right rude and HE TOLD ME THE FOLLOWING THINGS which were horrific to hear from an IT guy (and totally false by the way):

(1) do not to make Windows critical updates since they cause problems on the HP PCs

(2) HP simple pass which is an advertised security feature did not work well

(3) I should ignore all the red ! and yellow warning triangles on my pc

He basically just wanted me off the line and to live with a problem PC! The support person also had me install some software from him that hijacked internet explore and had my computer go nuts with virus warnings and I got several viruses too!..this is when I agreed to reformat my PC...the India HP tech had limited knowledge of the PC itself and refused to answer any questions on Windows 8 even when we were sitting on the phone waiting for the computer to reboot or do updates.

After reformatting the hard drive and another 5 hours of doing HP and windows updates I am still getting errors. I had already installed my last copy of MS office on this pc and am very upset at the prospect of having to buy another copy of Office out of my pocket. Ship this PC back and go out and purchase another PC. So far I have been on the phone with HP for 14 hours. HP support is the worse... My HP support person also made me deactivate a lot of the Windows 8 features on the second installation and when I protested he told me he would not support any Windows issues and I could turn them on later. When the updates were done I asked how to turn on those Windows 8 features and he told me he didn't know and that wasn't his job.

UPDATE...escalating with HP support...now they are telling me that since this 8AM Saturday they cannot do anything till Monday and they will have someone call me back then to help me return my PC and get a new one then. This is unacceptable to me because this means 2 more days without a PC than if I was helped now.

UPDATE (2 hours later) still escalating.... Now HP is telling me to pack the PC up, drive to fed ex and once they have the PC back (I purchased this from HP directly) they will ship another one to me AND then I need to either call Microsoft and ask them if they can transfer my license to a new PC OR I need to buy another copy of Microsoft office. This means I won't have a new PC for 5 + days and then I need to start the installation procedure all over again.

UPDATE (3 hours later) packing up my PC. Fedex will pick up package Monday and I will get new PC Wed. Hope this one works!

Seriously???? That much escalation to get OK service???? Looks like it will take a week to resolve the issue and get a new PC. That is a lot of down time and a lot of non productive time for me to fix their problem.

From what I saw of the PC when it was working..

1) the sound system is nice...clear and loud enough to play music on without external speakers. I played some support videos online and had the sound on one of the lowest settings and it was plenty loud. Played a few songs and the sound quality is better than any other PC I have had.

2) The webcam was also HD and the quality was nice.

3) I think I will like Windows 8 once I get used to it. There is a learning curve on this but it has some nice features.

4) Have talked to several friends who have HP and they told me their HP assist never worked well and constantly has problems with updates.

5) This is my first HP...may be my last...their PCs may be OK but their customer support is HORRIBLE!

Update:

Got the new replacement PC Wed (yesterday). Software updates process of HP and MS software took 4+ hours but went smoothly. The installation of my other programs was pain free. Still installing my files but all seems well. Still very impressed with the sound system on the PC and know I will be enjoying that once my mp3s are installed.

HP support group called me and sent me an email Monday AM and gave me a case # and a direct number to contact them if I have any more troubles. They were very nice and made me feel that my problem was a fluke and I now had good support if it wasn't. Right now it looks like their was a glitch in the software update of my first PC which threw off everything. The second issue was that I got a bad tech from their Indian support group he needs some more training on both customer service and the PC. The final issue for me is that by the time I started escalating it was Saturday morning and the US support was closed at that time.

What I should have done was to send back my first PC the second the issues started and got a new PC and escalated with HP about the fact that I had already installed MS office on the bad PC.

Update one month later:

HP contacted me several times to make sure I was happy which I thought was very nice. These calls came from someone in the US and not India. Thank goodness... I may get another HP after all. The PC is working fine. Am enjoying the sound system (which is very good for a laptop sound system) and windows 8. No other issues.

I can't resist writing a very pre-emptive review because I have great feeling about this PC. First of all, I had a Lenovo core i7 ideapad crap out after just 18 months since manufacture. The 2630QM processor was a bit consumptive and I am absolutely paranoid the chipset may have had a bit of a ticking timebomb in its workings. While I respect Lenovo's ThinkPad brand, clearly there are some to be avoided or scrutinized in the lower tiers.

So in the market was I, and after researching my target price range I had decided on the AMD A8 or AMD A-10 line, if I was lucky. After all, I have some esteem for the AMD products as I find them to function better than the sum of their parts. Plus, I could also blame Intel in large part for my prior PC woes in the chipset vicinity. The HP Envy Dv6 with AMD A8-4500M was quite compelling in my search for products, but I had my reservations not finding the A-10 version. I shopped a lot online but didn't buy.. still waiting for the right deal.

So off I went for some family time, but on my way I happened to pass a Staples and couldn't resist stopping in to see if anything called me. Well, in fact, they have some phenomenal deals and no-nonsense powerful PCs. Indeed they had the dv6 Envy A8-4500M model which I tried extensively. However their best deal was a $500 core i5 Envy at $150 cheaper.

Needless to say I was forced to buy Intel again, but I can't regret it much. The computer is blazing fast. However what I really want to emphasize in this review is the excellent build quality. The mostly aluminum case is rigid and the chicklet keys have a fantastic feel. The cooling fan pushes out nothing but cold air and the Beats Speakers are definitely a bump up in laptop speaker output. Trackpad seems like great quality also.

There is one MAJOR drawback ... the screen viewing angles are weak with dark tones, and the resolution is .. by todays standards.. quite BLAH or even BLEH. However with brighter tones (like this web page) the angles are quite good. And it is blindingly bright. Connectivity excellent w Bluetooth and USB 3,0.

Overall, the intel internals are nothing to scoff at. However, there is NO reason not to strongly consider the dv6-7210us which is quite a competent overall system which is capable of a higher windows experience index number with a few small modifications (this PC will be GPU restricted for a lower overall score). So this review is mainly to APPLAUD hp for doing what other PC manufactures haven't done basically ever: make a computer with a good CPU near the top of the line (AMD A8 also) in an excellent form factor with no major bottlenecks in quality anywhere. Ok, the screen isn't amazing, but everything has it's price and as the one factor I can see separating this from a $2200 mac pro, I could care less. I can still give a 5*.

Also, Bravo! to Staples for carrying far better PC's than any other big box retailer I've come across (best buy, walmart and friends, Costco). Almost all of their PCs were desirable and they even had the blazing fast Core i7 Toshiba for $630 all holiday season!

It took a brutal bludgeoning of market share by Mac and tablets, and a massive blow to share price, but on a price to performance AND build quality ratio this machine is something you've been waiting for.

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I had an awful experience when I first purchased the computer. It came with corrupted files. There was an icon on it to fix the problem. I made the mistake of following the instructions and wound up buying a service contract to repair the computer. I know Amazon will take back the computer with no questions but by the time I realized that it was too late. I wasted over $250 because of my own stupidity. A couple of days later Amazon reminded me that I had 15 days to send the computer back. I did so and got a replacement. I am generally pleased with the the dv6-722us. I had the same computer with Windows 7. My wife loved it so I gave it to her and bought the new one with Windows 8. To me the Windows 8 operating system is not an improvement. It takes a little getting used to but it is not difficult to learn. Overall this has been a good purchase. If I had not had the terrible experience with the first computer it would been an excellent purchase. Word to the wise, if it doesn't look right to begin with, put it back in the box immediately and send it back.

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Have had 2 computers shipped and both had mechanical defects, one of which the mouse button did not work and the other a problem with garbled speakers. Trying one more time...obviously not much quality control going on at hp these days..

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Great computer for out family!! Use it daily for social media and work. World highly recommend this computer to everyone.

Save 10% Off

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Toshiba L855-S5372 15.6" Laptop with 3rd Generation Intel Core i7-3630QM Processor, 6GB memory, 640

I have only been using this laptop for 5 days, but so far it seems pretty darn nice. It is fast everything opens and loads instantly. Startup/reboot takes literally a few seconds.

Excellent processor, ample RAM to handle many tasks at once, and can be upgraded to 16gb.

Screen is glossy and so it does have some glare depending on your lighting and angle. Frame around the screen is glossy back.

They keyboard, I am struggling to get used to. If my nails weren't so long, it would probably be much easier. The keys have some space between them and they are raised think Scrabble pieces laying on a table, just not as thick. They are totally flat and square, no slanted edges. I find myself missing a lot of keys when typing and have to be more purposeful and exact and be more proper with hand posture. To be honest, my fingers hurt after typing on it all day today. I am hoping it is something I will get more used to as time goes on. If you're already familiar with this type of keyboard, I am sure it will not be an issue.

The touchpad is pretty far off to the left. When you have the 10key number pad, the touchpad usually is more to the left, but this one seems pretty far over. My HP was not that far to the left. I am right handed, so it is a bit of a stretch. I am getting used to that though.

I had to really mess with the mouse/pointer settings in order to get the touchpad to work well for me. Factory set, it was skipping and sticking for me and when I would tap to click, i'd have to tap a few times, instead of once. It is much better now that I changed most of the settings. The touchpad is slightly textured, but it doesn't cause any issues.

The screen is bright. I have adjusted it down some, a little more dim.

It is quiet. I hear the fan kick on for a few seconds every now and then, but it is so very quietly. Haven't felt the laptop or the charging block get hot at all yet and it has been plugged in and running for 5 days straight. I put it to sleep maybe 4 times a day for about 15mins to an hour. The laptop has never even gotten slightly warm.

Windows 8 is.. different...slightly annoying, but I am sure I will get used to it. I deleted/uninstalled almost all of the "Apps" from the startup screen. I'd like to totally disable that screen. It will be useful for some, but others will hate it and see it as a roadblock of sorts to get to the "regular" desktop screen. It takes some getting used to, that's for sure. There are a lot of places on the web to see tutorials etc. There is a short bit of one in the laptop user manual as well.

Size and weight s perfect for me. Not too big, not too small and not too heavy. It isn't what you would call "thin and light" but it isn't too bulky or heavy. I don't like the smaller screens of netbooks and tabs, but I also do not like the huge 17" screens ether. This 15.6" is perfect. I don't travel with my laptop much, so extreme portability is not an issue for me. It is less than an inch and a half thick.

As soon as I set the laptop up, it picked up my wireless printer and already had it installed somehow. No clue how, but it was nice to not have to go through that whole setup process. On the other 4 laptops that are connected with the printer, I had to manually look for available devices, add and install the printer, usually needing to use the disk. Not this time. I just clicked on add printer, thinking I would have to use the normal process of adding it and it was already there and ready to use.

The sound was pretty bad at first, but I updated the driver and it is much better now. Still has somewhat of the cheap alarm clock radio sound to it, but not nearly as bad. There are some settings I will try and mess with and see if it makes a difference. I am not too worried about the sound though...it's not like I will be using the laptop speakers as a music source.

Something I *really* like is Toshiba's "Sleep and Charge" feature. It allows you to charge your cellphone, or other items, even while the laptop is sleeping or turned off. This is such a convenient feature for me. I love it.

So far, I am loving the laptop itself and still getting used to Windows 8. Definitely recommended. It is fast and powerful enough to handle pretty much anything and is Energy Star rated. Toshiba even offers free electronics recycling. 5 stars and will update as needed.

Fast, snappy, and gorgeous! Updated the memory to its full capacity at 16GB and it is the icing on the cake. Very happy with my purchase, highly recommend it...o and one more thing. Contrary to a lot of other people, I love Windows 8!

Buy Toshiba L855-S5372 15.6" Laptop with 3rd Generation Intel Core i7-3630QM Processor, 6GB memory, 640 Now

Okay this laptop is excellent if you're considering it...don't hesitate...get it!

The keyboard is excellent with a good feel.

The processor is a quad core i7 2.4GHZ,

Since I use Photoshop, illustrator and some other programs I have not heard the fan. I am yet to test it playing games.

The screen is the glossy type but it's clear and gives nice details.

The surfaces is also glossy and can be a fingerprint magnet.

The touch-pad is also good and has a matte feel.

The batter life is great so far but I've only had the laptop for 1 week.

All in all it's a good laptop and in my humble view an excellent bang for your buck.

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The laptop arrived in optimal conditions, the CPU is an intel core i7 very quick in my opinion, I've a ASUS G55V with 3610QM and I can not feel the difference in applications like office, the laptop is usually silent, and the temperature is generally lower of course I use a platform with a fan, the unique disadvantage is the GPU but respect to the price is ok, yesterday I could run Call of Duty Black Ops without problems with setting in middle quality, really I'm very happy with the laptop.

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Overall, the computers performance is great, the i7 processor is lightening quick even with several applications running simultaneously. However, the biggest gripe I have is that the construction feels cheap. I have been a loyal HP user for decades because the laptops have a very "solid" feel for construction. This Toshiba just feels cheap to me, and the keyboard needs to have the keys hit very firmly and centered for the key to work. I feel like I am constantly spell-checking because my key strokes are not firm enough. I know, I know..."so just type more firmly" is what you are thinking...but I AM! My HP must have me spoiled, with feather light key actuation. Takes a bit of getting used to, so I am adjusting. I am also adjusting to the whole Windows 8 operating system...still not a big fan of the "tile" displays. I guess I need to "unlearn" my comfort for using Windows 7 for so long.

In summary:

PROS: Super quick processor, great screen resolution,excellent for multi-tasking

CONS: Keyboard not very sensitive, overall "cheap" feel for construction

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Acer Aspire AS5560-7402 15.6-Inch Laptop (Black)

I'm a college student who just needed laptop for basic, general use. That includes basic internet browsing (often with many tabs), opening multiple, large, textbook-sized PDFs, running large powerpoints that professors often use and running programs like Skype, usually all at the same time. I'm also a computer enthusiast; I'm accustomed to high performance parts.

And I chose this laptop.

------------------------------------------

BASIC INFO

This is the first laptop I've owned. Right out of the box, WEI rates the memory, desktop graphics and hard drive at 5.9, "gaming" graphics are rated at 6.5 and the processor is rated at 6.7; thus the overall system rating is 5.9.

Like most laptops, this one also has bloatware. This was a nonissue for me since I did a clean installation of Windows 7.

Note that the processor actually comes clocked at 1.5 GHz and not 1.4 GHz as Amazon has stated in the specifications.

The laptop has 4GB of memory; there are two sticks of 2GB RAM. The model is Samsung M471B5773CHS-CH9. 512MB of memory is shared with the APU, leaving 3.47GB for the rest of the system.

The 1.3 MP camera works. Nothing much else to say about this.

------------------------------------------

AESTHETICS

Its design is sleek and simple. Nothing gaudy and that's how I like it.

The laptop has a glossy screen which may present glare problems if you use it outdoors. There is no glare when used indoors unless you're in exceptionally bright lighting. The monitor's viewing angle is decent; people sitting next to you shouldn't have a problem viewing your screen. There's no indicator light for when the webcam is activated.

The spaced out keys make it slightly easier to type, but there has never been a laptop keyboard I truly ever liked. Sadly, there are no indicators for caps lock or num lock.

The status indicator LEDs (power, HDD activity, etc.) are not overly bright. Good.

The speakers aren't anything spectacular, but I wasn't expecting them to be great.

------------------------------------------

PERFORMANCE AT STOCK SETTINGS, STOCK PARTS

Battery life is pathetic. It has six cells, but that is irrelevant as there is no industry standard for cell size. What matters is the rating in watt-hours; for this battery, it's rated at 48 watt-hours. That means it can provide 48 watts for one hour. This laptop uses 18-25 watts during normal use and up to 40-47 watts with more intensive loads, such as gaming. With that said, the battery will only last 2-3 hours at best. Don't expect to game for more than an hour on battery.

At idle and maximum brightness, the laptop draws 13.8-14.4 watts of power. At idle and minimum brightness, power draw falls to 10.3-10.9 watts. Based on those measurements, the battery will only last the advertised four hours if you leave the laptop idle.

I stressed it for one hour with Prime95; no errors or warnings occurred.

While stressing it with Prime95, power draw stays around 44-46 watts. CPU temperature went up to a maximum of 64°C (about 150°F) which is well within acceptable ranges, even for a mobile processor. Temperature was monitored using Core Temp. If those temperatures alarm you, keep in mind this was a stress test that runs the computer at 100% for the entire duration of the test; temperatures will not reach those numbers under normal usage.

The fan speeds up as temperature rises, but it isn't noisy. During the stress test, the bottom gets warm enough to be uncomfortable if it was in your lap; the left side of the keyboard surface also gets slightly warmer, but it is barely noticeable.

The hard drive is a 500GB 5400 RPM Toshiba MK5059GSXP. It isn't terribly slow, but slow enough to make me impatient. Perhaps I'm just spoiled by the SSD I have on my desktop. Not a con, but not a good thing either. Most users probably won't notice a difference.

As for gaming, Black Ops and Modern Warfare 3 runs at 30-40 FPS on medium textures and no AA. However, the frame rate isn't very stable and would be a problem in multiplayer; dropping down to the lowest settings smoothes things out considerably. Skyrim runs at 28-35 frames with a mix of medium-high settings. The frame rate isn't high, but in this case it is very playable because it stays stable and smooth. Heat was not a problem while gaming; I played Skyrim for two hours and the temperature averaged 56°C and reached a maximum of 61°C.

------------------------------------------

PERFORMANCE AFTER UPGRADES, OVERCLOCKING

I upgraded the memory to a set of 8GB (2x4GB) sticks from Corsair bought through Amazon; WEI memory rating went up to 7.3.

I plan on replacing the hard drive with a 128GB SSD, most likely a Crucial M4 or a Samsung 830. I'm just waiting for a good sale.

At stock, the A6 processor is clocked at 1.5 GHz @ 1.0125 volts. Using K10STAT 1.54, I have the processor overclocked to 2.1 GHz at the same voltage. I ran Prime95 for 24 hours without errors or warnings. Interestingly enough, I can also undervolt and overclock it at the same time to 2.0 GHz @ 0.9875 V.

------------------------------------------

CONCLUSION

With Prime's free two day shipping and at $399.99 I paid, this is a great laptop. I'm quite happy with my purchase.

Because it is an APU, the CPU and GPU are closer to each other physically and logically, allowing it to perform much better than it otherwise would. I don't plan on gaming on this, but it's nice to know it performs decently well.

The battery life sucks, but I don't mind bringing the charger with me. Once classes resume in the fall, the only place I'll be using the laptop is in the labs or library between classes. I'm there for four-seven hours at a time anyway which pushes the limits of most batteries anyway.

I have been researching laptops for quite a few weeks before I decided to purchase this one. The goal for me was to find a laptop powerful enough for gaming for $500 or less. Yes, the options were very low, but then I found this beauty. I can play games like World of Warcraft and League of Legends at nearly the highest settings with no screen tearing, lag, etc. Everything runs surprisingly smooth. I've played WoW for a few hours in a row without the laptop overheating. I would also like to mention that this laptop is very quiet. It is not noisy at all.

Pros

-Powerful for the price

-No noise when on for hours even in games

-No overheating

-Keys are nice and quiet

-Sleek and attractive design

-Etc!

Cons

-Speakers are not the greatest, but not a huge enough flaw to worry about in my opinion

-Can't think of anything else!

So yes, I must give it a 5 out of 5! This laptop is worth every penny! If you are on a tight budget but desire a laptop for gaming, this is the laptop for you!

Buy Acer Aspire AS5560-7402 15.6-Inch Laptop (Black) Now

I bought this to replace my desktop which was getting old 6 or 7 years old now). With a budget of 56 hundred dollars. After lots of researching, I came across this as the best deal. Acer listed the price at $499, but when I cam to Amazon it was $429, compared to other sites which had it for over $500. It has been a week or so since I got this, and I'm impressed. It is my first laptop and I wasn't sure what to expect. It runs games and other programs smoothly, and the machine stays cool most of the time. I ran WoW at 30 FPS steady on all settings set at "Good" and I run League of Legends at 25-30 frames on "High" settings. For the price and a decent upgrade for an older computer, I recommend this.

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My dad helped me purchase this Acer Aspire 5560-7402 laptop. We managed to get it at the price of 400 dollars and payed a little extra for the 2 day shipping. Amazon got the laptop here in perfect shape in less than 24 hours!

Be aware that there is a lot of "bloat-ware" installed from the beginning. I was rather vicarious and uninstalled a little too much in the beginning which caused some issues with the wireless. I ended up having to do a complete system restore, and I was lucky that Acer had such an option. Essentially it was a big reset button. So I'm just saying be careful with what you uninstall in the programs menu.

Also, another thing that confused me a bit in the beginning was the mention of "Turbo CORE technology" which clocks the CPU up to 2.4Ghz. I thought that there would be a some software that would give the the option to "Turbo" or Overclock your CPU, but found no such thing. After some research, Turbo Core Technology essentially Overclocks for a few Milliseconds, only when it is needed most (during a stressful in-game match for example). I'm not sure how much of a difference that makes, but it sounds pretty cool. Just be aware that you really are purchasing a laptop with a 1.5Ghz quad-core CPU, not 2.4Ghz. (Only for fractions of a second).

The games I have played are all online: World of Tanks, Diablo 3, and Team Fortress 2. I keep them on a low to medium graphical setting, because I prefer a silky smooth frame rate. I have played for a couple hours straight while running Skype without any complaints from my new laptop.

:THE PROS:

Price.

Rock solid gaming performance.

The Laptop Microphone works surprisingly well. I do all of my gaming while on Skype, and haven't heard any complaints from my friends as far as background noise, humming noise, static, etc.

If I had to complain about some things, here they are :THE CONS:

The volume control is too sensitive for my liking. I prefer a "dial" type of volume adjustment, not the "Fn+arrow". Just one bar can make a huge difference in volume, especially with headphones.

The colors are not as vibrant as I would like them to be on my monitor. Perhaps I could adjust it more to my liking, but out of the box, I'm not blown away.

In short, this laptop is exactly what I needed.

It provides me with online gaming power at an awesome price.

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PROs: The design is slick. Thin and very lightweight for a 15.6" laptop. Windows live ratings: processor: 6.7, gaming graphics: 6.7, meaning you can play most of the recent games in low/medium settings, use photoshop and illustrator with no problems. Few laptops in this price range have comparable or better graphics card. Super-fast boot and shut-down. Silent and cool, no overheating problem at all. No hardware problems in 1 month of use.

CONs: The price fluctuates madly, must check other comparable laptops and websites before making a purchase. Many bloatware, took me almost a day to uninstall all.

Highly recommended if you need a little more than a word processor and a web browser but not looking for a monster gaming laptop.

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Toshiba - Satellite C655-S5212 Laptop / Intel Core i3 Processor / 15.6" HD Display / 3GB DDR3 Memor

This is my first laptop, and I fell like I should have started with a worse computer.

I was drawn to the system from the cost perspective, and have found that the computer meets and exceeds my needs on many levels. Though I've had it only a few days, processing seems smooth, graphics are solid, overall function is great.

As of yet, there has been no power lag on any pages or programs.

I haven't tried out the DVD drive yet. I also haven't tried to run Netflix on the computer in an HD stream. Will update when those events happen.

So far, my only gripe is that 1) I managed to get a little coffee on it so far (still runs great though), and 2) sadly, this may become my main computer, as it seems to be better performing than my desktop at this stage.

I would recommend this product to anyone looking for a solid second computer for school, some business, or recreation. I'm sure there are better units out there, but for the money, this is an awesome investment.

Never buy a Toshiba laptop. After three months the screen displayed horizontal lines without being dropped or damaged. When I spoke to Toshiba I was hung up on twice and then told to speak to the place where I bought the computer. Finally I spoke to the customer service manager who informed me that the warranty didn't cover damage to the monitor even if the damage was not the fault of the owner. To say the least I'm very dissatisifed with the way Toshiba deals with its customers post purchase and the quality of a computer which would break after three months for no particular reason.

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Had the computer about 1 month when the hard drive crashed. I only used the computer about 1/2 hour a day at most. Toshiba made it difficult and charges $25 to fix the problem, in addition to not having a computer for 2-3 weeks. I realize problems occur with computers, but I would appreaciate more flexibility with their customer service when a major internal issue occers within 1 month of owning the computer. Will not buy another Toshiba product.

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I purchased two Toshiba Satellites model C655 August 2011. I use one for school, they both have excellent speed and are comfortable to use. The only complaint I have with one is that the hinge on the right hand side binds, and has caused the body of the laptop to separate.

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This is my 3rd Toshiba laptop, picked it up at Best Buy for $360.00. This laptop is plenty capable for what I and likely 95% of the population use computers for, day to day internet use, Itunes, Facebook, etc. The speakers are decent and the webcam is good for those that like to Skype. My three Toshiba laptops over the last 6 years were still cheaper than any Macbook Pro. You can't go wrong with this one!

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Samsung Series 3 NP355E5C-A02US 15.6-Inch Laptop (Black)

I bought this as a cheap beat up laptop. Turns out it's among the best I've ever owned. A half year into it, after using it 6 10 hours most days, it has yet to give me even a single problem. Not one crash, not one malfunction. The only wear came on the keyboard, where the letter paint has come away a bit. Not bad though.

Some other reviewers have claimed that this computer is slow. I'm not going to doubt them, but that has not been my experience whatsoever. The computer is as fast as any other that I have used and I run multiple programs (like Photoshop, Word and Firefox with plenty of tabs open) all at once. A friend purchased a Sony Vaio at the same time and has had nothing but problems, including with speed.

I recommend this computer.

This item was as described, one of my favorite laptops. Well made, great function, great quality for the price, thanks!

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My son loves this computer. It's sharp, fast, and plays his games perfectly. The only flaw would be that the bottom is light so when it lifts the whole computer when you open it must keep weight on the bottom while lifting screen so can't do it one-handed. My son keeps it in his room, plugged in, at all times, so I can't speak to the battery life. But, overall, it's a great computer at this price and we love it.

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Out of the box it comes with so much "bloat" that it's a challenge to weed through to the worthwhile pieces of software. The product is nice, hardware is more than decent, but for some reason, it hangs up from time to time. I haven't added any additional software yet, and I'm on 100Mbps fiber for Internet. Just sometimes when watching online videos or surfing the net it slows. It's not an extreme problem but it can be frustrating. I won't fault it for the issues I have with Windows 8.

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I ordered this as a Christmas gift for my husband. It is a slow computer! We have tried everything and it just does not have the speed of the other laptops in our family. And Windows 8 yuck! I don't want it on mine!

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Hewlett Packard TC1100 (PX284AA)

Ths tablet-laptop is a little powerhouse (thats what I call it) better than a tablet and better than just a laptop by itself. 60 gig harddrive 2 gigs of ram,

try getting that from a tablet.for around $170.00.

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HP Pavilion dv6-3010us 15.6-Inch Laptop

I bought this unit two weeks ago from the office store named after the stadium where the Lakers play. The tech manager recommended it based on the specs, price and the fact that it had the lightscribe laser that could firmware upgrade to the new color lightscribe and a DVD burner that could easily be replaced by a Blu for about $99 via HP direct, if I wanted. It also can be upgraded to 8GB of RAM, something not all of the newer notebooks can do...many still max at 4GB. They had it on sale for $200 off list, then I had a $50 off any computer coupon, $50 for trading in an 8 yr old desktop, and there is a $50 rebate out there, for those willing to find it. At this price, I figured, "what the heck, I really didn't need that Core i5 that much, did I?"

Wow, now that I've owned it for a while, I am impressed. This unit is light for a 15.6" lappie and runs cool, I get almost 4 hours on the std battery (6+ hrs on a recently purchased 9 cell!) and it is fast and easy to use. It took a while to get used to the keyboard (HP trying to emulate Apple here...island style with no num pad) and the touchpad is challenging, at least to start (again, the Apple emulation thing....): however, I love how easy it is to turn off the touchpad and, with the built-in bluetooth...something you don't find all of the time in these lappies...it is easy to just add a bluetooth mouse, and away you go. Internet connection is great, with the unit smacking my Dell netbook upside down from any spot in our home....

Typically, HP has their bloatware installed, but that can be easily fixed. As others have reported, the USB ports are a little tight; however, I've had no issues with them at all. I love the new 'champagne' color as it shows no fingerprints at all compared to their previous units. I would have preferred the AC connection to be on the back instead of the right side; however, I can work around this. The speakers sound great for a low-end lappie...might've liked a little more volume on the top end but: what the heck....

The screen is bright and resolution/picture quality is excellent for a low-end lappie. Built-in webcam is OK, however, I would have preferred a higher resolution; however, the built-in bluetooth more than makes up for this as I use the bluetooth more. The AMD dual core proc with premium ATI graphics is a workhorse and does it's job well. A high-end gamer machine? Nope...what do you expect for this price?

Not sure about those who rate this poorly. They must've gotten a bad unit 'cause I'm quite pleased, especially for the price.

Recommended, especially if you can get the price down like I did.

Let me start by saying that I have had this computer for about 8 months and that I only paid 450 for it new. That was the reason I bought it, other than I have an old HP laptop that is still kicking (longer than my moms, wifes, and brothers Dell). So I suppose I am partial to HP's. The reason I am writing this review is because in hindsight I wish I would have spent more and got either a better overall computer or at least one without this AMD processor.

The Good:

-Screen is nice bright and crisp

-Lots of ram and features for the money

-Keyboard is pretty good but does feel a little flimsy(has not broke yet so it must be ok)

-Solid hinges: have not loosened over time

-Windows7 Is a huge upgrade from my old HP that still had xp

The bad:

-Battery only lasts about 2 hours unplugged(sometimes less)..on the good side, the charge still holds the same as new

-Cooling fan: Gets ridiculously loud(always has)...it sounds like its going to get up and fly off the desk. I know its to cool the processor but should it really get that hot? ...maybe that is why the battery life is pretty short

-Start up time: I know it is not an Apple but why can you start them in literally 2 seconds and be on the internet and this takes 2 minutes(come on Microsoft).

The Really Bad:

-Touch Pad: Absolute garbage. It does things if you are typing and your fingers are merely close to it...It is so obnoxious when typing because it will all of a sudden move your cursor to some random spot in your paper so now you are typing into the middle of your paper, and have to erase and then go back. IT DOES THIS ALL THE TIME. If I had known about this, I would have not bought this PC.

On a good note, you can disable the touchpad. I bought a wireless mouse to overcome this and it is now fine. (Microsoft 4000:first battery lasted 5 months and I never even turned it off!)

Buy HP Pavilion dv6-3010us 15.6-Inch Laptop Now

So I looked at the negative reviews and I must disagree. I work on several computers every day and you must adjust to each keyboard so to blame the "extra keys on the left" for mistakes are user error. My system has been flawless so far, had it since October 10. I have done 2 bios updates and as long as you don't screw with it when updating they work just fine. Now to the track pad yes it is a little sanative but with use you can master it. I almost always use an usb mouse with this system and that solves it all.

All in all a nice system for a decent price have recommended it to several people who are satisfied with theirs too!

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i have had it for a month with no issues. i it has no problems. who knows what it may devlop in the future, but as far as laptops go it works great and is fast.No hardware issues no software issues. I read some of the bad reviews, if they are true well i thinks theirs a case of bad luck. But my machine works the way it should, fast and has not let me down with any issues

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I have had this computer for a few years now and I am about ready to throw it at a wall!!!!

It has overheating problems like crazy because the "brilliant" engineers at HP put the heatsync for the cpu right in front of the fan so it collects dust there and causes the laptop to get very hot and overheat! By hot I mean singing to the skin! It is so hot that an dual-fan cooling mat won't even keep it from overheating!

The overheating has also greatly affected the battery life limiting it to 5 minutes! It is practically a desktop!

The trackpad is also very annoying and I greatly prefer to use a wireless mouse.

Another downside is that if you do a fresh install of say Windows Ultimate, nothing works! NOTHING! You have to somehow get all of the drivers from HP's website and install them on your laptop!

Then we come to the processor itself! An AMD Turion II processor... I do not have a clue what I was thinking buying this! It can't do half of what I'd like it to! I have now grown to distrust and hate most of all HP products!

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HP 655 - 15.6" - E2-1800 - Windows 7 Professional

Print too pale ----difficult for seniors to read

No instructions included for setup or use; no manual. Didn't like it.

I have this laptop with Windows 8. Every 2 minutes it crashes and restarts. My daughter has a Lenovo with Windows 8 and it never crashes so I have to say the problem is with the laptop instead of the operating system. Just in case I am going to install Windows 7 to see if it gets any better.

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Toshiba Satellite U945-S4130 14-Inch Ultrabook (Ice Blue with Fusion Lattice)

very fast, good looking, and quiet for the price. It is also light, perfect size, and would like to recommend to others.

Overall I'm very satisfied with my purchase. This computer is very thin and light, makes it easy to take anywhere. Performance is very good. It boots and shuts down very quickly. Screen quality is about what you'd expect at this price point. Colors are good. Viewing angles aren't too bad considering. The keyboard definitely takes some getting used to. One thing this model seems to sacrifice in keeping it so thin is key travel. Key travel is very shallow, but over time you'll get used to it. Also important to note that the i3 model does not come with backlit keyboard. One of the main reasons that I purchased this ultrabook was it's ease of access to RAM and hard drives, planning on upgrading both very soon. Seems many ultrabooks make it quite difficult to get to these components. On this machine, it's just one screw and removal of the plastic panel to get full access.

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The product stopped working after the third use. It was found to have a defective hard drive (both by Geek Squad and Toshiba). Although defective, it cannot be returned due to "policy" which states opened laptops from this seller, even when found to be defective, cannot be returned. Therefore, Amazon cannot refund the $500 purchase.

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excellent, very good value vs performance, is very light and the battery lasts five hours, the only thing wrong is that it has illuminated keys.

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I think that is an excellent product, is very light and slim, the price is very good and the applications open very fast

Save 23% Off

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T400S 14.1" SP9400 250GB HDD

I was hesitant to order this laptop from the beginning. I did my research and found a lot of people complaining about issues with them. I thought, well, usually there's a lot more people who've had no issues, so maybe I'll get lucky. I've also had Thinkpads at work and home for the last 6+ years with no issues.

This laptop gets two stars because when it does work it works good and it is a nice light laptop. That's where it ends though...

I ordered this laptop directly from Lenovo. When I received this laptop it was defective from factory, the speakers did not work. I called Lenovo and was told the only thing they could do for me was to send it to be repaired...or charge me a restocking fee.

I argued that there was no way i wanted to turn my laptop into a 'refurbished' laptop a day after getting it and I requested a replacement with no restocking fee. After a lof of hassling and 2 days worth of calls i was eventually granted the RMA.

A second order was placed by them for a replacement laptop (exact same specs as the original). A couple of days after placing this order the price on the laptop went down considerably. I inquired about getting a price match trough the Price Protection Program (since I had not even received my order yet). I went trough at least 4 people in Customer support over the course of 2 days, but bottom line they refused to do this.

Why have a 'price protection plan' if you're not going to honor it????

I have spoken to countless people after this and sent several emails to customer support but they have been ignored

Needless to say I am extremely annoyed at this experience. To be honest I don't even expect the refund anymore, they can keep their 200 bucks, but it really bothers me that they would treat customers this way .

Stay away from these laptops...first off quality has dropped considerably (Don't take my word for it, do a search on Thinkpad forums or Lenovo support forums and you will see issues with speakers going bad and random reboots all over the pace with these models, people going trough 3-4 of these laptops and eventually giving up). Most of all however, their customer service stinks!

After going trough 4 Thinkpads at work and home, this will be my last one! If I could get my money back and return it, I would! Thanks Lenovo!

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