Need Work Laptop for under $1k

podiacide on 04/10/2019 - 13:19

I won't go into detail but my new boss is a crazy tight ass. Its my first week and I found out he bought me a refurbished laptop which didnt work.

Today I asked him what his specs and budget are:

Is this even possible for under $1k?

14 Inch
256gb SSD
16 gb RAM
Good speakers
Windows 10

Where is the best place to find refurbished machines?

I could only find the Lenovo e490 which looks a bit limited.

I'm a BDM, I'll be doing lots of demos on this and travelling with it a lot. And yes we are a small multinational tech company who is supposedly at the cutting edge of AI in our field. Apart from my boss being a ridiculous tight ass the job seems ok (he is into refurbished everything)

Computing Computer Laptop

Comments

  • Skramit on 04/10/2019 - 13:22
    +4

    Apart from my boss being a ridiculous tight ass the job seems ok (he is into refurbished everything)

    So he's an OzBargainer like all of us….. that sounds like an excellent trait to me!

  • KahluaKhan on 04/10/2019 - 13:36

    I've used the Dell outlet before and have found them to be pretty good. Outlet

    • scrimshaw on 04/10/2019 - 14:04

      I would personally skip the mainstream Inspiron series and go straight to the business grade latitudes. They are much more robust and well built.

      • cwongtech on 06/10/2019 - 18:56

        Since the implementation of 3 years NBD ProSupport warranty, their prices increased..

        You'd need a Latitude 7300 or 7400 (no 2-in-1) to even have close to 16GB RAM..

        Latitude 7400 clamshell version is nowhere near under $1k, even refurb.. let alone 16GB RAM
        Clamshell version you can DIY upgrade the RAM though I believe, 2-in-1 variant is soldered on

  • hoey888 on 04/10/2019 - 15:23
    +1

    Can be done without the 16GB ram requirement. Could always use it for a while then upgrade more ram in future

    https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/486145
    https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/482608

    • podiacide on 04/10/2019 - 15:51

      Yeah I know but this is what specs my boss wants - 16gb RAM. I just think he is being too unrealistic. Really bad omen for first week.

      • scrimshaw on 04/10/2019 - 18:30

        I think your boss is even more of a tightarse than mine :p

        • podiacide on 05/10/2019 - 10:21

          Yeah its so infuriating. Especially in my first week. He met my ambit claims on wage demands though. He just seems obsessed by refurbished technology. Ridiculous.

  • ode1online on 04/10/2019 - 18:13

    cutting edge you say..

    • podiacide on 05/10/2019 - 10:24

      Well IBM just signed us up to be their digital voice for their Watson platform and we are seen as one of the world leaders in Deep Neural Network digital voice technology. Research centres in Korea and Sweden. Amazon nearly bought out the company. Which makes me bosses tightass tendencies even more absurd. But he part owns the Australian subsidiary.

      • ode1online on 05/10/2019 - 16:33

        It is absurd, id avoid a refurbed laptop ,too many things to go wrong with it. Totally understand buying a second hand dell desktop pc as the things that usually fail are easily replaced, but laptops have major restrictions as so many components are on the one pcb , batteries and ram and the CPU are typically soldered to the pcb, the LCD ribbon cables fail. on and on.

        Your specs are missing the CPU as the CPU is the BRAINS of the computer it should be the focus of your purchase.. Not just the RAM
        also What PORTS are required ?

        14 Inch
        256gb SSD
        16 gb RAM
        Good speakers
        Windows 10

        Will the software you are demonstrating be installed on your laptop or are you playing videos? ? What is the software will you be using?

        Id be buying new , as it has longevity and warranty , there's nothing to say a refurb will last more than 6 months

        asus Zen book is often less than 1K on ebay with 20% , look at those or wait for another Lenovo sale..

        • cwongtech on 06/10/2019 - 18:58

          It is absurd, id avoid a refurbed laptop ,too many things to go wrong with it

          For Dell Outlet, Latitudes come with 3 year NBD warranty. Some of them were sample units sent to customers but cannot be resold as new.
          I've bought 7 refurbished latitudes, all of them look new, only 1 was a complete lemon (there was something wrong with the screen), and pretty much every faulty part was replaced under warranty.

          • ode1online on 06/10/2019 - 22:09

            @cwongtech: Good to know..

            • cwongtech on 06/10/2019 - 23:45

              @ode1online: I'm not saying always buy or don't buy a refurb, I'm just saying, try to find out the reason why it's classed as that.
              I.e. for the laptops that are 5 years old.. yeah.. unless someone's wallet is barely existent, I would avoid.

              Just like buying a second-hand car, find out why it's "refurbished"
              P.s. the latitudes I buy are usually only released to the market a few months prior.. How refurbished can it really be!?

              • ode1online on 07/10/2019 - 02:04

                @cwongtech: Yeah for sure, there is a difference from a returned unit that's been repaired by the manufacturer or a factory second as opposed to something that's been in the field and returned at end of lease. If you are getting warranty then definitely worth it.

  • Laziofogna on 04/10/2019 - 19:38
    +1

    You should have said it was a school requirement for your kid to have a hundred suggestions.

  • ziaxk87 on 05/10/2019 - 06:47

    Dell

  • bazzato on 07/10/2019 - 19:10

    https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Dell-E7450-14-i7-5600u-2-6GHz-16…

    Just go onto eBay, type laptop and then refine by 16GB ram

    Im not sure how a company can be on the cutting edge of AI and not have some sort of procurement plan for IT equipment.

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