Laptop Advice please!

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Cliffo27

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Hi, I've been away from FM for too long and need to get back in the game ASAP so a new laptop is required. Problem is I'm not an expert on Graphics cards so don't want to buy anything rubbish, especially as budget is £500

I've found this one which looks good to me, it has 8GB Ram, i5 processor, a SSHD and a dedicated graphics card, but is this card any good!?

LENOVO Z50-70 15.6" Laptop - White Deals | Pcw

As an alternative there is this one which has a different graphics card but lacks a solid state drive, is this better or worse!?

TOSHIBA Satellite L50-B-1P1 15.6" Laptop - Black Deals | Pcw

Thanks for any help you can give!
 
Graphics card is better in the Toshiba, but I'd go with the Lenovo. Generally better laptops and has the benefit of an SSHD as well as a better screen
 
If you were to pick out of them two I would go with the lenovo the SSHD makes a difference in this comparison but I would look more for the money, you could get a really good laptop that is second hand for this price range
 
Thanks for the nods towards the Lenovo. At the moment they are offering to give the VAT back so that knocks £90 off the price, plus I can 8% of PC World so will end up paying around £420 for it, does that make it more worthwhile or would I still get better second hand laptops for this price?

Any good sites for 2nd hand laptops (besides ebay!)
 
Cliffo27 said:
Hi, I've been away from FM for too long and need to get back in the game ASAP so a new laptop is required. Problem is I'm not an expert on Graphics cards so don't want to buy anything rubbish, especially as budget is £500

I've found this one which looks good to me, it has 8GB Ram, i5 processor, a SSHD and a dedicated graphics card, but is this card any good!?

LENOVO Z50-70 15.6" Laptop - White Deals | Pcw

As an alternative there is this one which has a different graphics card but lacks a solid state drive, is this better or worse!?

TOSHIBA Satellite L50-B-1P1 15.6" Laptop - Black Deals | Pcw

Thanks for any help you can give!
Click to expand...

I have also been considering the Z50-70 also mainly because of the VAT back deal and I can get discount at John Lewis. I have been looking at this one with an i7 processor and a 4gb graphics card little bit more but still seems a good deal for what you are getting

Buy Lenovo Z50-70 Laptop, Intel Core i7, 8GB RAM, 1TB + 8GB SSHD, 15.6" | John Lewis

The only thing putting me off is this review which wasn't impressed with the keyboard or screen
Lenovo IdeaPad Z50-70 (59427656) Notebook Review - NotebookCheck.net Reviews

For a little bit more there is this Lenovo Z710 Buy Lenovo Z710 Laptop, Intel Core i7, 12GB RAM, 1TB + 8GB SSHD, 17.3", Black & Silver | John Lewis

The other thing I am thinking is to wait till next week and see what Black Friday deals there are. If you buy the Lenovo Cliffo can you post how it is or if anyone else has either laptop can you let me know how you rate them cheers
 
Cliffo27 said:
Hi, I've been away from FM for too long and need to get back in the game ASAP so a new laptop is required. Problem is I'm not an expert on Graphics cards so don't want to buy anything rubbish, especially as budget is £500

I've found this one which looks good to me, it has 8GB Ram, i5 processor, a SSHD and a dedicated graphics card, but is this card any good!?

LENOVO Z50-70 15.6" Laptop - White Deals | Pcw

As an alternative there is this one which has a different graphics card but lacks a solid state drive, is this better or worse!?

TOSHIBA Satellite L50-B-1P1 15.6" Laptop - Black Deals | Pcw

Thanks for any help you can give!
Click to expand...


First off, the LENOVO isn't a SSD, it's a hybrid Drive. It's misleading advertising but you're getting a combination of a a SSD for the operating system and about 0.75TB of HDD space. It'll run slightly faster than the Toshiba but both HDD's have the same Spool Speeds (speed it reads off the HD)

The LENOVO is the better Laptop between the two though. DDR3L is more friendly on the motherboard. The (L) stands for Low voltage meaning it's not as taxing on the CPU or the battery so you'll get better performance at lower voltages; meaning less heat on the motherboard so the extractor fan won't be working as hard, sucking up precious battery life.

Both Laptops have the Same CPU so no difference there>

The LENOVO has a NVidea card and I have a person Bias towards them.

Toshiba is more of a work/design PC: it's 2x USB 3.0 slots make it more accessible for transferring files, the longer battery life implies it's for someone who travels often.

It has more display outputs: WiDi in particular which is designed for presentations.

The LENOVO suits your needs more for FM so I'd advise towards buying that one.
 
Last edited:
Brendn said:
First off, the LENOVO isn't a SSD, it's a hybrid Drive. It's misleading advertising but you're getting a combination of a a SSD for the operating system and about 0.75TB of HDD space. It'll run slightly faster than the Toshiba but both HDD's have the same Spool Speeds (speed it reads off the HD)
Click to expand...

I looked into this as was sceptical and your right they should make it clearer its a hybrid HD not full SSD. However it moves the programs/files you use most (eg FM) onto the 8gb SSD and this means you get faster read times than you would from a normal HD although its not as fast as a full SSD. AFAIK 8gb wouldn't be enough space to store the OS anyway!
 
bondj700 said:
I looked into this as was sceptical and your right they should make it clearer its a hybrid HD not full SSD. However it moves the programs/files you use most (eg FM) onto the 8gb SSD and this means you get faster read times than you would from a normal HD although its not as fast as a full SSD. AFAIK 8gb wouldn't be enough space to store the OS anyway!
Click to expand...

How the get away with it is by calling it a SSHD, which makes people think it's a SSD when it should be advertised as a SS/HD, but then that would conflict with the HD trademark for High Definition. If you want a career in I.T., learn off as many acronyms as you can then bluff your way throught eh interview into the office... Google will teach you the rest! :p
 
Thanks guys, a lot of really useful advice, especially about pointing out the hybrid drive. I will rule out the Toshiba and focus on the Lenovo, but will check some other sites so see what else there is aswell - the fact that I can get this for £420 though is a big selling point and means I can live with the ropey keyboard!

The only game I'd be looking to play on this would be FM so would this Graphics card be enough to run the 3D match engine without to many issues, or is this not nearly good enough?
 
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