Laptop Fried -- No time to waste

As the title says, my laptop (which is at least 5 years old by-the-way) all but died this morning. I started searching today for a quick replacement, but became quickly overwhelmed by so many with such diverse specs.
I am looking for something that will work for processing photos and is fairly fast with good colors (IPS?). I figure 8GB -16GB memory. Something that will be able to utilize an SSD and an HDD in two slots. Wifi, Bluetooth capable. CD-DVD and an SD card reader (Not absolute, but nice to have). OK anyone else been shopping lately and found something they could recommend. Oh price range: top end about $900, but prefer closer to $5-600..


Any help or ideas/brands will be greatly appreciated.

cwgrizz said:

As the title says, my laptop (which is at least 5 years old by-the-way) all but died this morning. I started searching today for a quick replacement, but became quickly overwhelmed by so many with such diverse specs.
I am looking for something that will work for processing photos and is fairly fast with good colors (IPS?). I figure 8GB -16GB memory. Something that will be able to utilize an SSD and an HDD in two slots. Wifi, Bluetooth capable. CD-DVD and an SD card reader (Not absolute, but nice to have). OK anyone else been shopping lately and found something they could recommend. Oh price range: top end about $900, but prefer closer to $5-600..


Any help or ideas/brands will be greatly appreciated.

Click to expand...

You could do a lot worse than a Dell Inspiron 5000; that's a lot of laptop for $750 or so. At the top-end of your budget is the Inspiron 7000 series.

Dell Inspirion 5000 Series

[MENTION=13090]Horoscope Fish[/MENTION]

What about this version. What do you think? Am I missing something? I think I can get it fo under $600
[h=2]Product Details[/h]

Other than it being a Dell, these have been getting good reviews across various circles. I'd personally pony up for something better, but these Dells are solid choices.

https://www.sagernotebook.com/Notebook-NP5855.html would be something I'd look into because it can handle more ram.

cwgrizz said:

[MENTION=13090]Horoscope Fish[/MENTION]

What about this version. What do you think? Am I missing something? I think I can get it fo under $600
[h=2]Product Details[/h]

Manufacturer #	I55677161GRY

2 in 1	no
audio hardware	Waves MaxxAudio
brand name	Dell
color	matte gray
front camera/webcam	Yes
frontside bus speed	2400 MHz
Graphics Type	Dedicated
hard drive capacity	1TB (1000GB)
hard drive type	hard drive
integrated speakers	yes
manufacturer	Dell

maximum memory capacity	16 GB
Maximum Turbo Speed	3.1 GHz
memory	12 GB
memory card reader	yes
memory type	DDR4 SDRAM
model	i5567-7161GRY-PUS
modem	no modem
numeric keypad	no
operating system details	Windows 10 Home
Operating Systems	Windows 10
optical drive	DVD+RW
peripherals included	camera
ports	2 USB 3.0; 1 USB 2.0; 1 HDMI
processor brand	Intel
processor model	Core i7-7500U
processor speed	2.5 GHz
processor type	Intel Core i7
Product Condition	new
Product Line	Inspiron 15 5000
screen resolution	1366 x 768
screen size	15.6 in.
Touchscreen	no
warranty length	1-year limited
weight	5.12 lb
wired connectivity	10/100 Ethernet
wireless connectivity	802.11a/b/g/n/ac; Bluetooth

Click to expand...

Looks pretty solid, but...

The graphics concern me since they're "dedicated". This means the graphics are handled by on-board chips and the CPU, instead of a discrete graphics card. Integrated Graphics may be fine for what you want to do, but it may not. The devil, they say, is in the details and I'm typically leery of on-board graphics.

cwgrizz said:

@Horoscope Fish

What about this version. What do you think? Am I missing something? I think I can get it fo under $600
Product Details

Manufacturer #	I55677161GRY

audio hardware	Waves MaxxAudio
brand name	Dell
color	matte gray
front camera/webcam	Yes
frontside bus speed	2400 MHz
Graphics Type	Dedicated
hard drive capacity	1TB (1000GB)
hard drive type	hard drive
integrated speakers	yes
manufacturer	Dell

maximum memory capacity	16 GB
Maximum Turbo Speed	3.1 GHz
memory	12 GB
memory card reader	yes
memory type	DDR4 SDRAM
model	i5567-7161GRY-PUS
modem	no modem
numeric keypad	no
operating system details	Windows 10 Home
Operating Systems	Windows 10
optical drive	DVD+RW
peripherals included	camera
ports	2 USB 3.0; 1 USB 2.0; 1 HDMI
processor brand	Intel
processor model	Core i7-7500U
processor speed	2.5 GHz
processor type	Intel Core i7
Product Condition	new
Product Line	Inspiron 15 5000
screen resolution	1366 x 768
screen size	15.6 in.
Touchscreen	no
warranty length	1-year limited
weight	5.12 lb
wired connectivity	10/100 Ethernet
wireless connectivity	802.11a/b/g/n/ac; Bluetooth

Click to expand...

One thing I found is that the video doesn't seem to be "Dedicated" On Dell specs it is Intel 640 built in and not a seperate video card. Boo!

Well I have about narrowed it down to this one, I think. The one I posted before which did not have a separate video card, I could have picked up the same day at the store, but I have about decided for about $250 more I will be happier with this one. One more drive SSD, 4GB less memory but can add up to 32GB, Nvidia video card, FHD screen resolution, with the following specs. It will take about two weeks to get here, so I will have to just make due for now.

Inspiron 15 5000 Series
Inspiron 15 5000 Gaming
Processor
7th Generation Intel® Core™ i7-7700HQ Quad Core (6MB Cache, up to 3.8 GHz)
Operating System
Windows 10 Home 64-bit English
Memory
8GB, 2400MHz, DDR4; up to 32GB (additional memory sold separately)
Hard Drive
128GB Solid State Drive (Boot) + 1TB 5400 rpm Hard Drive (Storage)
Video Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1050 with 4GB GDDR5 graphics memory
LCD
15.6-inch FHD (1920 x 1080) Anti-Glare LED-Backlit Display, Non-touch
Wireless
802.11ac + Bluetooth 4.2, Dual Band 2.4 & 5 GHz, 1x1
Primary Battery
74WHr, 6-Cell Battery (Integrated)
Keyboard
Backlit Keyboard
Power Supply
130 Watt AC Adaptor

cwgrizz said:

Well I have about narrowed it down to this one, I think. The one I posted before which did not have a separate video card, I could have picked up the same day at the store, but I have about decided for about $250 more I will be happier with this one. One more drive SSD, 4GB less memory but can add up to 32GB, Nvidia video card, FHD screen resolution, with the following specs. It will take about two weeks to get here, so I will have to just make due for now.

Click to expand...

That was $250 well spent. The i7 is a screaming good processor, a discrete graphics card is a very good thing, dual-drives are the ONLY way to fly in my opinion and 8GB of system RAM will be fine especially considering your graphics card packs 4GB of its own. Yeah... Sweet laptop, Walt.

Walt, if you're still deliberating, I've found using the sorting features on the B&H website helpful. Let's you pick criteria (like ratings, brands, price range and machine components) when searching.
The one you've tentatively identified looks good to me.

Well, I pulled the trigger on the I5 5000 inspiron gaming computer. I had it in my cart at about midnight or so with an additional discount. When I went to purchase it this morning the discount was gone. I tried to put it in again and it said the discount was good, but not for that computer. Sheesh. After about two hours in the chat session with Dell, it turned out they found another discount that I qualified for that actually worked out to be a little more. Win-win for a little time spent in the chat. Now I have to wait for delivery which is estimated to be between June 23 & 27. Then the fun begins loading it with all of the necessary stuff. Ha!


Thanks to all for your input.

cwgrizz said:

Well, I pulled the trigger on the I5 5000 inspiron gaming computer. I had it in my cart at about midnight or so with an additional discount. When I went to purchase it this morning the discount was gone. I tried to put it in again and it said the discount was good, but not for that computer. Sheesh. After about two hours in the chat session with Dell, it turned out they found another discount that I qualified for that actually worked out to be a little more. Win-win for a little time spent in the chat. Now I have to wait for delivery which is estimated to be between June 23 & 27. Then the fun begins loading it with all of the necessary stuff. Ha!


Thanks to all for your input.

Click to expand...

Sounds like a good laptop Walt. It is similar to mine, but dual drives were not available when I bought mine... not for that kind of money. I would suggest buying 8 more GIG of memory. I bumped mine to 16 a month after I got it and it made a big difference and the memory was cheap. It helped that I had a friend that installed it for free, but it would have been pretty easy. I just lack confidence and shake to bad.

Looks great.
I am looking at maybe buying a laptop since I have an expensive iMac paperweight sitting in my office. Yes, it has lots of memory, but they put the old drive in it, and it sux beyond the telling of it. It can't handle any operation without throwing a beach ball at me. It has been that way since it came out the box. Just clicking on computer preferences seems to confuse the crap out of it.
I never thought I would be a non-Apple person, but this last computer experience and iPads that hang-up in my own living room have me looking at PC.

I think I am going to take a look at this one because the price is right.