Good Laptop for $600 or less (AUD)

Icaraeus

Honorable
Oct 9, 2013
21
0
10,570
A friend wants to buy a laptop sometime soon to use (within the next month or 2). He wants something that he can take anywhere with him and which is fast enough for everything he wants to do (basically everything except games). He doesn't want to spend too much on it, preferably around $500 but he can spend a bit more but not too much ($700 would be too much).

I did a little bit of searching but didn't find anything good (found laptops with Intel Celeron, Atom and Pentiums). He doesn't want something crap but doesn't want to spend too much. Are there any laptops that fit this criteria?
 
15.6" Lenovo G50-70. Starts at $499 AUD for the Core i3-4005U @ 1.7GHz low voltage version.

http://shopap.lenovo.com/au/en/laptops/lenovo/g-series/g50-70/

14" Lenovo ThinkPad E440 (business oriented) starts at $569 for the Core i3-4000m @ 2.4GHz. Is rated to have double the battery life of the G50-70 (8 hours vs. 4 hours)

http://shopap.lenovo.com/au/en/laptops/thinkpad/edge-series/e440/
 
The 14" Lenovo ThinkPad E440 gives you an option for an i5-4210m CPU for an additional $129 AUD. That is about what's inline in the US; going from a Core i3 to a Core i5 typically adds another $100 to $150 to the cost. Total price for the ThinkPad E440 with the Core i5 CPU is $655 AUD. Adding 4GB for a total of 8GB brings the price to $705 AUD.

Don't know how much RAM cost in Australia, but in the US Lenovo charges $80 for a stick of 4GB, however, people can buy that same RAM for about $50 and install it themselves. RAM can always be added later if necessary.

The 15.6" G50-70 has a version with a Core i5-4200u for $679 USD. Lenovo's website does not offer the option to increase the RAM to 8GB, but you can install another stick of 4GB RAM on your own.

The i5-4200u is not as powerful as the i5-4210m because it has lower clockspeed to reduce power consumption. But the G50-70 does come with a dedicated graphics chip.