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General discussion

Is SONY still a good brand for a laptop?

Feb 17, 2011 10:04PM PST

Hi all. I have a five year old SONY Vaio and I think it's time to replace it. It was cnet's Top Five, 5 years ago, but I think current websites have outstripped what that little thing can handle nowadays. I have a 17" Gateway at work; it's fine but when I first got it, the tech's were tearing it apart weekly, for problems. Now, it works fine. My SONY has NEVER been in the shop! I've looked at cnet's Top Five now, and SONY is nowhere to be found.Sad My top limit is $900-$1000 and I'll only be buying it through HSN because of their Flex Pay sytstem. I know that SONY's name really meant something 5 years ago but it seems to be eclipsed by many other company's so I don't know if I should stick with that brand, based on how reliable it has been for me in the past. For those not aware of HSN, currently, they are selling a 17.3" Gateway LCD with 4GB Ram Dual Core HDD for $699.90, which is well within my budget. Currently, HSN sells SONY, Gateway, Acer, HP, Compaq, and Toshiba brands. How I use my laptop is very limited by my needs: email, download photos, music files and web browsing and shopping. That's it.

I'm looking forward to your help as I'm unqualified to figure out what I need for myself. It's got to last another 5 years until the next crop of NEW comes out in 2016. Thanks in advance to all who reply and help me out.

Discussion is locked

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My thoughts.
Feb 17, 2011 11:43PM PST

If we don't buy the bottom of the line, I think you're right. Remember that price is all that matters on the floor at most retailers. I hate to write this but the stores haven't sold me a machine in years but have been useful to check out the keyboard, display and the feel of a machine I am considering.

They don't get the sale because the model I wanted is not there. So we pick them up (home and the shop) from dell.com, amazon.com, newegg.com, geeks.com, overstock.com, ibm's refurb outlet, apple.com (it has an excellent refurb offering too) and other online order places. A notable exception was a pair of netbooks from walmart. They had the price and for what we used them for (driving a show booth display), it was all about price.

Lifetime tends to be half dependent on the owner and half on the maker's design. At least some of the life span is under our control.

Why not another Sony?
Bob

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Reply
Feb 18, 2011 1:53AM PST

No real reason to NOT get another SONY, except that it's rather fallen off of the "charts" of Tech Editors; they mention MacBook and loads of Acer machines, no SONY or even Toshiba. That's why I came here, to see if SONY's quality has gone downhill since my last purchase in 2006.

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Then you need to know.
Feb 18, 2011 2:00AM PST

That besides the Apple, Toughbooks and the higer end units that you rarely see in stores are all lower in quality than what I found in 2008. It's all about price now in the stores.

Back to Sony. A coworker has their nice carbon fiber unit. Little pricey but what a nice machine. And you won't find that at Best Buy.

The Acer machines deliver good value but we are talking value and not something I'd bet would last 5 years.
Bob

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Surf and decide
Feb 19, 2011 10:05PM PST

One laptop maker to avoid is HP to include Compaq. Yes, they can have good PCs but it seems you need luck at times. I exclude higher end models but then again, laptops are specific to what they do when brought and sometimes that's not a good match. For whatever reason you buy the laptop for be sure it has what you "need" as buying anything later for it may not be a good idea. I exclude any so-called gamer or gee-whiz laptops, they are too hot to cool or designed for hi-output but may suffer for lack of a better term somewhere to achieve this. I have found IBM and Acer laptops to typically deliver the goods. If you like visit a laptop support website and find a model# you liked then see in their support forums or google for "repair hits" or topic openly discussed. Two brands you mat not see often enough but seem very good are Fujitsu and Panasonic, look them over. You will find AMD based laptops just as good as Intel, but one or the other will have a problem cpu or appear so due to chipset, do not take anything for granted. Laptops are harder to cool even with a cooler involved, so any hi-perf. type setups may become problematic over time.

tada -----Willy Happy