theguruguys wrote:Has SquareTrade changed that much for the better? About 4 years I used them for three items, one being a cell phone I bought on eBay which went bad after a month. I never got anything out of SquareTrade, they fought me all the way and claimed it was 'normal wear and tear' the the keypad stopped responding. I went online and read TONS of people with similar stories to mine.

I would love to hear testimonials that they are much easier to work with now and have changed?

Well first my mobo and HDD went out in my Sony desktop about 3 years ago. They replaced it on my table in my home. Then the screen died on my 42" Toshiba. They didn't argue, they paid me 999.99 to my paypal. My refurbished desktop had a bad mobo. They figured it was cheaper to pay it off than fix it. $799. My refrigerator needed repairs $250 bill, a 24" monitor $220, ice maker $90... With all this cheap stuff from China, I've saved thousands on Squartrade. All my electronics and appliances have their warranty.

Who honestly uses a 17 inch screen? Helloooo external. May as well buy a desktop, these things hardly qualify as portable.

bmw66x wrote:Dual core? Quad core or no core, I say.

I want multi-cores so bad. Imma build my own!

where do you get a case for building your own laptop?

tsfisch wrote:Would this be tolerable for editing HD video with Sony Vegas 9? My current PC just laughs at me (works ok with standard def)

This one may not belly laugh, but expect plenty of giggles. My guess is you'll be able to open and edit your HD vids in Vegas, but you can get expect *at least* a bit of lag.

Let me put this woot in a nutschell:

This is plenty of computer and a great price for 95% of the population that uses computers.
Problem is the 5% that it is not enough computer for are very vocal in telling you its not.

WARNING:
the track pad on this laptop is very irritating.
it's flush with the rest of the palm rest, and it's the same texture too.
i kept losing track of where the track pad ended and where the palm rest began

Unique616 wrote:How does this computer compare to today's Woot?

If you check the specifications, the Gateway has several advantages (IMHO)...

1) NEW = full 1 year warranty, not 90 days.
2) You can probably buy locally, so local drop off if you have a problem.
3) CPU has a slightly (16%) faster passmark rating: Gateway's N660 scores 1803, the T4500 for the HP scores 1551.
4) Better video (gaming) performance.

But you're giving up the following:
1) Lower screen resolution: 1366x768 vs. 1600x900.
2) Smaller screen size: 15.6" vs. 17.3" -- Not an insignificant difference.

marn161 wrote:So yeah... I'm pretty much computer Lamuellan. Need some advice. (Yes, I realize "Lamuellan" isn't PC).

I home-school my 7 yr old twins and just need a machine that will work well for their online classes. We dont game or need anything fancy. Good deal? Or should I keep looking?




... Yes, pun intended.

This should have no problem at all handling any online curriculum sites, or educational software. I have an HP similar in stats to this one that I use for home-school curriculum for my 10, 11, and 14 year-old children. it is more than adequate for your needs.

Unique616 wrote:How does this computer compare to today's Woot?

The laptop you linked blows the pants off this one in every regard but screen size.

The CPU is faster than woot's dual-core pentium from any angle.

The GPU is dedicated, meaning an actual card that can play some games.

It has gigabit (1000mbit/sec) ethernet as opposed to the 100m/s here.

The rest of the specs are quite the same. The only thing this woot has going for it is the screen size and resolution (1600x900 vs your linked laptop's 1366x768), but I speak from experience when I say a 17" laptop is a PAIN to handle. Especially when the extra size could potentially have so much more power...

17 is a good size for portable media that you indend to share - videos and internets...since it won't do current games (older ones just fine), guess you kids won't be happy till Steve Jobs releases the Human CentiPad 2.0

I don't know why people complain that 17" is too big for a laptop they really don't weight a tremendous amount more then their 15" counterparts. That being said these larger laptops are generally designed to serve as desktop replacements so instead of having a unmovable machine and a more portable one which is a pain to do work on you can simply use this.

I also personally own a 17" laptop which I carry to my college classes EVERY DAY and when its inside my backpack or carrying case I could care less about its size. And since I spend a lot of time on it programming for my classes the screen real estate and lack of eye strain is well worth any other trade offs.

So my advice would be if you plan to use this as your primary and probably only machine, the screen size is great and you wont mind it being a little more bulky. And if you have another primary machine already then go with something smaller because extended periods of usability isn't much of an issue.

Also people keep asking about using machines for everyday stuff.. If your buying a laptop nowadays pretty much ANY machine thats on the market (which isn't a netbook or tablet) will do anything you need to do as long as your not a hacker, programmer, gamer, or graphics designer. I.E. if your just gonna use it for personal things you needn't worry about specs other than is it comfortable to use and nice to view.

I bought this one last time around and it's been fine for an internet cruiser. I'm typing on it right now.

The screen is the best part, just gorgeous. The worst part is there is no edge to the track pad. That's right, your finger is just out there wandering around looking for the scroll bar.

I've been meaning to glue something on the edge but haven't gotten around to it.

oh my god, my 2 year old NETBOOK has this same GMA 4500 graphics card.

want do not...

Lightscribe y or n ? Humm

I have one, and it works great for general-purpose stuff. The Pentium Dual-Core in this is better than the Celeron that's in the 15.6" that WM had at the same time for $100 less (this was $399; that was $299 on Black Friday).

Yes, the NIC is 100Mb, but that's all most routers have anyway. The wifi is BGN.

How often to people really use LightScribe anyway? Pay 5x for the disks just so they can print in monochrome on them?

The touchpad is the same texture as the rest of the surface, but I like that. There is an arch over the top so you can tell exactly where it is.

And the large screen is great for when I make service calls and need to look stuff up in a PDF service manual.

Product Web Site

phacopida wrote:Does this have enough get-up-and-go for editing with Photoshop Elements?

I don't know. But I hope so..

meh3884 wrote:Who honestly uses a 17 inch screen? Helloooo external. May as well buy a desktop, these things hardly qualify as portable.

I own this and no it is not very portable. Not only the size but the weight makes it very difficult to lug around.

Forgot to add...I purchased an HP from Office Depot about three weeks ago. I just happened upon a good deal. It was 399 here are the specs.
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
Processor Intel Core i3-380M Processor
Processor speed 2.53GHz
Memory 4GB DDR3 System Memory (2 DIMM) ; Max supported = 8GB
Accessible memory slots 2
Display 17.3" diagonal High-Definition HP BrightView LED Display (1600 x 900)
Video graphics Intel HD Graphics with up to 1696MB total graphics memory
Audio SRS Premium Sound with Altec Lansing speakers
Primary CD/DVD drive LightScribe SuperMulti DVD Burner
Hard drive 500GB (5400RPM) Hard Drive (SATA)
Networking Integrated 10/100BASE-T Ethernet LAN (RJ-45 connector)
Wireless options Wireless LAN 802.11b/g/n WLAN
PC card slot N/A
I/O ports 3 Universal Serial Bus (USB) 2.0; 1 HDMI; 1 VGA (15-pin); 1 RJ -45 (LAN); 1 Headphone-out; 1 Microphone-in
Finish HP Imprint finish in charcoal grey



Warranty and support 1-Year Limited Hardware Warranty with Toll Free Support (NA) ;1-Year Free Hardware Technical Support ; 30-Days Free Limited Software Support with 1-Year (from date of purchase) ; Free Limited Software Support with Product Registration.

Despite it's mediocre specs, the HDMI port has potential. This would be an easy way to watch internet media on a home theater without a substantial investment. All you need is one of those wireless keyboard/trackpad gadgets and you are good to go.

Might want to check transfer speeds of the wireless. I believe it ends up connecting at no more than 72mbps unless you use an external adapter.

I hesitate to buy a refurbished laptop, as you can wind up with one having an old battery that barely holds a charge. What assurance does woot give that this won't happen here or with other laptops???

If the epoxy doesn't hold on my existing laptop I might have to get one...

In for one. I have to console myself. I was in the crapper when they said the vows.

While I can't speak to its speed or long term durability (is there such a thing for HP?), I was just recently fixing one of these for a friend who mucked it up good with malware. I must say I was /not/ impressed with how it felt.

The texture on the case was...weird. The plastic felt cheap and thin. How you can make plastic feel even cheaper, I don't know. The entire unit is very light, which is nice in one respect, but combined with the dubious external quality, it really made this feel more like a kid's toy.

For photo/video editing, my advice is:

If you're going with a laptop, the 3GB memory won't be enough for PS Elements to work too well. It will work, but it will take much longer to process the files. I'd suggest at least 6GB, or more if you can afford it.

If you have $400 but have a choice between a laptop or a desktop, get the desktop. Desktops usually have more bang for the buck and are much easier to find parts to upgrade and are cheaper too.

The convience of having a laptop is balanced by the higher cost of the parts.

jgreen0101 wrote:17 is a good size for portable media that you indend to share - videos and internets...since it won't do current games (older ones just fine), guess you kids won't be happy till Steve Jobs releases the Human CentiPad 2.0

Cuttlefish and asparagus or vanilla paste??

agarwaen117 wrote:Refurbed walmart model....

As the doctor says. Basically, run...

Good catch. That's all I needed to know. Built cheaper to be sold cheaper, and built to not last as long, so they can sell more cheaper later.

I bought one of these last time .. I think its a great laptop for the price !! If you needed something a little more powerful it will cost around $100.00 to max the ram out at 8 GB. I highly doubt anyone could find a laptop with a x64 bit OS / 8gb ram / Dual layer dvdrw for under $500. The only thing i dont care for is the onboard mouse. Its terrible. had to get a wireless mouse

bmw66x wrote:Dual core? Quad core or no core, I say.

I want multi-cores so bad. Imma build my own!

You build your own laptops?

I bought this same computer for my wife last year and so far we have had no problems with it at all. The track pad is a little weird and it's definately not the fastest thing out there but it works perfectly for my wife's needs... Which basically means it will hold a ton of pictures and can get on facebook.

But no seriously we paid like $200 more than this for it and I have absolutely no regrets... except maybe that I don't have the money laying around to pick up another one. It's a great machine for the other 90% who don't need to play bleeding edge computer games, do any serious photo or video editing, or anything like that.

Oh and FWIW it works great for watching Netflix and such on the TV in our bedroom using the HDMI port.

It's a shame that it doesn't have gigabit ethernet...that's actually standard with the chipset, so they've gone out of their way to disable it to "add value" by lowering the price.

I have the CQ-70 which is almost identical in specs, but with AMD processor of the same performance and Vista, bought 2+ years ago for about $550. It's not a bad machine, and nice and bright with HDMI too, and hasn't failed, which is surprising for HP! Happy so far...

Picked this one up last time Woot had it. Keyboard had problems right out of the box, but HP fixed it and shipped it back within 2 weeks. Great computer for all my needs at a price that's almost free. You MUST get a wireless mouse! The touch pad is useless. Still happy with it.

Would this be a good candidate for a pc to hook up to the tv and keep a low profile, or do you guys feel there are better options at better prices for that? Considering I'd rarely use the screen, and no I don't need the media center software. Just want something that I can hide in the entertainment center and stream hulu,Netflix, etc. In looking at form factors, I've found that by the time I added hdmi and wireless I'm well above the cost of this laptop. Any thoughts?

theguruguys wrote:Has SquareTrade changed that much for the better? About 4 years I used them for three items, one being a cell phone I bought on eBay which went bad after a month. I never got anything out of SquareTrade, they fought me all the way and claimed it was 'normal wear and tear' the the keypad stopped responding. I went online and read TONS of people with similar stories to mine.

I would love to hear testimonials that they are much easier to work with now and have changed?

Speaking strictly from MY personal experience - I have 8 items that i bought SquareTrade warranties on - and attempted to make claims on 2 of them and been given BS responses on both of them. If any of the other items crap out - I won't even try, which I am pretty sure is part of their business model...

fourstringriot wrote:Would this be a good candidate for a pc to hook up to the tv and keep a low profile, or do you guys feel there are better options at better prices for that? Considering I'd rarely use the screen, and no I don't need the media center software. Just want something that I can hide in the entertainment center and stream hulu,Netflix, etc. In looking at form factors, I've found that by the time I added hdmi and wireless I'm well above the cost of this laptop. Any thoughts?

Honestly if you are going to leave it connected to a tv, you might as well just get a desktop, alot more bang for your buck

So if I were to purchase this, would the steering wheel on my car switch to the other side?

Does anyone know where to find a list of the bloatware on these that isn't necessary to run the machine properly? I'd like to clean it up without functional problems.

I own this brick. I'll give you $370 to destroy it for me. It performs like a stillborn kitten.

Don't buy. Trust me.