I have a high dollar Toshiba. I had it for several years and it's never been a problem. I ordered the reformatting CDs so I could reformat it if necessary and haven't even used those.

I'm a Toshiba lover, but when the last one went all lights out... the Lenovo's were on sale sooo cheap & I didn't have time to shop around. Pretty good computers.

I like the i5 processor & 8gb ram is good .. nothing wrong with win8. Its just win7 slightly changed and some nice new features. One click to get past the win8 tiles - one desktop folder to drag your installed programs desktop icons into, because there is no real Start/Programs.

Under the hood, you'll find most are more similar than different. Different brands all source the inputs from the same or similar suppliers of parts and sub-assemblies, third party contract manufacturing, and most have similar optional features. What can differ (and make a difference) is quality control practices, customer service policies, battery size (life) and so on.

What do you usually use your laptop for?

Got 2 toshiba's 2yrs ago on sale for $400 and son and I have not had one bit of trouble with them. Much better then the very expensive HP we bought him that died after 1 1/2yrs. Mary

I agree Snidely, When I bought my first one the sales person told me the same thing. He compared it to buying a car. My first was a Compaq before HP bought it, then Sony, finally HP which I have used since then. The Toshiba was a laptop I bought for travel.

I have always had laptops since forever..never had a desktop..you might also want to consider Acer and Asus machines..they are both as good as Toshibas (I have a few of them too)As someone mentioned, price will depend on what you need it for..More demand means better components means higher price

Just an add on..whichever brand/model you choose, make sure you make the "Recovery discs" as soon as you get it..Check your manual for the proceedure..dont put it off or you could be one of those that comes on here and says your hard drive died and you dont know what to do because you didnt make them

Just an add on..whichever brand/model you choose, make sure you make the "Recovery discs" as soon as you get it..Check your manual for the proceedure..dont put it off or you could be one of those that comes on here and says your hard drive died and you dont know what to do because you didnt make them

stuttering or shivering ?

Thanks for the feedback. I plan to use this one being considered as a desktop replacement. As far as computing activity is some Internet marketing, genealogy, e-mail and for word processing and spread sheet purposes. I've used Open Office for several years.

Mikie, I must confess, your comment failed to compute in my cluttered brain. Maybe I'm in the wrong part of the world to understand. Here in sunny Florida, I don't know why anyone would be shivering. Stuttering sounds like something else. ;-)

Thanks to all for your comments.

Tom

Not speaking for Mikie, but I believe he was referring to the Gene's double post a minute apart.

It was 5 degrees here this morning. Fortunately it doesn't bother me, but I bet there were a lot of people shivering, stuttering and cussing this morning. It's a heatwave now at 22 degrees.

I have been looking at lower end to middle valued Toshibas as a toy just for tinkering with W8. haven't made up my mind yet.

DA

samtom-
Do you have access to a Costco store? On electronics they have a 90 day return policy and extend the warranty to 2 years for free. Something you might want to consider as it would give you plenty of time to be sure you were happy with your choice of laptop.

First post looked like it didnt go thru..was hanging for whatever reason, so I clicked on it again and voila

Some credit cards like Visa also give you an extra year warranty..something to check into

Costco's return policy can't be beat, several months and no restocking fee. The problem is, what OP is asking about really isn't their sweet spot.

They're great for $1400 machines for $1150, or $1100 ones for $875. If that's what you're looking for. Something less expensive, not such a great place, and the selection at Costco is very limited. I think that's intentional, knowing they'll be successful in getting people to spend a bit more than planned.

The extended warranty is no freebie, you can be sure it's built into the price. But it's perhaps unnecessary. Failure probability for a PC and its components is a U shaped curve, a U with a flat horizontal piece. It's most likely when new then very unlikely, then likely again some years down the road. To have a problem during year 2 is not very likely.

snidely-
You can get a more expensive laptop at Costco, I agree. But I just checked their web site and they had a dozen laptops for sale in the $400-600 range. I agree that the extra warranty is probably factored in, but the prices are so good, I don't care. I also agree that most computers will fail soon or not for a while. My experience with owning probably 10-12 computers in the last 20 years is that they were all pretty good...except for the two that died at 15 and 18 months, respectively. I also found Costco's warranty to be a lifesaver when my highly rated $1600 Panasonic flat screen tv crapped out in month 13: Costco sent a tech out to the house twice and spent over $1000 on parts...including replacing the screen. Since the the OP seems concerned about reliability on a not-too-expensive laptop, I thought it was an option to consider.

I heard a story about one laptop Costco sold. They must have planned a special sale item.. probably got pricing by some number of containers full. Of course that one model ... with so many of the same thing all at once, is super efficient to make. Makes a simple fast project for purchasing and inventory control , production/assembly for everything.. for marketing.. everybody -- its so easy.

Well... somebody didn't think quite right when getting everything planned until it was too late. Each of those laptops got shipped with only one speaker. Somebody putting together the parts order.. one laptop, one switch, one speaker.. I imagine how it happened.... And somebody certainly kept their mouth shut or made that decision... get them packaged and into the containers and onto that boat. An important, well planned and scheduled special project wasn't going to become a dead order or delayed.

Costco had them as a special sale item,, they sold lots... all with just one speaker. Lots of angry people when they discovered.. its missing a speaker.

mikie-
Interesting...I'd like to read more about it. Do you have a link to that story? I guess the bright side would be that, if a customer figured that out within two years, there'd be no problem getting a refund...and if he hadn't figured it out by then, it might not matter!

Unfortunately, there are no Costco close by. Inventory is limited in this area. Most likely we'll need to order via mail order to get what we want. Thanks for the input.

I was in Walmart yesterday and they had a bunch of laptops which I thought was cheap.

15.6 HP with Windows 8 - Intel Pentium B(^) Processor, 4GB Memory, 500 GB Hard Drive, Webcam DVD drive, HDMI
$378.00

15.6" Windows 8 Dell. Intel 13 Processor, 4GB Memory, 500 GB Hard Drive, webcam.
$398.00

15.6 Intel Processor Gateway. 4GB Memory, 320 Hard Drive, webcam
$328.00

15.6" Windows 8 Toshiba
AMD E2 Accelerated Processor. 4GB Memory, 500 GB Hard Drive, webcam, HDMI
$348.00

All say additional 2yr warranty for $79.00

Jane

Don't know if you are still looking but starting Sunday Staples will have this laptop on sale for $499.99.

Lenovo laptop with Intel Core i5-3210M Processor with TurboBoost 2.0

best buy has a 30 day return, and when i found out they had sold me a 2005 model instead of 2012, i took it back..
of course, i waited the whole 30 days before i returned it...
it was a lenova and i did like it - yet i didn't want an old refurbished computer - unless that's what i knew i was getting..no prob. at all getting every cent back !!

Wow what operating system did it come with? I have never had trouble with best buy selling me refurbuished for new. I would think that needs to be reported some where if they are doing that. Mary

Personally, I avoid Best Buy. Their business is slipping and they're struggling to figure out what to do about it, It's a good place to stay away from until all the commotion settles down, if it ever does.

My guess is that they're destined to join Circuit City in the graveyard of failed retail businesses. Their business model doesn't work.

At one sale a day in the flash sale dept. they have a varied selection of laptops and tablets, some refurbed of course. And these don't last long on these sales.
Just offering yet another option.

Computers & Tablets

Besides the 2 big box stores here all we have for that type of stuff is best buy. I can drive 1 1/2hrs away to hhgregg. Stopped in there once when I was passing by as I needed some CD's and it seemed nice and friendly in there. Mary

Any Walmarts nearby? They have a great service where something bought off their website gets shipped for free to the store of your choice, where you can then pick it up.

I'd double check their return policy, but I think it is pretty liberal. Most sellers I know (except Costco) don't allow a no-questions-asked return of electronics stuff.

I did that with the new desktop I bought hubby last spring. I have ordered a bunch of stuff that way through walmart and it works well. I wouldn't hesitate to order through amazon either. We used to have a comp USA here untl they went under and I loved that store. Mary

I was in this thread looking for something on HP, didn't find it here or in a search.

For those in the know on HP an easy one. Is the Pavillion model consistent in the general quality of the case and keyboard - a shared quality? I ask because I like the one below but can't find it locally... I can find Pavillion at my Discount Store (BJs - where my last 3 laptops were purchased) and so I can to a "look-see" at other versions of the Pavillion.

Something else that bothers me is the physical size (it is a 17.3" and will be used to move from room-to-room, not for travel)

Item Dimensions L x W x H
3.10 x 22 x 13.60 inches

Forget the confusion of the listed LWH... the 3.1 must be how thick it is, can it be that thick? A compact desk top computer box may be no more than 5" thick. My current Toshiba and most others I see in the store are just over 1" thick, maybe 1.5" but nothing near 3".

The specific machine I'm targeting is:
HP Pavilion G7-2220us 17.3-Inch Laptop

Sorry for any typos, basically is the Pavilion an HP line with similar physical look/touch? And what about the thickness?

Jerry- the dimensions you listed are for the box it comes in. The actual thickness is about 1.5".

Here is a link that might be useful: Specs

To up-date you all on what I decided on, I initially bought an Asus
with I 3 processor. I thought I was getting 4GB of RAM with a 500 GB hard-drive. What I received was one with 2 GB of RAM and a 320 GB HD. That was a Windows 7 machine.

After much searching and rereading comments here on the Forum about Windows 8 decided to take the plunge.

I ended up with a Toshiba with an A6 processor, 640 GB HD and 6 GB of RAM. Office Depot was having a special and got it for $549 plus a $50 mail in rebate coupon.

I chose this as my wife has the same machine except she was Windows 7. She bought it last fall.

However, I'm having a lot of difficulty attempting to navigate this desktop.

Sooner or later, I'll get the hang of it. I haven't transferred things from the old desktop yet as I want to get more familiar with it first.

I appreciate all the comments. I've been a Gardenweb member and fan for several years but don't come here unless I'm in search of certain information.

Many thanks to all for your input.

Best wishes,

Tom