only 6 more hrs till the store opens!
Hello everyone. Today I will be reviewing the pc/laptop selection at Best Buy for this black friday sale. For those of you who don’t know what black friday is. It is a sale held the morning after thanksgiving “November 27th this year” where lines are wrapped around the building waiting for the store to open to get the cheapest deals of the year. Now I know that there are some people who don’t know what they are looking for in a computer, so before my review I will give a cheat sheet on what to look for. Here I will list 3 main things to look for.
Hard Drive -Also abbreviated as HD the size of the hard drive will determine how much information can be stored on your computer. The size of the hard drives that I will review are sorted from Gigabytes (GB) and Terabytes (TB). Now just to let you know how large a TB is you would need 1000 GB to equal 1 TB.
Random access memory – Most always abbreviated as (Ram) or just memory comes in a much lower number than hard drives. Do not confuse Hard drive for Ram, Ram determines speed not storage and can be added to a computer much easier than a hard drive. the ram in my review will range from 1 GB to 8 GB.
Central Processing Unit – Abbreviated as (CPU) the main purpose of the cpu is to carry out the instructions of a computer program. CPU’s are the main reason that the cost of a computer can range so much in price. The leaders in the cpu market are Intel and AMD. Bottom line the better the cpu the faster and better at multitasking your computer will be.
Now on to the reviews.
First off the Compaq Netbook w/Intel Atom Processor, 1GB Memory, 160GB Hard Drive – $179.99 Great for surfing the web and to type up work on the go, and with a 160GB HD you could store lots of music,pictures, and work files. but I wouldn’t try to take on any video games with the low 1gb of ram/memory. For the price I think that this is one of the better laptops out this season. Now there is also an alternative model of this that is the same except for a larger 250GB hard drive and a larger price tag of $229.99.
Next we have the Dell 10.1″ Netbook w/Intel Atom Processor, 1GB Memory, 160GB Hard Drive – $379.99 Here you are paying more for the Dell name, and I wouldn’t recommend to get a dell seeing as anyone I know who has had a dell has it break down within the year.That and the price tag is way to heavy for what it is offering. Come on this is supposed to be a sale!
Now on to a PC with the eMachines Desktop w/AMD Athlon Processor, 3GB RAM, 320GB HD, Windows 7, w/18.5″ LCD Monitor and HP Deskjet Printer – $299.97 Now emachines aren’t the best that money can buy but they get the job done, and with this you could get a lot done. If you are looking for an all in one under $300 you don’t get any better than this. This would be a great gift for someone who is starting out or anyone who wants to play games, download music, surf the web, or type up work.
If you were wondering about a laptop with the power and handling of most normal pc’s here it is the HP 15.6″ Notebook w/AMD Turion II Dual Core Processor M500, 6GB Memory, 320GB Hard Drive, Windows 7 – $599.99 And if there isn’t enough ram and HD on that for your needs there is another model the HP 15.6″ Notebook w/AMD Turion II Dual Core Processor M500, 8GB Memory, 500GB Hard Drive, Windows 7 – $699.99 But with a large ram and hard drive they also get a large price tag to back them up. Now if you really need that much power to carry around with you then by all means, but if you just need a sit at home pc with even more power and lower price tag then I would just wait for what I have next.
This I believe is the buy of the night the HP Desktop AMD X4 Quad Core, 8GB Memory, 1TB Hard Drive w/20″ Monitor, HP Deskjet DJ350 Color Printer & Windows 7 Home Premium – $499.97 Now this all in one pc this pc would usually run for about $1400 retail without the printer and monitor. And with a 1TB hard drive and 8 GB of ram it blows any other computer for sale out of the water in terms of storage and speed. Some may still be scared of the price but remember a computer is only as good as what you use it for, if all you are doing is surfing the web and typing papers then you don’t need a high end computer. But if you want to download music/pictures, play games , watch movies and everything else that you could think of then you need the tools for the job and then some.
On to a mac or as I called them in school macentrashes Macbook 13.3″ Notebook w/2.26GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 2GB DDR3 Memory, 250GB Hard Drive, w/$150 Gift Card – $999.99 Now its not that I hate macs its just that they are more of a business computer and horrible at multitasking, and with a $999.99 price tag and not very impressive ram and hd size I feel like im just paying for the name. p.s. last time I got a gift card I couldn’t use it until my next visit.
We are reaching the end of the barrel with the Sony 15″ Laptop w/Intel Dual Core Processor, 4GB Memory, 320GB Hard Drive, Windows 7 – $399.99 and the Sony 15″ Laptop w/Intel Dual Core Processor, 4GB RAM, 320GB HD, Windows 7, Sony Headphones, Built-In Blu-ray, Blu-ray Movie – $479.97 Both great for gaming but only one has a Blu-ray for watching blu-ray movies. my answer to this is buy a PS3 if you want a gaming system by sony that can play blu-ray. On the other hand it is a great laptop at a fair price.
last but not least the Toshiba 16″ Laptop w/Intel Core 2 Duo Processor, 3GB DDR3 Memory, 250GB Hard Drive (Model # L505-S5984) – $399.99 and the Toshiba 16″ Laptop w/Intel Core 2 Duo Processor, 4GB DDR3 Memory, 320GB Hard Drive (Model # L505-S5984) w/Printer and Case – $499.97 Did I say not least oops sorry about that. both of these laptops come with very little features and a very undesirable price tag.
Now time for my top 5
1.HP Desktop AMD X4 Quad Core, 8GB Memory, 1TB Hard Drive w/20″ Monitor, HP Deskjet DJ350 Color Printer & Windows 7 Home Premium – $499.97
2. eMachines Desktop w/AMD Athlon Processor, 3GB RAM, 320GB HD, Windows 7, w/18.5″ LCD Monitor and HP Deskjet Printer – $299.97
3.Compaq Netbook w/Intel Atom Processor, 1GB Memory, 160GB Hard Drive – $179.99
4.HP 15.6″ Notebook w/AMD Turion II Dual Core Processor M500, 8GB Memory, 500GB Hard Drive, Windows 7 – $699.99
5.HP 15.6″ Notebook w/AMD Turion II Dual Core Processor M500, 6GB Memory, 320GB Hard Drive, Windows 7 – $599.99
