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How are you getting on with the Lenevo @BrickMan?
Miss_Mouse-
5 years later report.... Endes up going back and being replaced under extended john Lewis warranty. They tried several times to get the touch pad repaired each time it sort of worked and then failed again. So had it replaced at 1 year and 11 month old.
Put full value plus an extra 200 i think into an asus u340 or 440? Which had a 3 year warranty (John Lewis again extends it) inc damage for the full three years.
This new asus (2 or 3 years old now) is perfect. The current mbp came out the same month but even going to the middle tier model (£1750?) it didn't give me much more than the asus.
Asus is 6th gen i5, 8gb medium speed ram, a reasonable ssd, almost 4k screen (14" so honestly 1080p would have been fine, has good brightness and contrast), screen folds all the way back making it into a giant tablet (use this a lot for reading magazines like single-track etc), battery life is epic, never less than 4 hours, can be as high as 10 if you eek it out. Build quality is fantastic, equal to an mbp, poss a better keyboard imo. Most asus you see in the shops are plastic framed with a thin piece of metal screwed om the outside, this one feels like it was hewn out of billet (its not but it feels that solid).
No break downs, only issue is touch pad sometimes freaks out (firmware isnt the best). Touch screen i use occasionally for tablet mode and for light room, but could take it or leave it
BrickMan
Yup I've upped the budget again, basically I could swing two ways...
1) spend just £300, get something thats newer with a warranty that will get it through 2 years and just deal with it being not that great at demanding things, but better than I have now
2) spend £750 on something that will work as I want it to, probably over the top really, but will do more like 4-5 years before I have to worry about it again, however 3 years of that are beyond the warranty.
Found something that will likely do, £750 from John lewis (better spec than from other places, reckon its specced for them), Lenevo U430, 14" ultrabook designated, just under 1.9kg, i7 4500/4510u, 8gb, 500GB HD + SSD, dedicated graphics card, 1080p screen, very good speakers + reasonable screen brightness.
Looks and feel's a bit like an Air, but 1" bigger and £500 less. There is a version with an I5 processor, 4gb, but still has the same graphics card for £699 but for £50 prob worth that £50 for the ram alone, some of the proper techy reviews show the I7 to be quite a lot beefier than the I5, and the I5 is probably more than good enough for what I want.
So, do I get something thats greater than I need, but very nice and won't fuss about anything I throw at it (if it does graphics then I'll prob get back into FPS games), but accept that after 2 years its the same old solid state laptop lottery. Or be sensible and spend less than half that, and know that for the period I need it for, shits covered?