New laptop - Dell or Asus?

[AI1601]

Time has come to replace my 11 year old Samsung laptop. Budget around £400 but potentially stretch to £450. I have narrowed down to Dell or Asus (although I'm open to other suggestions):

Dell Inspiron 15 - £380
Asus Vivobook 15 - £380

Both have i5 processors, 8GB RAM and 512GB SSD.

I'll be using for general browsing and streaming, nothing that requires a high end machine.

So, which of the two?

[thebraketester]

Is a tablet not an option for you?

[AI1601]

Not really a fan of tablets plus forgot to add that it'll be used when working from home too.

[sgrimshaw]

AI1601 said:

So, which of the two?

I've never had a problem with an Asus .... can't say the same for Dell.

Wife's company went over to Dell for a while ... she had her Dell Laptop replaced 3 times in less than two years.

[FMOB]

sgrimshaw said:

AI1601 said:

So, which of the two?

I've never had a problem with an Asus .... can't say the same for Dell.

Wife's company went over to Dell for a while ... she had her Dell Laptop replaced 3 times in less than two years.

Dell are not what they used to be, if it is your own money I wouldn't spend it with Dell.

[mike80]

I've got both, although in a higher spec.

The Dell is a bit nicer built, so I'd get that, everything else being equal.

[Turtle Shed]

I'd get a Chromebook.

https://www.argos.co.uk/product/5663459

[cobra kid]

We bought two Asus laptops about 18 months ago. SSD drives ensure a start up in seconds and have been faultless from new. They were about £600 each though.

[davek_964]

Bought an Asus about a year ago - considered several different manufacturers / models, but the Asus was the only one that had everything I wanted in that price range (mine was ~£800).

Very impressed with it.

[wildoliver]

Turtle Shed said:

I'd get a Chromebook.

https://www.argos.co.uk/product/5663459

Not being up to date with tech at all these days, can a chrome book do more or less everything a laptop can? I get it can browse the net etc. but can it download office and create PowerPoint presentations etc?

My MacBook died about a year ago and my wife's is hanging on by the skin of its teeth and I absolutely refuse to buy another one as the build quality is rubbish now. I've got a pc laptop but it's not got the ease of pickup that the macbooks do. As the main use case is sat down the side of the sofa to browse the internet mainly, with my wife occasionally using it to plan lessons (using an internet portal and word/powerpoint and email client) it seems a chromebook may be the answer.

[I am alright Jack]

Bought a dreadful Asus from Currys Cambridge winter before last. It wasn't what I wanted but It was pretty much all they had in the price bracket, about 450 I think and I desperately needed something.

Message above started after a few weeks and it also used to turn off randomly.

Took a few months for me to get around to doing but replaced hard drive for a better one.

Message went away but couldn't stop it randomly turning off.

Gave it away a few months ago. Awful thing.

There's people who have had problems with every make so maybe it's just pot luck.

[grumbledoak]

Turtle Shed said:

I'd get a Chromebook.

https://www.argos.co.uk/product/5663459

This advice should come with warnings.

Chromebooks can do equivalent things to a Windows laptop but they are *not* the same if you want MS Office!

[eein]

You'll get grumbles for individuals about both brands.

It's worth looking at the spec of each option - you've noted they are both i5, but are they both the same generation of i5 processor? And at that price it's likely an older i5, which could be lesser than a newer gen i3. Without getting too into the details, a crude but simple way to check if processors are better than each other is to look at the CPU score on https://www.cpubenchmark.net/. Don't worry about all the detailed numbers there, just the overall score per CPU - this is good enough to compare general performance.

[captain_cynic]

Asus, lighter
Dell, better after sales support.

I'm an Asus fan having had 4 laptops over he last 12 years with no issues, they're light, powerful and cheap. . However for work I'd still recommend Dell as you can get support very quick when time is money.

[snuffy]

AI1601 said:

Time has come to replace my 11 year old Samsung laptop. Budget around £400 but potentially stretch to £450. I have narrowed down to Dell or Asus (although I'm open to other suggestions):

Dell Inspiron 15 - £380
Asus Vivobook 15 - £380

Both have i5 processors, 8GB RAM and 512GB SSD.

I'll be using for general browsing and streaming, nothing that requires a high end machine.

So, which of the two?

I have an Asus Vivobook 15, bought it about 8 months ago for £400. I'm more than happy with it. All I use it for is surfing really, when sitting in the living room. It's light enough, can open plenty of browser tabs,quiet and looks smart enough, especially for what it costs.

In the past I've had 2 Dells, the first one was crap and the connector on the board broke (known fault). I foolishly bought another one, which also broke. I am annoyed that I was stupid enough to buy a second one. They are ste, but people on PH love Dell for some reason.

[CrgT16]

Can’t complain with Dell, had a xps for years until I dropped it. They will last well. At that price range is much of a muchness.

Replaced my Dell with a Razer and that has been a workhorse too.

No problems with either.

[LunarOne]

I've said this before on here but as an IT professional there are only two laptop brands worth buying and neither of them are Dell or Asus. With £450 to spend I'd buy a used business laptop so that I could have a much higher quality machine than £450 would buy in Argos or Curry's.

[muppets_mate]

LunarOne said:

I've said this before on here but as an IT professional there are only two laptop brands worth buying and neither of them are Dell or Asus. With £450 to spend I'd buy a used business laptop so that I could have a much higher quality machine than £450 would buy in Argos or Curry's.

Care to share which those two brands are please?

[Badda]

I bought the dell model you mention and love it. I really can’t fault it.

[Riley Blue]

captain_cynic said:

Asus, lighter
Dell, better after sales support.

I'm an Asus fan having had 4 laptops over he last 12 years with no issues, they're light, powerful and cheap. . However for work I'd still recommend Dell as you can get support very quick when time is money.

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding but four Asus laptops in 12 years is a high turnover rate; I'm in the process of replacing an 11 year old Lenovo and only because its case is damaged.