FOGEY 5 Laptops
The Fogey 5 are the best five products in their class by virtue of expert and consumer review from at least 10 respected and authoritative websites.
Sony Vaio Z-series
Not cheap by any stretch – prices started at £1,443.99 – the Z series represented Sony’s flagship bells, whistles, all-singing, all-dancing laptop. Buying one from the Sony website was a bit like choosing options on a new car, from case finish to processor to gigabytes of RAM, screen resolution and so on. Tick all the posher options and you’d be well over £2k even before you’d started loading up on extra software. The Z series is lightning fast and beautiful to behold but you trade that high-power for limited battery life – just 2 hours if you thrash it. And you will want to thrash it because the vivid clarity of the screen is ever-so-slightly awesome. It’s likely that the numbers that seem so impressive today – up to 8GB of RAM, an Intel dual-core Core i7-620M processor (CPU) running at 2.66GHz – will be pedestrian in a few year’s time but for now they are at the cutting edge of what’s possible. If budget is not an issue and you’d rather use a PC than a Mac, the Z-series is the one to have. NB. Since this Fogey 5 was compiled the Z-series has been discontinued. Top of the range is now the S-series, although there are plenty of Z-series machines around.
Around £1,800 or less. More info here
Buy Sony Vaio Z-Series 13.1 Inch Notebook (Intel Core i5 2.3GHz Processor, RAM 4GB, SSD 128GB) in Black
Apple MacBook Air 13” and 11”
Two screen sizes; one nifty way of demonstrating its wafer-thinness – slip it into a buff A4 manila envelope. Owning a MacBook Air is, apparently, akin to dating a supermodel; you tolerate occasional tantrums for hours of dewy-eyed devotion. Mac addicts will be familiar with the PC-crowd’s objections; few plug-in connectivity options (just 2 USB ports, no ethernet, no VGA and no optical disc drive for playing DVD or CDs or indeed, ripping CDs to iTunes) and ‘only’ 256GB of flash storage on the poshest model. Flash or solid state drives (SSD) use less power than standard hard disc drives (ie none) so increasing battery life and are also resistant to the potentially damaging shock of, say, being dropped. Worked hard, the battery will last around four hours and up to seven if you’re less demanding. Once fully charged it can remain on standby for a month, which is impressive.
Around £1,300 for the 13-inch and £850 for the 11-inch. More info here
Buy Apple 13 inch MacBook Air (Dual-Core i5,1.7GHz,4GB,256GB Flash,HD Graphics)
HP G62
There are many variations of HP G62 laptop but they are all, fundamentally, budget machines with an impressive spec. The G62-A45SA, for example, has a 2.27GHz Intel Core i3 350M processor, 3GB of RAM and a 250GB hard drive. Even 12 months ago 3GB of RAM would be unheard of in a laptop costing less than £500. The casing looks like aluminium (it isn’t) and so has a smidgen of MacBook cachet. Battery life is respectable for the money at around four hours, it runs Windows 7, has a 15.6 inch high def. screen and DVD writer. A lower spec. a G62 can be had for the thin end of £300. If you have a style-conscious teenager, they’re unlikely to feel too hard-done-by if this ends up in their Christmas sack.
Around £400. More info here
Buy New HP G62-a14SA CoreDuo P6000 1.86GHz 15.6″ 320GB/2GB/WIFI/HD WIN 7 64-bit
Samsung R580
In a departure from the standard black or silver the R580 has a shiny burgundy casing with an arty swirling pattern splattered upon it. Whether this will make you hurl or not is sort-of irrelevant because when the laptop’s open you won’t be able to see it. There are a few moans about battery life (which is a bit rubbish at around two hours when watching a movie) and screen resolution (which would still qualify as HD Ready if it was a TV) but in the main this is a well-spec’ed machine for not that much money. They’re even sold at Sainsbury’s. It weighs over 2.5kg, though, so is more desktop replacement than feather light travel companion. Be aware that although some software is included, on cheaper variants (the R580 can cost as little as £500) Microsoft Office might only be a trial version and will set you back at least another £109.99 for the 2010 Home/Student edition.
Available used/refurbished for around £530. More info here
Apple MacBook Pro 15”
How much do Fogies love pricing that says, ‘from £999…’ or somesuch. This means there is a basic product that you won’t want because you’ll know that if you shelled out just a tiny bit more money you’d not only get a ‘better’ product but also not be seen as a cheapskate, no matter how high the base price. So the MacBook Pro comes in 13”, 15” and 17” screen sizes from £999, £1,499 and £1,899 respectively. Reviewers probably favour the 15” because it’s powered by Intel’s i7 quad core processor – as is the 17” – but costs £400 less. The 13-incher still uses a Core 2 Duo CPU. And a 15” screen is still a good size. The casing is cast from one piece of aluminium and does look droolingly sleek. Unlike the MacBook Air, which is pared to the bone in terms of excess baggage, the MacBook Pro is fully loaded with connectivity options and a multi-function optical disc drive. It may seem slightly perverse, given Apple’s position at the cutting edge, that their products don’t support Blu-ray and that HDMI ‘out’ is only achievable with a non-Apple adapter but no one who’s anyone seems to be complaining. Too much.
Around £1,600 or less. More info here
Buy Apple Macbook Pro 15 inch Notebook (Intel Core i7 Quad Core 2.2GHz, 4GB RAM, 750GB HDD)
