Wanted: Mainstream laptop around 37k

1) What is your budget?
Between INR 30-40k

2) What size & weight consideration (if any) would you prefer?
Mainstream; 15" - 16" screen

3) What are the primary tasks you will be performing with this notebook?

Casual Gaming
Coding
Lot of TypeWork

5) Any typical configuration in your mind you're eying for ?

Must have at least 4GB of DDR4 RAM, a Core i3(at least 2GHz), and discrete Graphics(preferebly Nvidia 900 series)
I am not much aware of AMD specs, but suggestions are welcome

4) Are there any brands that you prefer or any you really don't like?
Nothing of that sort, only the customer service must be decent.

6) Anything else you would like to say?
Battery back up: extended (5-7hrs)
The laptop MUST have a really good keyboard(capable of handling a lot of typing) and a Solid overall build.

E|e<tr0|!0n said:
Anyone?

Buy HP 15-AY513TX 15.6-inch Laptop (6th Gen Core i3-6006U/8GB/1TB/DOS/2GB Graphics), Turbo Silver Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in @ 36k

bssunilreddy said:
Buy HP 15-AY513TX 15.6-inch Laptop (6th Gen Core i3-6006U/8GB/1TB/DOS/2GB Graphics), Turbo Silver Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in @ 36k

Thanks.......... This suggestion was great...........
Are there any more options I can look out for? Perhaps from brands like Lenovo or Dell, or from Japanese ones like Fujitsu and Toshiba?

bssunilreddy said:
Buy HP 15-AY513TX 15.6-inch Laptop (6th Gen Core i3-6006U/8GB/1TB/DOS/2GB Graphics), Turbo Silver Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in @ 36k

Is the Readon R5's graphics performance very good?

E|e<tr0|!0n said:
Thanks.......... This suggestion was great...........
Are there any more options I can look out for? Perhaps from brands like Lenovo or Dell, or from Japanese ones like Fujitsu and Toshiba?

Could not find anything from Fujitsu, Toshiba & Dell.
Buy Lenovo Ideapad 80UD0144IH (Core i3 6006U/8GB Ram /1TB HDD/Win10/15.6" Display/Intergrated Graphics ) Black Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in

E|e<tr0|!0n said:
Is the Readon R5's graphics performance very good?

Radeon R5 is entry level GPU.

OS doesn't matter, I can install one myself
All I need is a robust all-round laptop that can easily handle daily intensive use and last for quite a long time.
Also I need the battery life to be decent.

Any more options with great performance for the value?

E|e<tr0|!0n said:
OS doesn't matter, I can install one myself
All I need is a robust all-around laptop that can easily handle daily intensive use and last for quite a long time.
Also, I need the battery life to be decent.
Any more options with great performance for the value?

Some more options:
Buy Lenovo G50-80 15.6-inch Laptop (Core i3-5005U/8GB/1TB/Windows 10 Home/2GB Graphics), Black Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in
Buy Lenovo Ideapad 110 80UD014CIH 15.6-inch Laptop (6th Gen Core i5-6200U/8GB/1TB/DOS/2GB Graphics), Black Texture Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in
Buy HP 15-AY079TX 15.6-inch Laptop (Core i3-5005U/8GB/1TB/Windows 10 Home/2GB Graphics), Turbo Silver Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in

W

Buy Asus A555LF-XX410T 15.6-Inch Laptop(Core i3-5005U/8GB/1TB/Windows 10/NVIDIA GeForce 930M Graphic), Dark Brown Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in

It has nvidia 930m graphics which is the best you are going to find under/around 40k laptops.I don't think any laptop manufacturer provides a graphics card faster than 930m(including equivalent radeon cards) in laptops below 50k in India.

Else you can go for this model with 920m graphics but a full HD 1080p screen(a rarity in laptops below 40k).
Buy Asus A540LJ-DM667D 15.6" FULL HD Screen Laptop (Core i3 5th Gen, 4 GB RAM DDR3, 1 TB HDD, 2GB NVIDIA Graphics Card, Bluetooth, Wifi, Webcam, DOS), Silver Color with 2 Years Warranty Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in

In either case I strongly suggest to buy from official Asus store & buy ADP(accidental damage protection) warranty addon pack for 2 years along with the 2 years extended warranty by spending a few hundred more(it is worth it).

Is there a significant difference in performance related to DDR3 and DDR4 RAM?
How do I compare AMD CPUs and GPUs with Intel and Nvidia? Is it even worth it to consider buying a laptop with an APU?

W

Nothing you can notice in day-to-day tasks on a laptop.For a long time(almost 10 years) now intel processors are ahead of amd processors in almost every aspect & only with the recent launch of Ryzen desktop processors by AMD,things have started to change.For laptops however,there is not even such competition & intel processors are reigning.Only reason for considering dedicated graphics card is some casual gaming that requires something more than an entry level graphics card & if you are interested in trying out some image processing options in video players to enhance picture quality.

whitestar_999 said:
Buy Asus A555LF-XX410T 15.6-Inch Laptop(Core i3-5005U/8GB/1TB/Windows 10/NVIDIA GeForce 930M Graphic), Dark Brown Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in

It has nvidia 930m graphics which is the best you are going to find under/around 40k laptops.I don't think any laptop manufacturer provides a graphics card faster than 930m(including equivalent radeon cards) in laptops below 50k in India.

Else you can go for this model with 920m graphics but a full HD 1080p screen(a rarity in laptops below 40k).
Buy Asus A540LJ-DM667D 15.6" FULL HD Screen Laptop (Core i3 5th Gen, 4 GB RAM DDR3, 1 TB HDD, 2GB NVIDIA Graphics Card, Bluetooth, Wifi, Webcam, DOS), Silver Color with 2 Years Warranty Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in

In either case I strongly suggest to buy from official Asus store & buy ADP(accidental damage protection) warranty addon pack for 2 years along with the 2 years extended warranty by spending a few hundred more(it is worth it).

These laptops have older generation CPUs
Is the difference in raw performance negligible between 5xxxU and 6xxxU core processors?

E|e<tr0|!0n said:
These laptops have older generation CPUs
Is the difference in raw performance negligible between 5xxxU and 6xxxU core processors?

Get this:
Buy Asus X541UV-XO029D 15.6-inch Laptop (Intel Core i5-6198DU/4GB/1TB/DOS/2GB Graphics), Black Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in

SaiyanGoku said:
Get this:
Buy Asus X541UV-XO029D 15.6-inch Laptop (Intel Core i5-6198DU/4GB/1TB/DOS/2GB Graphics), Black Online at Low Prices in India - Amazon.in

Can I increase the RAM in this one as soon as I get it? If so, what will be the cost?
Also I've heard that buying online brings in warranty issues, does this stand true?

E|e<tr0|!0n said:
Can I increase the RAM in this one as soon as I get it? If so, what will be the cost?
Also I've heard that buying online brings in warranty issues, does this stand true?

Why should there be any warranty issues when the seller is Amazon India itself? For ram upgrade, I suggest you to look for official and youtube guides. Cost will depend on the ram speed and capacity you choose.

W

The performance difference between an equivalent 5th gen & 6th gen i3 is around 15-20% with 6th gen being better.However it all depends on your usage scenario also.For day-to-day tasks you will not see any performance improvements between them.In fact the only way you are going to see performance improvement on any laptop for day-to-day tasks is when adding a ssd which will cost you an extra 8k(around 7k for ssd & ~1k service charges for getting it installed in your laptop at authorized service centre without voiding warrant).Nvidia mobile graphics cards are more power efficient & run cooler than amd mobile graphics cards.Almost all such laptops have switchable graphics meaning graphics card will only be used for graphics intensive tasks like gaming while for all other things like windows desktop etc,processor's(aka intel) integrated graphics will be used so impact on battery life is not much for day-to-day tasks.

Also the thing to note is that some laptops only have drivers for win 10(like the above asus laptop posted by @SaiyanGoku ) which may not be suitable for some people.e.g.currently I am running win 8.1 on my laptop & have no plans of installing win 10 for at least next 1 year.

Here's another option I just found: Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (8 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux/2 GB Graphics) E5-575 Notebook Rs.40990 Price in India - Buy Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (8 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux/2 GB Graphics) E5-575 Notebook Black Online - Acer : Flipkart.com
Do give your opinion about it.

The warranty issues related to online shopping that I've heard is that most of the time it's some dealer(or supplier) in delhi and such far off places which give the warranty, and not the brand itself and so it makes it very difficult to claim any free repair..(pardon me if this appears as a very stupid question here, but I'm really clueless about this thing)
Can anyone please explain the whole warranty scenario related to online shopping of electronics?

E|e<tr0|!0n said:
Here's another option I just found: Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (8 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux/2 GB Graphics) E5-575 Notebook Rs.40990 Price in India - Buy Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (8 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux/2 GB Graphics) E5-575 Notebook Black Online - Acer : Flipkart.com
Do give your opinion about it.

The warranty issues related to online shopping that I've heard is that most of the time it's some dealer(or supplier) in delhi and such far off places which give the warranty, and not the brand itself and so it makes it very difficult to claim any free repair..(pardon me if this appears as a very stupid question here, but I'm really clueless about this thing)
Can anyone please explain the whole warranty scenario related to online shopping of electronics?

Looks good enough on paper but I'm not a fan of Acer's build quality of the laptops they launch in India.

If the product page says "Manufacturer Warranty" you'll get warranty from brand. If it mentions anything other than that, buy at your own risk.

Some guy @Travis58 apparently replied to this thread, and this appeared in my mail:-

I can make nothing out of it, and it's not present in the thread.

Anyway, the Acer E5-575G Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (8 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux/2 GB Graphics) E5-575 Notebook Rs.40990 Price in India - Buy Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (8 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux/2 GB Graphics) E5-575 Notebook Black Online - Acer : Flipkart.com with a 7th-gen i5 and 940MX graphics, as I've observed, is offering the highest specs in the sub-40k price segment out of all.
All my local dealers swear by this model, although online reviews state that it's got bad looks and a dim screen(I never cared about looks anyway..)
I've tried this one in a nearby store, and it does seem pretty decent to me.
Should I close my search on it?

E|e<tr0|!0n said:
Some guy @Travis58 apparently replied to this thread, and this appeared in my mail:-
View attachment 16971
I can make nothing out of it, and it's not present in the thread.

Anyway, the Acer E5-575G Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (8 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux/2 GB Graphics) E5-575 Notebook Rs.40990 Price in India - Buy Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (8 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux/2 GB Graphics) E5-575 Notebook Black Online - Acer : Flipkart.com with a 7th-gen i5 and 940MX graphics, as I've observed, is offering the highest specs in the sub-40k price segment out of all.
All my local dealers swear by this model, although online reviews state that it's got bad looks and a dim screen(I never cared about looks anyway..)
I've tried this one in a nearby store, and it does seem pretty decent to me.
Should I close my search on it?

That message is spam. By the way check if that model has expandable ram slots and m.2 slot for ssd for future upgrade.

E|e<tr0|!0n said:
Some guy @Travis58 apparently replied to this thread, and this appeared in my mail:-
View attachment 16971
I can make nothing out of it, and it's not present in the thread.
Anyway, the Acer E5-575G Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (8 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux/2 GB Graphics) E5-575 Notebook Rs.40990 Price in India - Buy Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (8 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux/2 GB Graphics) E5-575 Notebook Black Online - Acer : Flipkart.com with a 7th-gen i5 and 940MX graphics, as I've observed, is offering the highest specs in the sub-40k price segment out of all.
All my local dealers swear by this model, although online reviews state that it's got bad looks and a dim screen(I never cared about looks anyway..)
I've tried this one in a nearby store, and it does seem pretty decent to me.
Should I close my search on it?

Go with this laptop instead as it is worth the money:Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (4 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux) E5-575 Notebook Rs.37500 Price in India - Buy Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (4 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux) E5-575 Notebook Black Online - Acer : Flipkart.com

bssunilreddy said:
Go with this laptop instead as it is worth the money:Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (4 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux) E5-575 Notebook Rs.37500 Price in India - Buy Acer Aspire Core i5 7th Gen - (4 GB/1 TB HDD/Linux) E5-575 Notebook Black Online - Acer : Flipkart.com

OP selected one with 940MX. This one does't have dGPU!

W

@E|e<tr0|!0n That 940MX Acer seems fine but definitely go for extended warranty & extended ADP warranty also even if you have to pay some 2-3k extra for it.

This is my personal opinion. I've bought the Asus and Acer models for my friends last year. The built quality of the laptop isn't very assuring. The keyboard area in the ASUS is flimsy,it presses down inside noticably while typing. The Acer Laptop finish is also not up to the mark, the plastic material is weak, laptop design feels unergonomic and bulky. I feel you should go for brands like HP, very often people don't require the extra computing power, but having a well built laptop is necessary.

W

Which asus & acer model(more specifically their price range)?I also have friends buying asus & acer laptops(~35k each) last year & their build quality is decent.In fact the asus laptop has chiclet keyboard design so I don't see how "keyboard area" can press down while pressing any key which is possible in case of traditional design laptop keyboard.

whitestar_999 said:
@E|e<tr0|!0n That 940MX Acer seems fine but definitely go for extended warranty & extended ADP warranty also even if you have to pay some 2-3k extra for it.

I'm certainly getting the extended warranty and ADP, along with freebies like mouse, bag, headphones, key & screen guards from my local store.

The build does feel bulky and somewhat weak, but it's hard to find any other model with those specs at that price.
Also it has abundant ports of all types, most which well-built HPs and Dells don't have.
I am going to use it more at college, although the power I need is for personal purposes like gaming.
Do I really have to reconsider for a well-built HP?

W

To be honest,if you follow even the basic precautions of handling laptop then it should be no issue.Build quality matters most when you are running a laptop 18-20 hours a day for weeks/months or handling it roughly in day-today usage.Even opening & closing laptop lid gently helps a lot instead of slamming it open & close like a door.

whitestar_999 said:
To be honest,if you follow even the basic precautions of handling laptop then it should be no issue.Build quality matters most when you are running a laptop 18-20 hours a day for weeks/months or handling it roughly in day-today usage.Even opening & closing laptop lid gently helps a lot instead of slamming it open & close like a door.

Should I go for the Acer then?

W

You don't have much choice anyway as it is the only 940MX laptop within your budget.Just get extended ADP & handle it with care even in day-to-day usage.

P.S. Try not to fully close the laptop lid or even close it at all when not using.Install some monitor turn off software if acer doesn't have a key combination to manually turn off screen(asus has it) instead of putting it into sleep mode by closing the lid. You may also turn it off but don't close the lid.Only close the lid while carrying it.It may help with reducing wear & tear associated with laptop lid rotating axis parts.

Thanks everyone...
This was the first forum thread I've ever posted in my life.

I couldn't have reached anywhere in my laptop search by myself had it not been your guidance and participation.
I've finally booked the Acer at my local store.

I'm deeply indebted to all repliers(especially @whitestar_999, @bssunilreddy and @SaiyanGoku) for all that priceless info about what really matters when buying a laptop, and I guess this is something I'm going to remember for life.

E|e<tr0|!0n said:
Thanks everyone...
This was the first forum thread I've ever posted in my life.

I couldn't have reached anywhere in my laptop search by myself had it not been your guidance and participation.
I've finally booked the Acer at my local store.

I'm deeply indebted to all repliers(especially @whitestar_999, @bssunilreddy and @SaiyanGoku) for all that priceless info about what really matters when buying a laptop, and I guess this is something I'm going to remember for life.

Well then, could you post a review with temps on idle and load after you've received it? (Use HWMonitor )

SaiyanGoku said:
Well then, could you post a review with temps on idle and load after you've received it? (Use HWMonitor )

Sure.
I'll do it as soon as I get it on Monday.