HELP - Laptop Recommendation --- Win 7 pro

[coffee]

I have to buy 2 laptops for a client. I purchased 2 of these below and the performance was really poor! They were extremely slow for some reason. I have to take a return on them because of the poor performance. Thought it would be faster than what they were with the intel i5 processor.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HEYVAV8/ref=oh_details_o03_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

My customer is going to use them for their small business and must have windows 7 pro instead of the dreaded win8. The price point must be below 600 bucks. I know win7 is getting hard to find but my customer will probably *hit if they get win8.

Any recommendations please?

Thanks in advance!

coffee

 

[AdamsAPlus]

First I would say to stay away from Lenovo. I used to work in IT for a company and they used to buy only Lenovo for the laptops. For some reason Lenovo just doesn't seem to have the performance as other computers with equal specs. Not sure why. Even after you take off all the junkware.

You may be better off calling Dell or HP's sales department and have them sell you one with Win7 on it. If you call the company they will have more choices with Win7 than what you can find on websites.

Or head over to newegg.com. They have a lot of Win7 Laptops

 

[Markverhyden]

To be honest I think you will have a hard time finding a W7 pro machine whose performance you will like for under $600 TT&L. BTW, I'd bet the problem with the ones you got was most likely the 5400rpm drives.

A suggestion. While they will be running W8 have your customer stop by a local big box and play around with the laptops. Then have them give you the SKU's for what they like. Then you can get specs, prices, etc. to show the customer.

 

[Mokester]

I agree with Mark. $600 performance laptop with win7pro will be hard to find off shelf. If its just basic office apps...his suggestion of buying a cheap laptop and slapping in an SSD is how I'd go about it. Best performance upgrade for your money.

For businesses, I don't think I've ever quoted something less than $1500...thats including 4 hrs of tech time to setup...but I dont use all of it so probably around 12-1300.

 

[lan101]

I've had a few lenovo's with similar specs as that, and I think the stock hard drive really brings it down. Samsung ssd or a WD RE series is what I would do.

 

[BrentfromZulu]

I have a Dell Lat for work and it is slow. I've used an SSD for home for about 2 years now, and going to use the laptop is soo atrocious. Going forward, I can imagine going Laptop + SSD Upgrade when it is a power user or someone asking for a performance machine.

 

[Markverhyden]

SSD does make a huge difference. I bought a pair of Dell Latitude D630's to replace my really aging D610's. Core2 Duo's, T7300 2gig processor. Bumped RAM to 8gb and swapped out the 5400 drive with an SSD. The machines dual boot using grub, Kali and W7 Pro. Takes about 36 seconds to get to the W7 desktop. Compared to my months old top of the line Retina, which gets to the desktop in about 13 seconds, that's really impressive.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Still easy to get Win7pro on laptops...if you head for the business models.
Lenovo Thinkpads
Dell Latitudes

Problem is...a budget the same as junky home grade computers. Gotta bump that up...

 

[coffee]

I think this is going to end not well. I really do not want my customer to be using win8 for business.

Im wondering if perhaps offlease/refurb is possible. I will be talking to the customer today as I finish up some work but what I have found in the refurb that might work is this so far:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=8366727&sku=M977-154203

Its got the SSD drive for speed but perhaps I better give dell a call today and see what else I can do instead.

coffee

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

There ya go!
We do lots of Lenovo Thinkpads (T series and X series) for our clients..and ourselves. I love 'em! Real work horses...solid business grade laptops that last..and last...and last!
The "W" series is todays version of an upper end T series...the Txxx"p". More towards graphics, like for CAD design people. It's more of a mobile graphics workstation. Typically costs more. Good solid unit.

I have not seen performance problems with Lenovos...at least not the good Thinkpad lineup. Matter of fact..at my clients with large fleets of laptops of mixed brands, after a number of years when the fleet is older..the Thinkpads are still running good while other brands have slowed to a snails pace or crumbled or died years ago.

"Factory Outlets" deals on Lenovos or Dell Latitudes can be a great deal. You'll often get computers completely unused...still new in the box, the OS image never unbuckled.

 

[BrentfromZulu]

On Stonecats note, Refurbs are great deal. At my old job we would get them all the time. Great savings.

 

[coffee]

There ya go!
We do lots of Lenovo Thinkpads (T series and X series) for our clients..and ourselves. I love 'em! Real work horses...solid business grade laptops that last..and last...and last!
The "W" series is todays version of an upper end T series...the Txxx"p". More towards graphics, like for CAD design people. It's more of a mobile graphics workstation. Typically costs more. Good solid unit.

I have not seen performance problems with Lenovos...at least not the good Thinkpad lineup. Matter of fact..at my clients with large fleets of laptops of mixed brands, after a number of years when the fleet is older..the Thinkpads are still running good while other brands have slowed to a snails pace or crumbled or died years ago.

"Factory Outlets" deals on Lenovos or Dell Latitudes can be a great deal. You'll often get computers completely unused...still new in the box, the OS image never unbuckled.

Well, I think I will pull the cord on this then. Im just worried about this deal as it seems to be going south fast and its hard to recover deals when that happens .

So, You think the link to that Lenovo looks good? Normally I dont have problems making decisions like this but Im kinda gun shy now since I got burned on the last lenovos I bought.

coffee

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Well, I think I will pull the cord on this then. Im just worried about this deal as it seems to be going south fast and its hard to recover deals when that happens .

So, You think the link to that Lenovo looks good? Normally I dont have problems making decisions like this but Im kinda gun shy now since I got burned on the last lenovos I bought.

coffee

I don't have experience purchasing from Tiger....always stayed away from them since many years ago they were so bottom basement. Realize they've gotten better over the years...but just never bought from them.

I think that particular laptop is nice.

What happened with Lenovos in the past that burned ya?

 

[angry_geek]

Check the Dell outlet. Look for extra promo codes. I just ordered last week a latitude 14". i5, 4gb ram, 250 gb 7,200 rpm, win 7 pro, 3-year warranty. $570ish with the promo code I found.


Edit: wow, that Lenovo is a great deal! What's the warranty?

 

[deachus]

I just picked up the $599.99 HP ProBook from Micro center pre-installed downgraded to Win 7 Pro SP1 x64 with free upgrade to Win8 when you want. i5 8 GB ram, ATI video card. I slapped a 256gb ssd in it as requested by client to be used in small business. Great, fast laptop

 

[FremontPC]

Indeed the bottleneck on the B590 is likely the HDD. Just take a look at Task Manager while it's being slow and you'll probably see the CPU languishing while the HDD light is on solid.

SSD is the fix, or at least a decent 7200 rpm hdd.

 

[coffee]

I don't have experience purchasing from Tiger....always stayed away from them since many years ago they were so bottom basement. Realize they've gotten better over the years...but just never bought from them.

I think that particular laptop is nice.

What happened with Lenovos in the past that burned ya?

I ordered in 2 of these:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HEYVAV8/ref=oh_details_o03_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

They turned out to be really poor in performance. I dont know what the deal is but they are so slow its like working on some 1990's celeron processor. I had gone thru the laptop and removed all the bloat but couldnt find out why they were so darn slow. So, I have a customer that is concerned about getting good laptops from me and Im looking at my bottom dollar on this deal.

coffee

 

[coffee]

Check the Dell outlet. Look for extra promo codes. I just ordered last week a latitude 14". i5, 4gb ram, 250 gb 7,200 rpm, win 7 pro, 3-year warranty. $570ish with the promo code I found.


Edit: wow, that Lenovo is a great deal! What's the warranty?

Warranty is only 3 months. But, I can cover it for the rest of year if need be. My only concern is the SSD's in them. Hopefully they have some good life left in them.

coffee

 

[altrenda]

I ordered in 2 of these:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HEYVAV8/ref=oh_details_o03_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

They turned out to be really poor in performance. I dont know what the deal is but they are so slow its like working on some 1990's celeron processor. I had gone thru the laptop and removed all the bloat but couldnt find out why they were so darn slow. So, I have a customer that is concerned about getting good laptops from me and Im looking at my bottom dollar on this deal.

coffee

As you found, these are inexpensive, low performance laptops. Lenovo, like everyone else, has different levels of products. This is on the low end of Lenovos range, and not the same as the Thinpads we think of when we think of Lenovo.

You will see a big perfromance difference bewteen the B590 with i3, integrated Intel HD graphics, and a 5400 rpm drive and the ThinkPad W510 with the i7 processor, NVIDIA Quadro FX 880M graphics and a relatively small SSD.
If your customer is OK with an off lease machine, it looks like an OK deal.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

I ordered in 2 of these:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HEYVAV8/ref=oh_details_o03_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

They turned out to be really poor in performance. I dont know what the deal is but they are so slow its like working on some 1990's celeron processor. I had gone thru the laptop and removed all the bloat but couldnt find out why they were so darn slow. So, I have a customer that is concerned about getting good laptops from me and Im looking at my bottom dollar on this deal.

coffee

Oh...yeah...the "B" series. B for "budget". B for "bottom end".
Like Altrenda mentioned above.
Clue number one 3rd line down in specs..."5400 rpm hard drive" You should have done a U-turn right there! No computer with a 5400rpm drive is fast. most "cheap" models come with them. Seek 7,200rpm...or SSD. And if 7,200rpm ...don't settle for the cheap one with only 8 megs cache..go for 16 minimum, 32 better.