Should I recommend a CF-52MK2 to a friend?

Hi everyone,
I have had a CF-19MK2 for a few years and a friend has asked my to help him get a laptop for his new job. He was just going to go to Best Buy and spend about $700. Now here is the fun thing. He works in the environmental field, doing things like detoxing industrial sites. Hazardous waste, chemicals, etc. He "says" that the laptop will just be used in his new home office. Then why not get a desktop? Well, sometimes I'll need to take it into the field. My point exactly when I said he will need something a little more durable than a simple (insert major brand name here) laptop. Seeing that his budget will not afford him a new Toughbook, I looked on line and found a couple of CF-52s. One is a CF-52GCMBVAM for $325, with a 250Gb HDD and no OS loaded. The other is a CF-52GFNBVAM for $500 with a 160GB HDD and Vista installed. I figure that based on the performance of my 19MK2, that these 52s should work fine. He is going to be doing stuff like Excel, Word and doing invoicing with Quickbooks. I figure that if we can get the one for $325 and with the rest of his budget buy Windows 7 and Office 2013. That would bring us in at about the same price as what he is looking to spend at the Big Box stores, plus, while the 52 wouldn't perform as fast as a i3 or i5 laptop, after the first drop on to the floor in a factory, the 52 would still be working!
Is this a good idea or I'm I going to regret suggesting this to him?
If we do go this way, should I go with Win7 or will Win8 work on a 52?
Thanks,
Ted

 

Good idea, your friend will thank you after a "few" drops for sure LOL. I'd also consider getting Office 2010 vs. 2013 and put bux saved into a solid state drive ~120GB. That should make it a bit faster, longer battery life, and definitely tougher.

I have no experience with Win8, but Win7 should run well.

 

+2 on the SSD and office 2010.

 

I wonder if anyone has tried Windows 8 on a 52? It's about half the price of 7.

 

This is just a guess on what both 52's have in them so I would go with the cheaper one . I have 3 52's (MK1,2 and 4) and they run very good with XP but I now run W7 on all of them. I have also installed SSD's in all of them to and they are very fast...boots into windows in about 22-25 seconds . I did try W8 but did not like it at all...maybe if it was a touch screen I might like it... maybe

Also the restore disk for these are around $25.00 (XP)

 

Thanks Tough. May I asked where you pulled the specs up from? I have been trying to find more details but gave up after an hour of Googling. I tried config.toughbook.com, but it wouldn't pull up the specs from the CF-52 model numbers. Do you know what the vPro is? Can you add Bluetooth to the 52s? (I had to put the BT module into my Dell XT2, seeing as my company didn't think that we used BT in the field.)
BTW, your on the boarder, but are you on the side with Coffee Crisp or Babe Ruth? )

 

I could not find your model # so I changed the one letter it did not list...the V to a X
CF-52GFNBVAM to CF-52GFNB XAM

I like things crispy :thumbsup:

 

Depending on the type of screens he likes he may also want to consider a CF-30 or 74 model.