Recertified, risk, and comparisons

Hi. I've been looking at many posts regarding the new Asus G73 line laptops. It appears that they have a lot of problems, and only the newest iteration, currently sold at Best Buy, has most of the fixes completed at this point.

Asus - Laptop / Intel® Core™ i7 Processor / 17.3" Display / 6GB Memory / 640GB Hard Drive - Black - G73JH-BST7
($1200)


I've been looking about buying a laptop, and I noticed that many refurbished models are being sold at a very cheap price for what they contain:
Newegg.com - Recertified: ASUS G Series G73JH-RBBX05 NoteBook Intel Core i7 720QM(1.60GHz) 17.3" 6GB Memory DDR3 1066 500GB HDD 7200rpm DVD Super Multi ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5870
i7 720
ATI 4870

for only $850.



By comparison, the nearest competitor is the MSI GX740:
Newegg.com - MSI GX740-235US NoteBook Intel Core i5 450M(2.40GHz) 17.0" Wide SXGA+ 4GB Memory 320GB HDD 7200rpm DVD Super Multi ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5870 Broadway XT
i5
ATI 4870

for $1100.



I was practically ready to jump on the refurbished deal until I heard all the problems that occurred even with the new version.


Is the $300 in savings worth the poor initial build quality + risks inherent in recertified laptops?


Or should I try to get the bestbuy one, which is new, has all the fixes, and has a i7 740?


But I don't want to spend an additional $300-400 if the risk is minimal or manageable (i.e. fixable if I DIY it)


What are your suggestions?

 

Just a note for you, the BB models only come with a 1 year warranty. If you purchase from an Asus re-seller you get a 2 year warranty and a 1 year accidental. Personally, I would stay away from the referbs, they've been hit or miss.

 

Hope you jumped on the recertified model, newegg I'd one of the fee that fix the overheating issue. The issues that people have now is really just being picky. Use the windows driver for audio and the touchpad and the problems are gone.

 

I just bought the G73 refurb from btotech. 999$ base price, 155$ for a 3-year warranty. They can do a repaste for 75$, though they say you shouldn't need one for their products. This seemed like a great deal. They seem really responsive to issues as you can see from their forum.

I don't usually trust refurbs, but if they offer a 3 year warranty that cheap, they probably trust their products. The usual word of mouth is don't pay more than 25% of the laptops value for a two year warranty. Their two year warranty is 99$ (10%). And you'd expect it to be even higher for a refurb.

 

I wouldn't buy squat from that company, have you even seen how they take appart a laptop? Sure their guide is nice, but the guy really man handles the laptop and does not use a anti static protector.