compaq cq40 with amd proc and ati 3450hd, i think around rm2099

might not, since its an amd proc? 2k a bit too tight for anything

dell inspiron 1525 for rm1899 and below?

specs are on here

http://www1.ap.dell.com/content/topics/top...4173&lid=827449

i bought my machine for rm31xx and that was in may, before they officially took windows xp off the shelf (it was rm2899 before i decided to upgrade to windows xp pro (from home) and 8600 gt graphics card (from 8400gs)

there are a few offerings u can have and allows u to use windows xp normally

it is sad that the need arise for you to buy a new laptop months ago, else u would have got it

the only way going away from that is to use some laptops preinstalled with windows vista business or ultimate, so you can downgrade your laptop officially and there would be support for drivers.

if you dont intend to use your laptop in an office or anywhere that relies on legalities too much, you can buy the dell inspiron 1420 or 1520, as they cover your criteria, instantly. the windows xp drivers are ready for download from dell's webpage and woulds save you hassle, as some compaq notebooks never made the xp drivers.

the other hp laptop you can consider is the hp6510b business machine, around rm2600, but it doesnt come with integrated webcam. so best bet for you is to buy the dell inspiron 1420, which comes with the drivers for xp

i have the dell d630, no complains till now, you may want to consider the lenovo t61 with nvidia quadro 140m graphics (equilavent to 8400gt speed). i think its buyable for below rm6k and it would be a solid performer as it is one of the competitors of the d630

i think the e6400 is a good idea, as the new centrino 2 processor has more power savings options compared to the original centrino. however, clock speed and performance remains the same, its just power savings and good that it lasts 19 hours on the latitude

the xps1330 will be outdated soon and to be soon replaced with the xps studio 13 by december. im not sure if you could wait that long, but it would feature a centrino 2 processor

i think there are lots of offering with core 2 duo at rm2100, expand your budget a lil bit and you would get a core 2 duo processor

if your budget is 4k, you might consider the dell xps laptop as it would be sufficient for designing purposes.

i have no problems with 2 inspirons so far, i dont see it as any bad. i had an inspiron 6400 before that i used for almost 2 years that got replaced by the 1520. so far no problems at this point. i heard compaqs suck more than the hp pavilions. in terms of reliability, compaq's tend to end up in RMAs. had a cousin which bought the v2000 and v3000 but mostly ends up in service.

if you really want to get a good laptop, go all out pavilion, skip the compaq presario, its just comparing inspirons to xps, but of course the inspirons are as good as it gets

i had two acers from 2 different generations, a pentium III desktop processor 550 alpha and a travelmate 1680 with the ati radeon 9800 mobility graphics card. it was good, but the keyboard crumbled apart and the motherboard died later on for my acer. maybe its really the luck and we might be unlucky to take the 5% bad production margin. else the lenovo thinkpad might be a good idea if ur company hasn't purchased yet

i think the reason for dell is that it has a hassle free NBD support. u dont have to drive all the way to subang jaya to send away the acer, which i did, twice for both my laptops. i was more of a desktop user before going to laptop. no point overclocking nowadays, xp just dont need that much of juice.

my company has 3 acers and all failed, including an old celeron 2.4 machine.

given a choice, you should try toshiba. none of the units failed so far when owning. the dell e6400 sets to be good. check out www.notebookreview.com
i do check it up and see if the notebook was made for me or not.

budget 4k is tough, but u should look on compaq presario with centrino 2 and dedicated cards.

else just get dell latitude e6400, comes with quadro graphics and centrino 2

btw if u buy this week (ending 13th oct) u will entitle for rm500 rebate off ur laptop if ur amount exceeds rm5000, rm300 rebate for amount exceeding rm4000. use those coupons and max out the specs.

xps is a better laptop. build quality and speakers are better. upgrade to the sb audigy software for rm34, its worth it. however centrino and centrino 2 are two different things. centrino is using last year's santa rosa platform where as centrino 2 using montevina platform. centrino has Txxxx series while centrino 2 is Pxxxx series. speed and processing power the same, only thing is that centrino 2 is more power saving

This post has been edited by KeV: Oct 4 2008, 08:56 PM

dell only offers centrino 2 in the dell latitude e series. i think this is because dell hasnt updated their line of laptops. plus there is no significant difference in centrino and centrino 2, other than the power savings.

i dont know about the webcam offerings on the xps, but my 1520 comes with it. i guess it really depends on the offerings. so did u managed to find out about the discount

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Added on October 5, 2008, 3:50 pmmight consider compaq cq40 with the centrino 2 processor, gma4500hd , i think its about rm2800 but i cant remember

or get the dell studio 15, that comes with those specs, but better graphics card. around rm2999

This post has been edited by KeV: Oct 5 2008, 03:50 PM

u can consider dell latitude e6500, with slightly close to ur spec, add nvidia quadro nv160m graphics card, which totals rm5452 then use the rm500 off coupon to deduct from the spec, would get u a total of rm4942.

the nvidia quadro nv160m is a geforce 9650 equilavent graphics card, in terms of gaming performance. i think this is a better buy for ur strict budget. the e6400 is cheaper, however u only get 14.1 inches, but u can have options to 2.4ghz, instead of 2.26ghz now.

for example, a e6400 setup price.

Base System
Intel® Core™2 Duo Processor P8600 (2.4ghz) edit
Operating System
Genuine Windows® XP Professional SP2 (Eng) -Downgrade Vista Business-EMRP edit
LCD Panel
14.1" Widescreen WXGA (1280x800) Display edit
Memory
1GB (2x512MB) 800MHz DDR2 SDRAM edit
Hard Drive
250GB SATA (5400RPM) Hard Drive edit
2nd Hard Drive
None edit
Optical Drives
24X CD-RW/DVD Combination Drive edit
Graphic Card
NVIDIA Quadro NVS 160M, 256MB With PC-Card edit
Batteries
6-Cell Li-Ion Primary Battery edit
Power Adapter
90W AC Adapter - 3 Pin edit
Palmrest
No Fingerprint Reader edit
Wireless Network Cards
Intel WiFi Link 5100 (802.11 a/g/n 1X2) MiniCard edit
Bluetooth Module
Dell Wireless 370 Bluetooth® 2.1 edit

dvd writer drive add rm125, if u want it.

budget off by rm32 anyways

Dell™ Latitude™ E6400 (R721011MY)
Online Price RM 5,032.00

This post has been edited by KeV: Oct 5 2008, 09:09 PM

stylish one, in what sense stylish?

u can consider dell studio with mike ming's skins. they are styled by a tattoo artist, costs rm200+ more.

else a macbook maybe? lots of choices.

tablet? theres some from hp that costs rm2999

it really depends what u want

dell inspiron 1420 for rm1899
compaq presario cq40 for rm1899

go dell for intel, go compaq for amd, up to u really. budget rm2000 max?

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Added on October 5, 2008, 11:12 pmcompaq presario cq40 with centrino 2 p8400 processor might suit u

else just get dell inspiron 1420 or 1520

This post has been edited by KeV: Oct 5 2008, 11:12 PM

its good, the only issue is that if u are ok with a large and heavy 17 inch screen and also a non centrino 2 processor. btw go all the way up to t9xxx series or get windows ultimate or max out the ram to use that rm500, its worth it

my bad on the quadro, i confused the 1600m with the 160m, lol. it was a silly mistake, i checked the same list too

well u see, the rebate only applies if the amount goes above rm5000, so assume ur check out amount is rm50xx, thats after the upgrade to the t9xxx series with 6mb cache. note that the cache will help a lot in processing power. its pretty worth it, besides, u still get back around rm45xx. its still a bargain rather than not going all out. think about what i say. for vista ultimate, one could just buy their own copy. its up to u really

This post has been edited by KeV: Oct 6 2008, 01:12 AM

dell only allows u upgrade to 2 years max as per the studio selection buttons. but do question yourself, how long do u intend to use the laptop. i had my dell inspiron 6400 for 2 years now and its still running strong, although it has been relegated to the office staff. laptop parts are expensive. even though ur warranty is over, dell do offer optional extension of warranty in case of a laptop breakdown. you can extend it later on if u feel like it, just call up dell on the deals

blueray? not-really. there are fully capable blue-ray laptops that sells for rm4.5k , i think it was an acer with blue-ray and 9500gs graphics card, but with the quality of acer, i wont wanna take it.

blue-ray takes a while to mature, cd-rom has been around since 1992 and was only replaced by dvd-rom in 1999. blue ray may take about another few years to mature and materialise. no software ever uses blu-ray unless its for watching movies. better off buying a playstation 3 officially from sony then

This post has been edited by KeV: Oct 6 2008, 01:20 AM