Which laptop?

[Jobos]

I'm trying to source 30 good laptops. They want to be 15" screen, i3 cpu with a minimum of 4GB of memory and have SSD's. I've never done this but I've read that I can set the bios to wake up the laptop to install any updates. Not sure if this is really needed when using SSD's as the laptop will be quick anyway but it seems a good idea.

 

I know the HP desktops we have here can do this but I don't know if it can be done with laptops they won't have access to WOL. Any ideas which models can be woken up like is?

 

I've looked at the online stores and can't see any which have an SSD so that looks like a job for me before imaging them.

[sted]

some bios's do have a timed turn on yes not sure you could "force" updates but you can make them turn on at say 6am sunday morning schedule a task at sat 6:15 wuauclt /detectnow (assuming that works in win7) then a scheduled task to turn off at sat 8am. I suspect as to which models its going to be put luck i really doubt it will be on the spec sheet

[sonofsanta]

I would say - how desperate are you for these new laptops? Intel's new processor family - Haswell - is out early next month, which means either a) better laptops for you (including much better battery life) or b) cheaper prices on existing stock.

[MYK-IT]

The HP 650 Range (i3, 4Gb RAM, 320Gb HDD) still currently have (up to) £100 cashback promotions on, making them around £250 (inc. VAT) after Cashback.

You could then use the cashback money towards purchasing SSD's??

 

As far as suitability for your needs is another matter (keyboard type etc).

And HP extended warranty is peanuts for education too.

[Michael]

I used some Toshiba L850's yesterday. They came pre-loaded with Win 8, but will work with Win 7. They're extremely quick, even without an SSD!

[glennda]

Lenovo's - cannot fault them!

[VeryPC_Tom_M]

PM Sent

[LoundsZ]

Bought HP650 they're good. Only problem is with our imaging software it captures the image but when you go to write the image to another laptop it doesn't except it, I dunno if these Win8 laptops have weird bios that don't except Win7 images. I have manually install Win7 by disk :-/ other than that brilliant kit for money.

[RTFM]

HP or Toshiba is all we buy at the moment

[robjduk]

We have around 400 Toshiba laptops but are moving away from them. Last year they have become shoddy and their warranty department is next to useless with 3 week waits with no information and trouble getting them to honour extended warranty's a real pain.

[witch]

Dont like the HPs - somehow the keyboard layout isnt good. Take a look at the Fujitsus - very impressed with the build quality and some have 6GB RAM

[3s-gtech]

We've bought 57 or so Lenovo B580 and B590s recently. As far as budget laptops go I've been mega impressed, little flexy in the cases but nice overall build, great spec (Sandy/IvyBridge i3, 4GB RAM, 500GB HDD). We swapped out the discs for SSDs on all of them, and rolled them back to Windows 7. They're seriously fast at booting, and great in use.

[sted]

Dont like the HPs - somehow the keyboard layout isnt good. Take a look at the Fujitsus - very impressed with the build quality and some have 6GB RAM

 

the 620 keyboard is annoying an extra row on the left that means you constantly hot caps lock rather than a and so on

 

last fujitsus i used were cheap and nasty but its been a while. lenovo and samsung seem to be the least worst ive seen recently. keep meaning to give acers another go they felt poor but ones bought before hps are still going long after the hps that replaced them died

[witch]

the 620 keyboard is annoying an extra row on the left that means you constantly hot caps lock rather than a and so on

 

last fujitsus i used were cheap and nasty but its been a while. lenovo and samsung seem to be the least worst ive seen recently. keep meaning to give acers another go they felt poor but ones bought before hps are still going long after the hps that replaced them died

It is since Fujitsu lost Siemens that they have gone back to being nice quality. Huge difference in the way they used to be. I have a lot of Toshibas but was disappointed in the build quality of the latest lot

[sted]

It is since Fujitsu lost Siemens that they have gone back to being nice quality. Huge difference in the way they used to be. I have a lot of Toshibas but was disappointed in the build quality of the latest lot

 

ditto had some c660's last year and about half of them wouldnt turn on with the battery till you removed replugged and generally fiddled with the battery