Thread: Laptop choice

Originally Posted by Fluids

Can anyone tell me which of the two machines I listed is the outright better spec' machine ??

The Toshiba gives you the older generation processor and slower DD3 Ram - but i7 rather than i5 and twice the size of SSD.


The Dell gives you newer generation processor and DDR4 RAM - but only 1/2 the SSD size and lower spec processor

One is Win 7 the other Win 10..... Looks like you can get windows 10 drivers for the Toshiba so if the OS was a concern you could upgrade easily enough.

I doubt you will pick a huge difference between them to be honest.

Personally I'd lean to the Toshiba - have you got hands on with them both?.... which one do you like?

Originally Posted by Bytemrk

The Toshiba gives you the older generation processor and slower DD3 Ram - but i7 rather than i5 and twice the size of SSD.


The Dell gives you newer generation processor and DDR4 RAM - but only 1/2 the SSD size and lower spec processor

One is Win 7 the other Win 10..... Looks like you can get windows 10 drivers for the Toshiba so if the OS was a concern you could upgrade easily enough.

I doubt you will pick a huge difference between them to be honest.

Personally I'd lean to the Toshiba - have you got hands on with them both?.... which one do you like?

Thanks Mark .... No, can't get hands on, so unfortunately it's purely down to research & advice.

My current A10 is a 1680x1050 15" and the Toshiba is a 1600x900 14" ... research again seems to place both close, whereas the Dell is only 1366x768. The Toshiba has a Nvidia GeForce 16S-GM 2GB video, the Dell only the onboard GPU, so in theory, the Toshiba should have a better video capability.

Checking the CPU's against one another online seems to have them about on a par with one another ... much of a muchness performance wise as I see it.

Both can be docked. My A10 lives in a dock at work. My 2x older SatPro4600 PIII's are docked as well.

DDR3 vs DDR4 .... 33% faster on the Dell and a CPU than can go 32GB ... jury's out on that one for my use. Don't think it matters too much. Extra 8GB in the Toshiba will be around $50-60 and 16GB is plenty.

The Toshiba out-of-the-box means I don't have to root around upgrading the SSD and re-install the OS ... and Win7 Pro 64 bit will be just fine as it's more business use oriented ... can update to Win10Pro at a later date IF I feel the need (but all the extra crap Win10 seems to have is just stuff I wouldn't need or use), and since both have a 3yrs warranty (Toshiba is a prepaid return/deliver - Dell is onsite) it covers me until the end-of-support for Win7 anyway and maybe by then I can get a newer machine with Win10 ??

Yes, my feeling was it's a case of 6 or one 1/2 doz' the other, with the Toshiba being around $100 cheaper with an easy Ram update for $50 ... Which one do I like ? ... The Toshiba, based on my good run with the current A10 and 2x previous Toshiba's .... both have 4G/LTE which I wasn't looking for, so that's just a bonus, and the Toshiba is still listed on the Toshiba Aus website at $2805 ... I'm paying $879, so nearly a $2000 saving ... the Dell site shows as current, but with 256SSD + 4G/LTE options makes it $2750 ... I'm paying $990 with 128SSD ... add Ram and 256SSD upgrade by me and its around $1240 ... $360 more + my time to get it sorted & setup.

... thank you very much for your thoughts ... kind of confirms what I've been thinking ... the Toshiba's looking good I think. Hope the 14" screen is workable as I've been used to the 15.4" for a long time ... ??

Hey! It's only money !!