What have been your best/worst computer deals?

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KBD
Posts: 959
Joined: Sun Jul 03, 2011 7:52 pm

Re: What have been your best/worst computer deals?

#21 Post by KBD »

JayM wrote: Wed Sep 04, 2019 6:43 am
Yep. Even the cheaper ones like the Averatec N1170, made by Trigem in Korea, that I bought for my wife in 2010 as a birthday gift and am currently using. An Intel Atom N270 1.6GHz single-core 32-bit CPU (slow, utilization maxes out often, but never gets hotter than 56C in a hot climate and it's rated at up to 90C.) Came with 1GB RAM upgraded to 2GB, its memory never gets beyond 65% utilization now. Some keys no longer work, the touchpad died years ago, the batteries no longer take a charge, the BIOS reverts to original settings (date: 01/01/2005) whenever AC power's disconnected, but the darn thing still runs and works, albeit rather slowly. I paid around ₱12,000/$250 for it new (computers, smartphones, digicams and other tech gadgets cost more in the Philippines than in many other countries including the US and EU.) It works best with antiX but I'm currently running MX on it with the 4.9.0-9-686-pae i686 Debian kernel. It even works OK with the stock 4.19.05 kernel (but I'm testing this one to see if it's better on this system or not.)
I had 3 Acer netbooks. The KAV60/D250 were easy to upgrade the ram and change the hard drive. The D255 was terrible to take apart. I had to replace its keyboard once, but it was a nice machine that I did lots of distro-hopping with. It held up incredibly well. They had surprisingly good keyboards on them, especially the KAV60/D250. I loved typing on those little machines.

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jackdanielsesq
Posts: 244
Joined: Sun Apr 21, 2019 9:02 am

Re: What have been your best/worst computer deals?

#22 Post by jackdanielsesq »

Used to spend a lot of time in HK - before the troubles - buying the latest whizzbang gizmo's

Every NB from the top guns like HP, Dell, Acer, etc, was a miserable failure, yet everybody in
SoCal had a yellow waterproof Sony gadget in the shower, pool or boat that just wouldnt quit,
even battered, drowned Walkmans just kept on playing - I even spent a small fortune on some
really high-end Sony studio reference hi-fi gear - one of our partners at the time was Japanese,
so that helped too .... what could go wrong ....

Back in HK one sunny day, I spotted this large Sony Vaio 17.5 inch NB in a HK store that knew me
well - stunning machine - nothing to touch it - they assured me it would revolutionize the NB
sector, so I bought it - just a shade north of $3K at the time - they delivered it to me at my
Kowloon hotel that evening - I was in-love - stunning - then installed PCLOS Mini-Me Custom
KDE 3.5xx + Compiz etc, went back to Phuket to gloat in my own pool.

My partner, who had just arrived from NC, wanted one as soon as he set eyes on it ... I finally
ended up purchasing 10x pieces for our group ... what an expensive, catastrophic failure that
would turn out to be ....

A week later the HDD failed - WD, I believe - I have more RMA's there than Opple - after a couple
more failures, I finally landed up at Singapore Sony Service Centre .... they replaced almost every
component, buttoned-it-up, only to find it wouldnt boot - the tech-in-charge, took a fresh unit out
of the box, swapped out the HDD and we were back in business ... a week later I was back in SG!!!

QC means zip to China .. the devices failed systemically - even ribbons failed, and there were a lot
of them ... we even thought the units were counterfeit ... they were genuine, according to Sony.

It goes on, only gets worse ... never bought another Made in China Sony product since - never will.

Regards

Jack

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uncle mark
Posts: 866
Joined: Sat Nov 11, 2006 9:42 pm

Re: What have been your best/worst computer deals?

#23 Post by uncle mark »

I guess it depends on what you mean by "best". I paid $700 for my first home computer in 1997(?), a Packard Bell 233Mhz with monitor and keyboard and mouse, running W95. It changed my life. It opened up a new world. I discovered Usenet with it. I courted my (now) wife with it. I made friends all over the world with it. And it got me started toward a new avocation and skill set that I enjoy and employ to this day.

I've gotten lots of good deals on machines and peripherals since, but for most bang for my buck, that first one wins hands down.
Custom build Asus/AMD/nVidia circa 2011 -- MX 19.2 KDE
Acer Aspire 5250 -- MX 21 KDE
Toshiba Satellite C55 -- MX 18.3 Xfce
Assorted Junk -- assorted Linuxes

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azrielle
Posts: 162
Joined: Mon Feb 15, 2016 5:34 am

Re: What have been your best/worst computer deals?

#24 Post by azrielle »

Two best deals come to mind:
eMachines EM250 netbook (rebranded Acer) purchased from Walmart in Feb 2010 for $200 to replace a homebuilt circa 2001 desktop that went bellyup, at a time when I could afford little else; still works, swapped in a 32GB Dogfish SSD last year;
Lenovo i3-3227 based X131e for $100 including shipping from eBay in Nov 2017.
Lenovo T430 i5/3320m 8GB MX17.1/Win7SP1 180GB SSD/128GB mSATA
Lenovo X230 i7/3520m 12GB MX17.1/Win7SP1 500GB SSD 480GB mSATA
Lenovo X131e i3/3227u 8GB MX21Xfce/Win7SP1 500GB SSD
Lenovo 11e Celeron n3150 4GB MX19/Fedora30Games 128GB SSD

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KBD
Posts: 959
Joined: Sun Jul 03, 2011 7:52 pm

Re: What have been your best/worst computer deals?

#25 Post by KBD »

There are many schools using Chromebooks, and these beater laptops are starting to show up on ebay as schools upgrade to newer versions. I recently picked one up for $50. The listing had good photos of the machine so I knew pretty much what I was getting. Often these are listed in batches, with a generic photo of the laptop, and you just cross you fingers and hope for the best. I won't touch anything with missing keys, cracks on the screen, or keys nearly worn off. Chips, scratches, general wear don't bother me as much. 4gb ram was a deal breaker though, I've got old Chromebooks with 2gb ram and more is definitely better.
I probably got my money's worth, especially if it lasts me a few years. It still has almost 2 years official support from Google, and has an intel cpu, and will have life after ChromeOS if it survives with Linux and/or Cloud Ready.

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