HEL-80 buyer question

I have decided to go for the HEL-80 as my first notebook. It fits into my budget, has cool featuers, can do games, and looks nice! I do have a few questions regarding this notebook before I make my purchase though.

The GPU seems fine for the time being, but will I be able to upgrade it in the future if I want to? Has anyone played BF2 or BF2142 on the HEL-80 and if so how well did it work? Finally, does anyone know which hard drive is in the HEL-80 on newegg the 5400RPM or 7200RPM? I asked the newegg customer service, but they just said that I will have to contact the manufacturer.

( link: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16834227015 )

 

I bought an HEL-80 from PowerNotebooks (PN) and like it a lot. I also bought my desktop as components from NewEgg and like them too. I notice that the NewEgg description on the HEL-80 doesn't mention wireless or Bluetooth. I don't know if those are important to you, but you can get them from PN. Also check out the different hard drives available at PN; they definitely have 7200 RPM drives. If you want a 3 year warranty it is standard at PowerNotebooks, and the total price will beat NewEgg. You also might want to check out the reseller ratings on iBuyPower before you decide.

As far as the games you mentioned, I don't play any of them, so someone else will have to comment on that.

From all I have heard, the GPU in this laptop and most others is NOT upgradeable.

 

You cannot upgrade GPUs in notebooks. This is universally true with very few exceptions.

I would also recommend going with a reputable reseller like powernotebooks--if not only for the fact that they give you a standard 3 year warranty with next business day shipping both ways. Not to mention you can configure it exactly the way you want to.

 

search the compal forum here for bf2142. I've posted sevaral times about it. Sum it up, they work great! (also play bf2 on mine)

 

hey thanks for the input guys, I went to powernotebook.com to build the same notebook as newegg has, came out to be almost $350 more expensive.

One more question though, if newegg doesnt sell the wireless and bluetooth with the notebook will it be possible to purchase these items later and put them in manualy? Isnt there slots for these on the side of the laptop?

I checked the reseller ratings on IBUYPOWER and I'm hearing bad things about them, thats why I rather buy the PC directly through newegg even though its an ibuypower notebook ( if thats how it works )

 

My BF2 settings are maxed out, looks -very- sweet.

This is with the "old" duo T2500, 2 gigs of RAM and a 5400 RPM drive (the rest is the same for everyone).

 

Noomi: The wireless and Bluetooth are internal cards. They don't go in the PCMCIA or ExpressCard slots. I didn't see the BT in the NewEgg data so am assuming it isn't included. I got one of the very early HEL-80s and the BT card didn't come with it--it came later and I had to install it myself. It is a very small card with a very small multi-pin cable and connector and it goes underneath the hard drive; the instructions from PN were great. I wish I could help you with the warranty issue, but I don't know how iBuyPower is to deal with, and the 3 year warranty from them brings the price up to beyond PN. All I know is that PN support is superb. I've called them 4 times for miscellaneous things and a tech (not an operator) answers in seconds and I've had answers in a few minutes. Good luck!

 

Hmm, I just noticed that newegg does infact sell the notebook with a WLAN card .

Communications:
Modem: 56K
LAN: 10/100/1000Mbps
WLAN: 802.11b/g Wireless LAN

There is no mention of the bluetooth card which I really would like to have. Since you said that it is pretty easily installed, I almost %100 positive I will go with this notebook. It sucks that there is no warranty, but I have purchased from newegg many times before and was very satisfied with their service... so I'm willing to take this risk, then again I have 14 days to return if anything is wrong, and after that if anything goes wrong I can always take my notebook to a CompUSA or something and get it repaired.

Thanks everyone for the input, it is much appreciated, hopefully soon I will be the new owner of HEL80

Oh, and before I forget. Eggum, which bluetooth card did you purchase as I might be interested in one as well if the laptop wont have one already.

 

oh man, newegg just went out of stock on the HEL80 for $1,500. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to wait for the Asus G1 :/

 

noomi I am sorry but if I configured the NewEgg model to the specs from PowerNotebooks you would save $200 dollars and you wouldn't get an extended warranty. So keep in perspective that you could also build your own with even better parts and again compare it to PN and you would save around $200 with no warranty. I struggled with the same decisions and I like NewEgg also but fair is fair it simply isn't as big a savings in reality as it would appear from simple numbers alone. Now if you are on a tight budget maybe the risk is worth the savings but be careful because laptops do have issues and they usually don't show themselves for around 6-8 months. I compared my system from PN with the NewEgg model with the parts I wanted and it is almost exactly the same except for the warranty:

1400 Compal HEL80
100 Matte Screen 1680x1050
150 Seagate Momentus 7200rpm drive
150 Windows XP Professional
-----
$1800

Granted I would still have the original drive but I would have no warranty a three year warranty from NewEgg is $400.

 

also keep in mind with this that most notebook repairs are minimum 2 hours labor plus any parts needed. Most shops charge 65-105 per hour to work on laptops. Lets say the motherboard fails after 14 months eh?

From my previous 9 years of tech repair work, to replace a motherboard you would be looking at around 3-4 hours in labor, plus the cost of the motherboard. The average motherboard takes about 5 business days to arrive granted you can find a place that actually has the exact one you need in stock. Plus, the shop you take it to is going to take atleast 1 business day to determine the motherboard is bad and order the part, plus atleast 1 day to install the new board when it gets there.. alot of shops also keep it overnight to burn it in.. so lets just call this 2 business days..

Cheapest Fasted Estimated Turn around:
65 x 4 = $260 in labor
1 x mb = $250+ for this new a board
Total spending is $510 bucks.
Now for the time lost.. We will assume your system fails early morning and the tech shop can look at it that day..
1 Day = Determine whats wrong
5 Day = Wait for part
2 Day = Install and burn-in
So now you have spent 8 business days (nearly two weeks) and $510 bucks to fix your system after 13 months (I used that because all the 1 year warranty stuff would be gone) Now, after 24 months your LCD backlight goes out... 2 hours + hardware again..

These are of course only possibly problems, your system may never get any issues you can't resolve yourself, but I used to specialize in notebook repair (made extra money over a normal tech that way!) and I can tell you that 1/3 of the notebooks coming in the owners were told to buy a new system, because the cost of repair was almost the price of the parts, and their system is still the same speed as it was before.. Just for numbers people...

1500 bucks now for a notebook
13 months from now you replace the motherboard for $560
24 months from now you replace the backlight for $150 (hope you dont need an entire new LCD)
so now, 24 months later you have been without you system for probably three weeks total, and you have paid $2310 and you will maybe get 1/4th of that when you go to resell it to buy your next laptop. Thats assuming someone will buy it without a warranty..

Now, if you buy the notebook from powernotebooks and get the 3 year warranty.. you only ever paid the first price to get it from them, they pay fast shipping both ways, plus, you can sell the laptop in 2 years for 1/3 or so what you paid and have a better chance of it actually selling, plus get a higher price for it since you can give the new owner the last year of the warranty.

 

PieceOfChum and pyro9219 make excellent points above. I will also add that in this industry, you generally get what you pay for. Oftentimes, by saving a few bucks, you are cutting something out like top-notch support or an excellent warranty.

Ultimately the choice is yours, but ibuypower is not highly recommended by many here, and I know you will find a lot of NBR members that are very high on resellers like powernotebooks. Remember that a notebook is only as good as its support.

 

Noomi: The bluetooth card I have is the one that PowerNotebooks includes if you buy that option. It is made by Foxconn and is Bluetooth 2.0+EDR. The chip is a Broadcom BCM92045NMD. I do not know where you could buy it elsewhere. You might ask Donald or Ron at PowerNotebooks if it is available separately, or maybe Google it.

 

You can buy it from powernotebooks. It is said to be very easy to install. I believe powernotebooks has the instructions for it on their website as well.