Author Topic: Used laptops  (Read 3193 times)

Offline scottws

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Used laptops
« on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 07:44:22 PM »
I'm looking for a cheap used laptop.  I want to throw Ubuntu 7.10 on there and just use it as a portable web browser mostly.  But I want it to be able to run Flash ok.

So I'm looking for something like a Pentium M, Celeron M, Turion or above, with at least 512 MB of RAM, a 40 GB hdd, a CD- or DVD-ROM drive, and 802.11g wireless.  USB 2.0 and an ATi or nVidia video processor would be a plus.

I'm looking to spend hopefully $250 or less.  Most of the used laptops I see on eBay are going for around $300-$500, but a lot of them are a little more modern than I need.

If anyone has something like this in theirs or a friend or familiy member's house collecting dust they might be willing to sell, I'm all ears.  Otherwise, does anyone know where a good place to find what I'm looking for might be?  Online shops selling used laptops are selling them priced much higher than eBay.  I found what might be good deals on Craigslist, but I just don't trust Craigslist at all.

Offline Raisa

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Re: Used laptops
« Reply #1 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 09:11:31 PM »
i have one but it's dead.. needs to go to the shop for repair first.
Taken.

Offline scottws

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Re: Used laptops
« Reply #2 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 09:18:14 PM »
Yeah maybe I should have mentioned that I want a working one.

I found an Acer Aspire 3680 on Craigslist for $300.  I offered $280 in cash on Friday.  We'll see what happens.

Offline gpw11

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Re: Used laptops
« Reply #3 on: Tuesday, December 04, 2007, 11:22:42 PM »
EEE PC?



Apart from that check the yellow pages for used computer stores in your area.  I know a lot of them here offer stupid cheap old laptops that I'm fairly certain would be capable of what you want to do.

Offline WindAndConfusion

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Re: Used laptops
« Reply #4 on: Wednesday, December 05, 2007, 12:14:30 AM »
EEE PC?
$360 on Newegg (shipping included). It's more than Scott was hoping to spend, but not by much. It's what I'd buy in that situation, assuming I didn't mind a 7" screen and tiny keyboard.

Offline Quemaqua

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Re: Used laptops
« Reply #5 on: Wednesday, December 05, 2007, 12:36:51 AM »
The real question is - will it play WoW?  Okay, that isn't the real question.

天才的な閃きと平均以下のテクニックやな。 課長有野

Offline Antares

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Re: Used laptops
« Reply #6 on: Wednesday, December 05, 2007, 09:59:27 PM »
Craigslist seems like your best bet.  Ideally you could find something in your area that you could go check out in person before commiting to buy it.

Offline scottws

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Re: Used laptops
« Reply #7 on: Thursday, December 06, 2007, 08:37:57 AM »
Well, the one Craigslist thing I mentioned doesn't seem to be panning out.  I haven't gotten responses to any of the adds I've sent an e-mail to, after several days.  Is this how Craigslist usually goes?  Don't these people want to sell these things?

The EEE PC... no.  Way too small.  7" screen?  Yikes.

Offline gpw11

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Re: Used laptops
« Reply #8 on: Thursday, December 06, 2007, 05:36:54 PM »
I wouldn't be surprised if stuff on Craigslist in major cities gets sold in hours.  That's pretty much how it works for apartments and housing rentals anyways.

Offline scottws

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Re: Used laptops
« Reply #9 on: Friday, December 07, 2007, 12:22:14 PM »
eBay is weird.  I've been bidding on laptops like crazy since last night and finally got one this morning.  I got a Dell D600, with a Pentium M 1.6Ghz.  $290 + $15 shipping.  Not bad considering most people were paying ~$320 + $40 shipping for the same thing.

There were a ton of D600's, most with the 1.4 Ghz P-M.  They were going from about $285 - $440.  And most of them were from the same seller!  I was like, hello idiots!  The same laptop just sold for more than $100 cheaper than you bid!  There are tons of other ones still available!

Anyway, I decided I'm going to do Kubuntu instead of Ubuntu.  I've never really messed with the KDE interface before and it actually is more highly regarded in the Linux world, it seems.

Offline Pugnate

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Re: Used laptops
« Reply #10 on: Friday, December 07, 2007, 12:31:34 PM »
Quote
There were a ton of D600's, most with the 1.4 Ghz P-M.  They were going from about $285 - $440.  And most of them were from the same seller!  I was like, hello idiots!  The same laptop just sold for more than $100 cheaper than you bid!  There are tons of other ones still available!

haha

Man that is so true.

People are so stupid on ebay about bidding on items with more bids. It is ridiculous, and I see it all the time. There could be ten identical items selling for $10 from the sale seller, but one of them with multiple bids will go to $50.

I think people just hate to lose.

Offline Ghandi

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Re: Used laptops
« Reply #11 on: Friday, December 07, 2007, 04:34:13 PM »
I think people just hate to lose.

No, they are just dumb.

Offline scottws

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Re: Used laptops
« Reply #12 on: Thursday, December 13, 2007, 10:42:48 AM »
Well, I got the laptop, and it seems to be running fine.  It took me a bit to figure out how to tell my wireess card to use shared instead of open authentication, to get DVDs working, to get Flash working, and I still can't figure out how to mount some of my file server's shares (I'd done it before... I don't know why it won't work now).

But for the most part it works pretty flawlessly.  I'm fairly happy with it.  This will be perfect for what I want to use it for.