New Laptop

[sodakjoe]

I'd recommend buying from the TechCyte area in the ISU Bookstore. They offer pretty good deals to students. However, you may have to wait until she is officially a student.
Tech CYte - Home

The best thing about buying a Dell through the University is the warranty. You have to pay a little more than you would buying a refurb or whatever, but you'll get a no questions asked replacement policy, and she can get it fixed right on campus by the University, for free. It's definitely worth looking at, although the price is going to be a little more than what you've stated your range is.

For those who don't think warranties come in handy: You have no idea how many times I had kids come in and tell me their "roommate" spilled "something" on their keyboard and fried a bunch of stuff. Trust me, it's worth it.

 

[dmclone]

The Best Laptops Under $500

I normally buy Dell but I bought a Gateway for my wife the last time and I have to say I've been pretty impressed so far.

 

[Cy4Patriots]

Personally, I'd go with Dell. A couple of the main reasons....1 - Dell offers accidental damage protection for fairly cheap. So, you spill something on it or drop it, it's covered. 2 - You can get warranty work done onsite at ISU for Dell (as well as Apple) so you don't have to mess around mailing the thing in if something fails.

Warranty Service and Vendor Partnerships | Computer Service & Repair | IT Services

Info for purchasing through the ISU Bookstore is at Tech CYte - Home.

Generally speaking (not knowing what her major is) I'd do an Intel i5 (or better) processor and a minimum 4 GB of memory (RAM). Hard drives anymore are all plenty big so storage isn't much of an issue. If she's going to be in engineering, I'd make sure you get a discreet (non-integrated) graphics card (ATI or Nvidia). It'd be a good idea to think about an external hard drive for backup purposes as well. The little Western Digital Passports are nice and compact and work well. The ISU Bookstore carries those as well.

1. Be responsible.
2. Intel i5? Really, I didn't see the OP say, he wanted to do 3D graphic drawings?
3. Backup? Really? Store everything in the cloud. All docs, pics, etc. This is a good idea, but not a necessity.

 

[CYdTracked]

I like the Lenovo T series laptop, we use them at work and they have outlasted any Dell, HP, or Gateway we have ever used. Only drawback is the low end models are near the top of your price range but I think its worth the most bang for your buck. I'm typing this on an IBM (Lenovo bought the Thinkpad series) Thinkpad T42 which is at least a 7 year old laptop. I'm running XP on 2 GB RAM and I can't tell any difference in speed than my new Win7 HP PC at work for your basic usage like internet and Office products. The Thinkpad series is a very durable built laptop that's not flimsy like some of the cheaper laptops and is going to last for years even if someone treat it rough. I haven't replaced a part yet on my Thinkpad and I probably place way less warranty claims on the Lenovo laptops at work than I do any other brand we have in our environment.

 

[4VR4CY]

If you wait until June orientation she can get the ISU TechCyte discount. She will have to have her student id and print out of her schedule (she will get both in June). The biggest savings will be on software. ISU student pricing on software is GREAT. If she is an Engineering student, the CoE has IT computer recommendations on their website.

 

[scotteric58]

a mac is the only way to go. you are paying for the name, yes but your also paying for quality!
and when it comes to support, apple replaved EVERYTHING extrtnal on my computer just cause I dropped it and dented it. everything worked fine but I didn't like how it looked. $670+ and they did it for free! no questions asked.

 

[josh4isu]

macbook pro. you wont have to buy her another computer ever again if she treats it right.

 

[NATEizKING]

Never had any serious problems with Dell. My whole family has them and I think the worst problem we've encountered was a battery no longer charging after three years which is around an $80 replacement and mine died completely after around five years but I took that thing around the world 37 times including a complimentary swimming lesson that it survived.

My brother had an HP once and bought the expensive warranty plan and then something went wrong with his screen. They claimed he shut a pencil or pen inside it. They refused to cover it and wanted to charge 3/4 the original cost of the laptop in repairs. Haven't gone HP since.

 

[mramseyISU]

Holy hell those Mac books are expensive. Reading this had me curious to what they cost. Dude get her a Dell.

 

[dmclone]

Holy hell those Mac books are expensive. Reading this had me curious to what they cost. Dude get her a Dell.

They are only 3x as much.

 

[Goothrey]

Get a Dell.

Customizable, good customer service/warranty policy, and inexpensive. I have a dell inspirion 15 and it is going on 3 years with no issues what so ever.

Intel I3 processor and 500 gig hard drive should suffice.

 

[GoSTATE71]

I know you said $700 is the max, but a macbook pro for college is awesome. Not sure if you could swing it or not as computers are expensive and a big investment but I'd highly recommend that and if not a Dell is great, i had a dell before i bought myself a macbook.

 

[cytech]

They are only 3x as much.

Yup just think a average laptop will last maybe 5 years maybe longer or less depending on how you take care of it or what you use it for. So you can buy 3 laptops over 15 years for the price of one macbook. Both the Macbook and the dell will be outdated after the 5 years.

 

[Cy4Patriots]

I know you said $700 is the max, but a macbook pro for college is awesome. Not sure if you could swing it or not as computers are expensive and a big investment but I'd highly recommend that and if not a Dell is great, i had a dell before i bought myself a macbook.

Ahhh of course, OP says max of 700 and Apple fanboys come in and say, "just pay double your max amount and it will be worth it"

To the OP: It's not worth it. Macs are great, no doubt, but if any money is one of the deciding factors, Macs are out of the picture.

If MAC and PC's were both 700 that would be more of a debate.

 

[JUKEBOX]

The most reliable brands are generally:
Toshiba
Asus
Acer
Lenovo
Apple (rip-off)

Here's an idea for a laptop...
Newegg.com - Acer Aspire AS7750G-6662 Notebook Intel Core i5 2430M(2.40GHz) 17.3" 4GB Memory DDR3 1066 640GB HDD 5400rpm DVD Super Multi AMD Radeon HD 6650M

 

[MaccloNe]

The most reliable brand is Apple. Everything else is a ripoff.

FIFY.

 

[alarson]

FIFY.

Lulz. For the price i can afford to have my laptop die in half the time, and the second laptop will be more powerful than either the first or the macbook.

 

[NebrClone]

Check out the Dell Outlet. You can find great deals there.

Dell Outlet | Refurbished Computers, Laptops, PCs & More | Dell

I have bought 30+ computers on the Dell Outlet. I have saved a lot of money over the years for my com[any.