Advice on which laptop

Well as the title says, I want to buy a laptop but I am not sure which laptop to choose. I am looking for a budget laptop that can still handle modern games such as Counter Strike and Counter Strike Source. I went to circuit city today and looked around and found these laptops:

Compaq Presario F572US 15.4" Widescreen Notebook PC for $449.99

http://www.circuitcity.com/ccd/produ...20Products-_-4

Acer Aspire 5100-5674 15.4" Widescreen Notebook PC for $549.99


http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Acer-...oductDetail.do

Gateway MT3423 14.1" Widescreen Notebook PC for $649.99

http://www.circuitcity.com/ccd/produ...20Products-_-3

Also I liked this laptops from bestbuy:


Acer Aspire AS5570-2067 Notebook with Wireless Mouse & Laptop Case for $590.97 without case and wireless mouse its $499

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....prd75800050015


I know most everyone will proubly say that the one from bestbuy is the best deal because of the Intel Pentium Dual Core over AMD but will the graphics card in that laptop be able to handle CSS?. I really like both of the Acers, I have heard mixed reviews on Gateway. One reason I like the Acer from circuit city is I will get a free all in one printer, wireless-g router and internet security software with the purchase of a notebook.

I thought there was a catch so I read the fine points of it and you pay like 200 bucks for all of that but then you do mail in rebates and its all free. I was planning on buying a new wireless router so I am fond to that.

So please let me know what everyone thinks. If I can I would really like to get Acer laptop from bestbuy and then just pay the 50 bucks for a wireless G router. I don't really need a printer or that internet security junk. So just let me know what you think thanks.

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Noob

My

The compaq definitely has the best price if money is an issue, but remember that you get what you pay for.

***Subtle message that is not really here***
Compaqs are crap and I would never own one, EVER. If Compaq was the last surviving company of a nuclear war, I would give up computers and learn how to fix cars, unless of course Compaq started building cars in which case I would probably just shoot myself because I would already be in in the 7th layer of...Sorry, I got side tracked. I hate Compaq.
***End of Subtle Non-Existent Message***

For $649 the Gateway is a solid laptop and you would definitely not have any issues playing games on it.

Now for the part of the post that might be helpful

I own an Acer, and it is a solid laptop. Mine has the AMD, but from what I hear you get longer battery life from the Intel (which would be amazing if true because I can turn on my power save features and surf the web for well over 4 hours or I can play WoW for about an hour on my battery).

I can't speak for the graphics card on the Best Buy laptop, but I have the ATI Radeon Xpress 1100 and it runs all my games just fine (the 2 main ones I play on the laptop are WoW and F.E.A.R.) but if you do go for the AMD, check and see if you can't get the one with the 2G RAM upgrade because the graphics card shares the computer's RAM and I have 2G in mine and have never had a problem. If you stick with only 1G, the games might run a bit slow b/c then you have 512MB for the video card leaving only 512MB of the RAM for the game to use.

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A wise man can learn more from a foolish question than a fool can learn from a wise answer. ~Bruce Lee

Thanks for pointing that out on the Acers from Circuit City. I assume with only 512mb of ram left over it will run games very slow because of Vista? I plan on upgrading whatever laptop i buy to 2 gb in the future. Also I wasn't really leaning towards the Compaq but is there really much of a difference between the Compaq and the Acer besides you get a smaller hdd. I wouldn't mind spending the extra 100 just because I really like how the acer looked in the store and just felt when i was typing and so forth. I am proudly going to go to bestbuy today and take a look at the Acer they had there. Thanks for the reply

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Noob

This made me cry. I need a few minutes to recover.

*sobs*

Ok. I'm good now.

I didn't even think about the fact that it will be running Vista, so yeah, sharing 1GB of RAM with the OS, Game, and Graphics Card would not be pretty.

I will tell you why I am so against Compaqs. They tear up, and they tear up often. I don't have any experience with their laptops, but I know their desktops are crap. Their desktops are such crap I will never even give their laptops a chance, which is why I made it clear in my 1st post that you would not get a fair review of a Compaq from me.

When I took computer repair in high school, we fixed students computers for free (they only had to pay for any hardware or software required, and they got the labor/troubleshooting for free). I took this class for 2 years. In my 2 years there, I worked on a total of about 15 computers that were NOT Compaq. And it's not just the quantity that made me mad. Compaq made there internal hardware proprietary (I am talking about desktops, not laptops. I know laptops are another story). I couldn't just run to Best Buy and pick up replacement parts for a Compaq, we had to order them from the company. On top of that, they made each system recognize the hardware, so when you replaced a video card or something similar, you had a whole mess of problems from the other hardware not wanting to accept the new video card.

Essentially, a repair that could be finished in a day with a quick trip to pick up some hardware, would take weeks waiting on parts to be shipped, and hours to install the hardware.

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A wise man can learn more from a foolish question than a fool can learn from a wise answer. ~Bruce Lee

I don't think I've ever had to do as many hard resets on any other PCs as I have with Compaqs. I wouldn't recommend a Compaq to anyone.

Not a huge fan of Dells either, but at least they work most of the time.

I love IBM. Just can't afford it.

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Hello, World!

Well I just went to circuit city and bought the Acer for 549.99. They didn't have any in the store so my dad is picking up the laptop tommarow at a store near his work. I also got a free wireless g-router and all in one printer after mail in rebates. Its running Vista on 1 gb(512mb will go torwards the video card) so im going to go ahead and order a One Gig stick or possibly a 2gb stick if I can find one. Can anyone recommend a good 2gb stick thats fairly well priced?

I found this on newegg... I might buy it after i get the money back from my rebates

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820231123&ATT=20-231-123&CMP=OTC-pr1c3watch&cm_mmc=OTC-pr1c3watch-_-Memory+(Notebook+Memory)-_-G.SKILL-_-20231123

Can anyone recommend this company? Or find me a different 2gb stick. Thanks for all your help and stories

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Noob

My ,

In my experience working at a help desk at my college, I have by far seen more Dell's with problems than any other brand. Dell fills there computers with a lot of crap software and most laptops are filled with just about equally crap hardware.

I, personally, have had good luck with HP which I have had a good deal of experience with. Compaq is owned by HP, but I don't know how closely related they are and have never dealt with Compaq (recently, anyway).

I have always heard good things about Acer, but never had any experience with them.

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Minnesota Genocide Intervention Network

I personally prefer the Compaq brand over the other brands but I would not spend my money on an AMD due to the fact that it uses more battery and doesn't perform as well. Is your price range from $400 - $600?

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That was pretty much my price range because I wanted it mainly for travel and to just surf the web anywhere. I spent 550 on the laptop and will probably spend another $200 on additional ram over the course of the life of this laptop.

My only concern with the laptop is that the video card uses 512mb of ram so I am def. going to need a good bit more ram for Vista.

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Noob

I've found that usually www.crucial.com will match the correct RAM with your motherboard and current RAM modules.

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