Hello =) I'm a soon to be student who is on a short-ish budget, but I've been planning to get myself a laptop before I'm off to university in September. I do quite a lot of work with Photoshop working with graphics for websites and layouts and the like so I was thinking of getting a high end computer. However the one's I've been looking at with the likes of... 512MB RAM, 60GB HD, 533Bus Speed etc. are in the range of 750-1000+ pounds and so I've been looking into factory refurbished laptops which although still not cheap are nevertheless cheaper than normal (around 500-600)... So what I really wanted to ask is if anyone has any experience with refurbished computers and whether they are a good investment or not. Does anyone have any experience or advice on buying a refurbished computer??? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!!! xxx

Buy from a trusted source. ie. A compnay that refurbished laptops for profit.

Its should be like buying a new computer, what you need, your budget.

To keep yourself outta the hot, make sure it comes with Warrenty.

Only main problem with buying refurbished laptops, is you got no way of knowing whats its been though. You need to be 100% sure that, what your buying won't die within the next 4 months.

Have you thought about a new laptop, with downgrading some stuff?, it can be reasonable cheap, and you get a better buy.

I have thought about downgrading a little but when I look at the Ghz some of the cheaper laptops have they look to be around 1.2-1.4 which when you compare it to a home PC with say 1.8 to 3.2 isn't that great. Maybe it's different for laptops though and they don't need that much?!?!? I just basically want to be able to run my software such as Photoshop and Dreamweaver without too many problems and therefore would like a pretty reliable laptop... I'll keep looking into it though and see if I can find out the exact specifications for what I need. xxx

If you want to buy a refurbished laptop (for my a great idea), pay attention in two things:

1. The Screen , is very important that the LCD is ok, because is the more expensive part of the notebook.

2. The battery, there are a lot of people that bought a very cheap laptop, but they din´t know that the Battery Recharging system don´t work ok, (Like IBM TP 600 series), so then you couldn't have the laptop more than 15minutes without the AC connected.

Today a new battery is around U$S130, but the problem is when the laptop do not recharge it.....

About the Spec, for photoshop and Dreamweaver, the Intel Celeron 1.3 M350(1mb cache) is not expensive, is the same as the Pentium M (Laptops with it are called Centrino), with lower FSB (400), and without a Technology called SpeedStep that optimize the power consumption,


With this processor you can have a 90 minutes of autonomy.


kservice

Hi fl4mers,
refurbished computers can be good .. if they are FACTORY refurbished AND come with a "decent" FREE warranty.
90 days = OK warranty
6 mo = GOOD warranty
1 yr = BEST warranty.
Don't pay for an "extended" warranty. Either they are willing to "stand behind" their work ...or not.
Hope this helps
RGPHNX

i bought a refurb laptop a year and a half ago, and it worked well for 6 months before the cd drive gave up. i cana ttribute that though to overheating problems with the model and not the refurb quality. i bought from a dealer with a 3 month warranty, and it was good. my opinion: 1 month=ok warranty.
3 months=quite good.
it's not worth the extra money to buy more warranty coverage. i would definitely buy only a brand name refurbished laptop though. compaq, dell, hp, ibm. try to avoid one that has been leased by a company because those ones are the ones that have gotten the most wear and tear. try to get one that has been bought by a normal person, but something went wrong and it was brought back. then you'll get a decent model. also, what is their refurb policy? one company offered a guarantee that their refurb laptops broke down 90% less frequently because of the extra testing that went into refurbsihing them.

oh and one more thing. if you're planning on using it for graphic design, adobe, dreamweaver, etc. you're gonna' need something that can really punch. don't go for low budget specs for remember the saying..."you get what you pay for."
and as far as celeron, i wouldn't touch it with a 10 foot pole!!--i guess it's cuz the Intel Celeron processor was always designed to be a low-cost or rather cheap alternative to the Pentium processor line.
the most important differences between the Pentium 4 and the Celeron chips coming out today are...
Cache - Celeron chips have less cache memory than Pentium 4 chips do. A Celeron might have 128 kilobytes of L2 cache, while a Pentium 4 can have eight times that. The amount of L2 cache memory can have a big effect on performance.
Clock speed - Intel manufactures the Pentium 4 chips to run at a higher clock speed than Celeron chips. The fastest Pentium 4 might be 70 percent faster than the fastest Celeron.
Bus speed - There are differences in the maximum bus speeds that the processors allow. Pentium 4s tend to be about 40 percent faster than Celerons.
obviously they're completley different beasts!--to be honest though, the celeron will work fine for someone who's planning on sticking to MS office or internet browsing, or just checking ur e-mail but if you're planning on doing any serious computing with a celeron--run!!!
as far as the Mobile centrino, this is an entirely different system, it's the latest technology in laptops and it seems that all the companies at least the biggy's have turned that way! it's an actualy designed notebook "engine" instead of sticking a desktop "engine" into a notebook.--thus no overheating and longer battery life. my friend bought one and it runs for 4 hours!--Sweet!!

personally i would not buy a refurbished laptop. i will be getting a laptop in a year but will buy a new one. i think it would just be safer to get a brand new laptop and not have to worry about old problems coming to life again. and for that much money, you will not be getting a "high end" laptop. yes it might say 512mb of ram and whatever but higher end laptops run $2000+. you would most likely get a lower end graphics card and slower hardware. for regular computers, ram coms in speeds besides 256 or 512, it also comes in pc2700, pc3200, etc. i dont know how laptops go but it would probably be pretty similar. try and see if you can get a little more money for a laptop and get a better one. also, try and find one with a good battery life. especially if you use photoshop or play games, if you have a laptop with bad battery life, you wont be able to spend a long time away from a plug. and one last thing i recommend is to look at user reviews online. some laptops may look good in a magazine or in a picture with some specs, but reviews will really help you understand what you are getting into.