Updated 26 May, 2012, 4:18 pm IST

Business Laptops For All Budgets: Round 2

28 Jul, 2010, 8:31 am IST | by Dushyant Khilnani

So which one of these latest machines is going to sit on your desk?

In round one of business laptops of for all budgets, we listed a few machines that featured old and new hardware, like the Intel Core 2 duo and the latest Core series of CPUs. In this article, let’s take a look at business machines, preferably with newer hardware. Since laptops from a given brand have variants belonging to two or sometimes all three segments, entry-level, mainstream and high-end, we shall discuss them together as opposed to categorically.

Lenovo Ideapad V460 (Entry-level and mainstream)

Weight: 2.2 kg
Screen Size / resolution: 14-inch / 1366 x 768
Processor: Intel Core i3-330M, 2.13 GHz
RAM: 4 GB DDR3
Hard drive: 320 GB
Graphics: Intel HD
Operating System: Free DOS
Price: Rs 36,400

Targeted towards the small business segment, the V460 series of laptops offer good value for money, in terms of hardware. Looking at the specs, a notable downer is the absence of a Windows Operating System, especially considering that there are laptops with this hardware, which offer Windows 7 in a similar price band. This model has variants which offer Windows, but their price starts at Rs 45,000, going upto Rs 50,600 (Core i5 CPU with dual graphics). The rest of the hardware is the same.

HP EliteBook 2540p (Entry-level, mainstream and high-end)

Weight: 1.53 kg
Screen Size / resolution: 12.1-inch / 1280 x 800
Processor: Intel Core i5-520M, 2.40 GHz
RAM: upto 8 GB DDR3
Hard drive: 250 GB to 500 GB (SSD variants are also available)
Graphics: Intel HD
Operating System: Windows 7 Professional/Home Premium/Home Basic/Vista/DOS
Price: Rs 45,000 approx. (Awaiting confirmation from HP)

The approximate price mentioned above is for the mainstream model which features a Core i5 CPU, and other variants should be similarly priced. You’ll also find Core i7 variants at higher prices of course, which will put this machine into the high-end segment.

The status and prices for the HP laptops have been updated (at the end of this post)

Dell Vostro 3300 (Entry-level and mainstream)
Weight: 1.90 kg
Screen Size / resolution: 13.3-inch / 1366 x 768
Processor: Intel Core i3-330M, 2.13 GHz
RAM: 2 GB DDR3
Hard drive: 250 GB (7200 rpm also available)
Graphics: Intel GMA HD
Operating system: Windows 7 Home Basic
Price: Rs 35,900

Apart from this Rs 35,900 model, you can choose three other configurations with some upgrades in the hardware, specifically RAM and hard drive, rest, the other three models feature Core i5 CPUs. Similar is the case with the Vostro 3400, 3500 and 3700, where the screens are larger (14 / 15.3 and 17.3) and, the CPU variants are different (with slightly higher clock speed). Since the hardware specs are quite similar, there will be little difference across variants of the same CPU (in a real-world scenario), but yes, a Core i5 evidently performs much better than Core i3. We’d say that this laptop is a good pick, mainly for its form factor and weight, at this price.

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