Official Black Friday LAPTOPS Discussion Thread

[Pnambic]

If the laptop is too heavy, maybe a membership to a gym, or fill a water bottle with Helium and stick it in the backpack.    I kid.

 

Need to go back to the requirements.  She has a laptop.  So she has something to write her papers on.  What would she be using the tablet for?  Note taking?  Email and web browsing in those boring periods between classes?  Just to look cool?  Would any of her classes require particular programs?  You'd hate to get her something and then find out it doesn't do everything she needs so she ends up needing her laptop anyway, so then she ends up carrying both the laptop AND the tablet everywhere...

 

Many smart phones are large enough to perform most tablet functions these days (phablets).  The Note is a prime example....explosions aside.  My iPhone 7 Plus is great for note taking and web browsing and Netflix watching and game playing and time wasting.

 

So, we should have her make a list of:

 - things she NEEDS (for school and for general life usage)

 - things she would love to have

 - things she absolutely doesn't want

 

Then we can be more prescriptive in our answer.

[queenkishaa]

Has anyone heard anything about the Samsung chrome and how it compares to the Surface pro's?

 

Sent from my SM-G920T using GottaDeal mobile app

[Pnambic]

Interesting read.

I wonder if this means we might be in for a treat of better than average Mac discounts this year...?

 

http://www.cheatsheet.com/technology/dont-want-buy-new-mac-right-now.html/?ref=YF&yptr=yahoo

[Kanyon71]

Especially if you don't mind the last model. They have an event in 2 days and rumors are it's most likely to announce a bunch of new release for Mac Hardware.

[bribri25]

Has anyone heard anything about the Samsung chrome and how it compares to the Surface pro's?

 

Sent from my SM-G920T using GottaDeal mobile app

 

I assume you mean a Chromebook?  Those are essentially a heavy tablet with an attached keyboard. If you're going for a chromebook, get an Android table with a bluetooth keyboard.  They won't give you what you're used to in a Windows laptop.

[racerfan]

If the laptop is too heavy, maybe a membership to a gym, or fill a water bottle with Helium and stick it in the backpack. I kid.

 

Need to go back to the requirements. She has a laptop. So she has something to write her papers on. What would she be using the tablet for? Note taking? Email and web browsing in those boring periods between classes? Just to look cool? Would any of her classes require particular programs? You'd hate to get her something and then find out it doesn't do everything she needs so she ends up needing her laptop anyway, so then she ends up carrying both the laptop AND the tablet everywhere...

 

Many smart phones are large enough to perform most tablet functions these days (phablets). The Note is a prime example....explosions aside. My iPhone 7 Plus is great for note taking and web browsing and Netflix watching and game playing and time wasting.

 

So, we should have her make a list of:

- things she NEEDS (for school and for general life usage)

- things she would love to have

- things she absolutely doesn't want

 

Then we can be more prescriptive in our answer.

Just want something for when the teachers tell them to bring in a laptop/other device for research. She only has an hour break for lunch, unless a class is cancelled.

 

She has taken her laptop to school but by the time she gets home ber back is killing her. That is why I was wondering if there is an alternative at a doable price. She carrya a backpack throughout school the laptop is in top of her books. She does not do it every day.

 

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[queenkishaa]

Has anyone heard anything about the Samsung chrome and how it compares to the Surface pro's?

 

Sent from my SM-G920T using GottaDeal mobile app

I assume you mean a Chromebook? Those are essentially a heavy tablet with an attached keyboard. If you're going for a chromebook, get an Android table with a bluetooth keyboard. They won't give you what you're used to in a Windows laptop.

 

Sorry I meant the Tab pro 3

 

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[bribri25]

I assume you mean a Chromebook? Those are essentially a heavy tablet with an attached keyboard. If you're going for a chromebook, get an Android table with a bluetooth keyboard. They won't give you what you're used to in a Windows laptop.

 

Sorry I meant the Tab pro 3

 

Sent from my SM-G920T using GottaDeal mobile app

The Tab Pros are pretty good. They are probably a little high priced, but with a good deal....worth it. They have good specs, but remember they are Android; not Windows.

 

Do you have a Samsung phone?

[myboysnme]

I used to be all over Black Friday laptops... every year... but then I realized... buying laptops in this price range.... usually means you'll need to buy a new one every 1-3 years... because they don't last. I finally started buying Macs... and realized you can get 5-8 years out of them easily. They are worth the extra money!

I find this to be true as well.  I bought a Dell doorbuster last BF and now in Oct the hard drive is full.  I had to go and delete a bunch of stuff.  Still with 4 laptop users in my house I know I will try to grab one just in case someone's laptop bites the dust when it's not in the budget.

[queenkishaa]

The Tab Pros are pretty good. They are probably a little high priced, but with a good deal....worth it. They have good specs, but remember they are Android; not Windows.

 

Do you have a Samsung phone?

Yes I do. I have had the galaxy tab smd enjoyed using it until one of the kids dropped it and shattered the screen. I want something that I can sync with my phone and figured this would be nice.

 

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[bribri25]

Yes I do. I have had the galaxy tab smd enjoyed using it until one of the kids dropped it and shattered the screen. I want something that I can sync with my phone and figured this would be nice.

 

Sent from my SM-G920T using GottaDeal mobile app

 

It will feel much like you're using your phone, but with a much larger screen. If that appeals to you, then it's a decent idea. Just be aware for Microsoft Word and other Windows applications that you won't be able to use.

[Kanyon71]

I'm interested to read some reviews about the new HP phone that can be docked to work like a desktop.

[bribri25]

I wonder if it has the computing power to make it worth docking and using like a desktop...

[bluebear]

I'm interested to read some reviews about the new HP phone that can be docked to work like a desktop.

I have a 950 Microsoft phone that also has continuum as a feature. I don't use it very often, but my husband uses it heavily. Like all day every day at work. In the last couple of updates I think they have added some more features that he was really happy with, and they have plans to do more with it. Let me know if you have specific questions. He has a dedicated monitor, but he also has a cool usb switched in case he ever needs an additional monitor for his pc.

The HP Elite I believe is marketed towards business users. In comparing it with the 950 and 950xl, the 950s have a better camera, and that is what held him back from upgrading. There are some leaked images of a new windows phone coming out with t-mobile, named Alcatel Idol 4S, not a lot of info yet. But that may be something you might want to look at too if you have tmobile. And then there are always the rumors of the surface phone!!

Edited October 26, 2016 by bluebear

[Kanyon71]

I have a 950 Microsoft phone that also has continuum as a feature. I don't use it very often, but my husband uses it heavily. Like all day every day at work. In the last couple of updates I think they have added some more features that he was really happy with, and they have plans to do more with it. Let me know if you have specific questions. He has a dedicated monitor, but he also has a cool usb switched in case he ever needs an additional monitor for his pc.

The HP Elite I believe is marketed towards business users. In comparing it with the 950 and 950xl, the 950s have a better camera, and that is what held him back from upgrading. There are some leaked images of a new windows phone coming out with t-mobile, named Alcatel Idol 4S, not a lot of info yet. But that may be something you might want to look at too if you have tmobile. And then there are always the rumors of the surface phone!!

Thank you for the info, when I saw the release info on the HP one is sort of brought some interest to me. I haven't used a Windows phone in a long time, got kind of gun shy on them when my last windows phone was constantly locking up and such. Would hit the button to answer a call and the phone would lock up lol.

[bribri25]

Thank you for the info, when I saw the release info on the HP one is sort of brought some interest to me. I haven't used a Windows phone in a long time, got kind of gun shy on them when my last windows phone was constantly locking up and such. Would hit the button to answer a call and the phone would lock up lol.

 

Oh, you wanted your phone to have calling capabilities??  I guess a phone could be used for that, too...

[Pnambic]

Oh, you wanted your phone to have calling capabilities??  I guess a phone could be used for that, too...

[Kanyon71]

Oh, you wanted your phone to have calling capabilities??  I guess a phone could be used for that, too...

Oh no it had the ability to have incoming and outgoing calls. There was just no guarantee you could actually answer or start the call without having to first pull the battery

 

To be honest I use my phone less and less as a phone all the time and more for surfing and texting. I don't really like talking on the phone if I can avoid it lol

[wildshan24]

My daughter is wanting a laptop for Christmas. She will 10 next month. It will not be used for heavy gaming. She is homeschooled and at least one or tow of her classes will be done completely online and it is possible that at least one class will be on DVD so it will need a CD/DVD drive as well. Other uses will be typing papers and basic online games.

 

I am trying to decide whether to put one on layaway or wait until BF. I can't spend over $300.00 but 250.00 or less would be better.

 

I bought my daughter one last year on blk Friday from dell online . Check there flyer they have special deals at different times on select items . I think I paid $230 for it and it retailed for $550 I believe ! Good luck

[Pnambic]

Interesting read.

I wonder if this means we might be in for a treat of better than average Mac discounts this year...?

 

http://www.cheatsheet.com/technology/dont-want-buy-new-mac-right-now.html/?ref=YF&yptr=yahoo

 

 

Especially if you don't mind the last model. They have an event in 2 days and rumors are it's most likely to announce a bunch of new release for Mac Hardware.

 

Yup, here's the news release from Apple.

http://www.apple.com/newsroom/2016/10/apple-unveils-groundbreaking-new-macbook-pro.html

 

Past due if you ask me, but maybe just in time for some smoking good Black Friday deals on the old models this year for anyone who's looking for one.

[noehlp]

My son wants me to help him find a laptop deal for Black Friday. This shall be fun! I'm excited to help him, I just hope I don't guide him to the wrong thing. I will definitely be asking for help from you all once ads start coming out that have laptop deals.

[Pnambic]

My son wants me to help him find a laptop deal for Black Friday. This shall be fun! I'm excited to help him, I just hope I don't guide him to the wrong thing. I will definitely be asking for help from you all once ads start coming out that have laptop deals.

 

Sounds good.

You need to answer these questions:

 - budget?

 - what are you going to run on it?  Games (which games)?  Video/Graphics rendering (which software)?  Just regular web surfing/email stuff?

 - will it need to run without being plugged in a long time a lot of the time or just occasionally?

 - prefer light and portable (smaller screen & better battery life) or massive awesome screen (heavier & harder on a battery)?

 

I'll come up with some more questions...  

Edited October 31, 2016 by Pnambic

[Peppermint]

My son wants me to help him find a laptop deal for Black Friday. This shall be fun! I'm excited to help him, I just hope I don't guide him to the wrong thing. I will definitely be asking for help from you all once ads start coming out that have laptop deals.

Apple, Apple, Apple if it's in his budget!

[starbeck96]

I bought my daughter one last year on blk Friday from dell online . Check there flyer they have special deals at different times on select items . I think I paid $230 for it and it retailed for $550 I believe ! Good luck

Thank you.  I have looked at the Dell flyer, but I just glanced over it.  I will definitely be taking another look.  I am even considering getting a netbook and then buying an external CD/DVD drive.  It all depends on what will be the cheapest route. 

[noehlp]

Sounds good.

You need to answer these questions:

 - budget?

 - what are you going to run on it?  Games (which games)?  Video/Graphics rendering (which software)?  Just regular web surfing/email stuff?

 - will it need to run without being plugged in a long time a lot of the time or just occasionally?

 - prefer light and portable (smaller screen & better battery life) or massive awesome screen (heavier & harder on a battery)?

 

I'll come up with some more questions...  

 

 

He said $400 to $500 (He's a college kid buying this with his hard earned money, so the lower the better so long as its still a decent laptop)

He needs/wants it to take an online college course to finish up his degree. I think a web browser is all it would need (but I will suggest he double checks). I think having basic office products would be best (MS Word/Excel) but not necessarily required.

It won't get a ton of usage, as he is a very busy young man with going to college and working full-time. I would assume he'd use the web browser the most for the online course, social media, normal web surfing. He may need to type up some documents for some classes (though most are welding/mechanical classes) - but he can also come home and use the desktop if he had to.

I don't see him playing games on the computer at this time.

I would say an average size screen. As for battery I think whether he needs to have it plugged in or not is not too relevant for him, as I am sure he may only use it at his apartment. He *might* occasionally take it to school w/ him, but again he should have access to plug ins.

 

I do think something not flimsy would be good - sorry but he is a male. He is not dainty with things.

 

Please let me know if you have any other questions or there are other things we need to be looking at. Oh, memory. Ideally it'd have enough that he doesn't have to add to it. Most things for school would probably be saved to his flash drive. So idk - 4 GB at least, I am truly at loss here as for size.

[sdn40]

With portable storage becoming dirt cheap, I utilize it to keep my computers clean. It forces you to sort through things, organize them, and delete unwanted items. A more stable format and like I said - keeps your computer as clean as possible

[gina01]

Before you buy MS Office, have your son check with his school. Most colleges offer a discount on it since so many classes require it.

[Pnambic]

Before you buy MS Office, have your son check with his school. Most colleges offer a discount on it since so many classes require it.

 

This!  My school gave Office 360 to me for free.

 

 

He said $400 to $500 (He's a college kid buying this with his hard earned money, so the lower the better so long as its still a decent laptop)

He needs/wants it to take an online college course to finish up his degree. I think a web browser is all it would need (but I will suggest he double checks). I think having basic office products would be best (MS Word/Excel) but not necessarily required.

It won't get a ton of usage, as he is a very busy young man with going to college and working full-time. I would assume he'd use the web browser the most for the online course, social media, normal web surfing. He may need to type up some documents for some classes (though most are welding/mechanical classes) - but he can also come home and use the desktop if he had to.

I don't see him playing games on the computer at this time.

I would say an average size screen. As for battery I think whether he needs to have it plugged in or not is not too relevant for him, as I am sure he may only use it at his apartment. He *might* occasionally take it to school w/ him, but again he should have access to plug ins.

 

I do think something not flimsy would be good - sorry but he is a male. He is not dainty with things.

 

Please let me know if you have any other questions or there are other things we need to be looking at. Oh, memory. Ideally it'd have enough that he doesn't have to add to it. Most things for school would probably be saved to his flash drive. So idk - 4 GB at least, I am truly at loss here as for size.

 

Well, here are my first thoughts:

• "average" size laptops are 15.6"
• speaking of screen size, I wouldn't get anything smaller than 1600 x 900, and I would probably try to hold out for 1920 x 1080.  The biggest gripe I have with my current laptop is that there's just not enough room on the screen for many of the application interfaces I use (Alice, Netbeans, SQL Developer, etc.).
• if you see something like Intel HD Graphics, that indicates the laptop has what's called "integrated" graphics where it shares system resources with the rest of the system.  If you see something like "Radeon" or "NVIDIA", then that means the laptop has what's called "discrete" graphics and that means the graphics card has dedicated resources that it doesn't share and is pretty much always better than integrated.  Discrete costs more, and in my opinion is a must have for anything even pretending to be a gaming machine, but if he's not going to be gaming on it, it might not be necessary.  I would be surprised if a laptop with discrete graphics came in under $500, but this is Black Friday - anything can happen, right?
• Unless he's downloading pirated movies left and right, 500GB of HDD is probably sufficient.  And if he is downloading pirated movies, he should probably keep them on an external hard drive anyway.  If he is interested in dual booting the machine and maybe running Linux on a separate partition, 1TB would be the way to go probably.  Or if he's a gamer.
• wireless 802.11 AC is pretty awesome, but only works if your home router is also wireless AC.  Otherwise, you just go at the N or G speed that your home router is (or whatever router you're connected to).  USB wireless AC network adapters can be bought separately down the line if you don't have the infrastructure to take advantage of it now.
• 8GB seems to be a sweet spot for Windows 10.
• personally, I'd go with an Intel i3, i5 or i7 processor.  AMD's not terrible, Intel just has the better rep right now.
• Do you think having a DVD drive is important to him?

 

Given your requirements, I'd probably aim for a 15" laptop with 8GB or RAM, Windows 10, 1920 x 1080 screen and an Intel i5 processor.

[bribri25]

This!  My school gave Office 360 to me for free.

 

 

 

Well, here are my first thoughts:

• "average" size laptops are 15.6"
• speaking of screen size, I wouldn't get anything smaller than 1600 x 900, and I would probably try to hold out for 1920 x 1080.  The biggest gripe I have with my current laptop is that there's just not enough room on the screen for many of the application interfaces I use (Alice, Netbeans, SQL Developer, etc.).
• if you see something like Intel HD Graphics, that indicates the laptop has what's called "integrated" graphics where it shares system resources with the rest of the system.  If you see something like "Radeon" or "NVIDIA", then that means the laptop has what's called "discrete" graphics and that means the graphics card has dedicated resources that it doesn't share and is pretty much always better than integrated.  Discrete costs more, and in my opinion is a must have for anything even pretending to be a gaming machine, but if he's not going to be gaming on it, it might not be necessary.  I would be surprised if a laptop with discrete graphics came in under $500, but this is Black Friday - anything can happen, right?
• Unless he's downloading pirated movies left and right, 500GB of HDD is probably sufficient.  And if he is downloading pirated movies, he should probably keep them on an external hard drive anyway.  If he is interested in dual booting the machine and maybe running Linux on a separate partition, 1TB would be the way to go probably.  Or if he's a gamer.
• wireless 802.11 AC is pretty awesome, but only works if your home router is also wireless AC.  Otherwise, you just go at the N or G speed that your home router is (or whatever router you're connected to).  USB wireless AC network adapters can be bought separately down the line if you don't have the infrastructure to take advantage of it now.
• 8GB seems to be a sweet spot for Windows 10.
• personally, I'd go with an Intel i3, i5 or i7 processor.  AMD's not terrible, Intel just has the better rep right now.
• Do you think having a DVD drive is important to him?

 

Given your requirements, I'd probably aim for a 15" laptop with 8GB or RAM, Windows 10, 1920 x 1080 screen and an Intel i5 processor.

 

I agree and think that's an accurate assesment & perfect starting spot for a recommendation; again with the 500GB vs. 1TB HardDrive option, with an additional external drive, if necessary (got 1TB drives last year for < $40).

[racerfan]

What do you all think of this one.  Its for my Daughter.  She has a regular laptop, but we are looking for something small to take to school. For notes, surfing for research  if needed in class.  At home possibly use for Netflix, but then she has her regular laptop.

 

Price is good. Its just to to take to school.  Her goes is heavy along with her books.  She has 6 classes and goes 3 days a week.

 

Thanks