Anyone know anything about the £199 Laptop at PC World

[gamingking]

Hi doesnt anyone know much about these £199 laptops at PC World?

Spec? Harddrive? Ram? etc

David

[Greg]

Originally Posted by gamingking

Harddrive? Ram?

Naa, for £199 I don't think it will have any of those.

Had a look on the PC World website and can't see anything about it. I would guess that it will be one of those 1 per store offers, that are gone within the first couple of minutes of the store opening.

[gamingking]

I know PC World in Newcastle, Kingston Park are getting 20, 10 for Boxing Day and 10 for the 27th, I was just wondering if it would be worth getting. Just I daftly forgot to ask the spec when I was in on Christmas Eve.

Cheers though, Im going to head down for opening time see if its worth the £199, if not buy it and maybe sell it on for a few quid more.

Merry Christmas.

David

[shay0]

I read the specs on another forum and the basics are 1.5GHz CPU, 256MB RAM, 64MB onboard graphics and XP Home pre installed.

Can't remember owt else, sorry. But for under £200, it'll do for surfing the net.

[gamingking]

Cheers mate, more than a knew before hand.

David

[unique]

as much as i've tried, i couldn't find anything on the pc myself, it's not on the pcworld, dixons or currys website, in fact in the laptop sections the cheapest were about £400

expecting the offer to be instore only and limited to about 5 per store, snapped up by folks queing from daft times in the morning, i went for a refurb packard bell sempron 3100+ with 512mb ram, 50gig HD, wifi and dvd writer, 15.1" widescreen, which was £299.99 reduced from £350, and a £20 off £200 voucher, making it £280 with free delivery, which i thought was a pretty good price

i had a good search on past laptop deals on hotukdeals site, and found that dell did have a few laptops for £300 all inc before, but mostly with 14.1" monitor, celly 1.3, 256mb ram, fairly low spec. the "better bargains" seemed to be for higher spec laptops around £400-£500

there was also mention of medion laptops at £200, but again the specs weren't great, and i saw a pic of one which came with an external optical drive!

so if you don't get the £199 laptop, until dell come out with more deals (and i ordered one on NY even 2 years ago, so the sale must have started then) then the packard bell seems to be the best cheap offer around at the moment at £300. the £20 off voucher expired yesterday, which is why i ordered then, but i would expect another new one to appear as they continously expire and get reissued. i read about someone getting a packard bell (made by NEC) refurb and they said you couldn't tell it was a refurb as everything seemed new and packed as new, it just had a stick on the box to warn it was a refurb. comes with 12 month warranty, so i'm sure if there is a problem it'll arise within the first few months

[gamingking]

Just got back, people are stupid they where all lined up out side since 7am, but what they didnt know is that someone has super glued the locks on the PC World doors so even that staff can't get in. This is the Newcastle, Kingston Park PC World, Ive been told noone is getting in till at least 11am, as their waiting for a locksmith.

The guy said it's rather crap so for £199 its just about good enough for surfing the net....just.

David

[unique]

theres more info on the MSE site, it seems 10 per store and the following specs

cdrom
14"
256mb
1.3 cpu
20gig hd
xp home

so it's a fairly basic machine, fine for internet and typing but not going to be great at too much else. if you can spend a few quid and upgrad the RAM it won't be so bad (cost about £40 if you can install yourself) as long as you don't need a lot of HD space. if you have an external HD and/or dvd writer it's not so bad, but factoring in costs of those you may as well get a beter more expensive machine. if you can drag and drop files over your network you can store and save that way

i think for the extra £80, the double ram, bigger widescreen, dvd writer and faster/decent speed CPU on the packard bell is certainly worth it. the wireless etc is an added bonus (it's not a mobile CPU but the laptop is to be used in a flat with limited space, so it's a desktop replacement rather than mobile pc). i don't think the £199 machine has a pcmci slot either

strangely there is a lack of decent laptop bargains around at the moment.

oh, btw, there are a couple of refurb desktops (no monitor) for £150 ish at pc world, the £155 model includes a dvd writer, only 40gig/2456mb but not bad for a basic home machine if you have a monitor. i'd still spend another £40 on more RAM tho as you really need 512mb+ for smooth XP operation, 256mb is a little bit small

[gamingking]

I can normally get stuff from Dell at really cheap prices, as I have a business account with them for my internet business, I think anything like a laptop I'll see what deal they can put together or just ask my mate as PC World what he thinks is best, and then get discount in their business section.

After telling me that, the machine seems crap, 20gb harddrive, I have 330gb in my desktop at the moment.

David