Home Run

I don't feel like I hit an electronics home run often. Usually, when I purchase anything electronics, I simply stop looking at my flyers and emails because I know that something better will be on sale within a week of my purchase, or whatever I purchased will have a massive price drop shortly afterward.

My wife and I agreed to use one of my paychecks from my current contract to get me a laptop. This had multiple uses and reasons behind it:

• First and foremost, it would get the software required for the current contract off my PC. Ever since installing it, my otherwise completely stable and never crashing PC has been crashing and achieving the dreaded BSOD.
• It would allow me mobility, to take my work into the office for a consultation or training, etc. It would also allow me to take it with me and work from exotic locales, if my wife and I travel somewhere but I still need to do some work while we're gone.
• It would allow me a separate machine that I could always reset to a "like factory new" setting after a contract, wiping away all traces of the work-related instals if needed.

I started looking. I didn't have many prescribed needs, but I knew I needed a maximum of memory, I wanted a 16" or larger screen due to some of the programs I would use as a technical writer (some of which will use all the memory and screen real estate you give them), and I preferred to have a dedicated graphics card.

We stumbled on a sale that had a Samsung NP-RF710 for $899. This machine had a 17.3" screen, 4 gigs of memory, a dedicated nVidia 330 graphics driver, an Intel i7 processor, and a full-sized keyboard. During my searches, pretty much all 17" and i7 or equivalent AMD processor machines were selling for between $1000 (cheap, no-name brands without dedicated graphics cards) and $1400, so to see one for $900, with those stats, was pretty incredible. In addition to that, it had USB 3.0 ports, the touch pad mouse had iPod-like capabilities, and the fastest wired/wireless networks.

We discussed it, and decided to pull the trigger. Neither of us were familiar with Samsung as a laptop maker, but we really liked the Samsung TV we had purchased recently and I said, "If they make great consumer TVs, how bad can their laptops be?"

I've been using the machine for a couple of months now. I am so impressed with it, you cannot believe it. The thing runs very cool and is extremely quiet. The graphics are superb, I have a nice, wide viewing angle on it, the i7 processor is fast. It has been able to run all of my tech writing software easily, as well as the various applications I need to install for this contract. I have yet to have a BSOD on the laptop.

I decided recently to run a Windows Experience test on both my PC and this laptop. The results were nearly identical, with my PC being slightly better in RAM and Graphics/Gaming Graphics, and the laptop actually beating my PC in processor (all other WEI numbers were identical). So, basically, I have a PC-quality machine that runs cool and quiet as my laptop.

What pleases me the most is that I haven't seen a laptop with equivalent stats sold as cheaply since that deal. It is refreshing to see that I a) got a great deal and b) actually got a very good machine, one that is working as well or better than advertised.

My wife and I will certainly entertain Samsung for laptops in the future. We have found it to be a quality product, sturdy, works as advertised, and without a lot of bloatware or adware. We are incredibly happy with the purchase and feel it has a made a big difference in my work.