jamesflorraine

We are hoping to move to the sunshine coast in sept/october my 2 daughters
both want new laptops to take with them.
however we plan to stop in singapore for a few days on our way to oz can anybody suggest weather the can buy in singapore wait until we get to oz or purchase before we go. thanks jim/lorraine

DrWho

If you do buy before you get here make sure you get a worldwide warranty...

kevinbloomfield

I'd get a couple of Dell laptops whilst you are in the UK. You can get something half decent for 400 quid or so. Almost everything costs more over here and that includes computer equipment. As to Singapore, I don't think it's much cheaper there than the UK is, the UK used to be a ripoff place but that's all changed and Australia has taken over :-(

Andrew Crown

Dell have an Australian website so you can check prices vs UK prices. I bought a Apple Macbook over here and it cost the same as the UK. I think it might be a bit easier (plugs etc), even if it is a little more to buy over here as you then have the peace of mind of quick service with an Australian bought product.

boff

Whilst the tax here can feel pretty stiff at times one thing you can do is salary sacrifice for a laptop. Go to google.com.au and have a look. There are various websites that'll explain it much better than me, but if you've got jobs lined up it may be worth asking your employer if they will help you out with such a scheme. If you pay a higher rate of tax & they help you out with GST (similar to VAT) you can save 40-50%.

Cheers

sassie

Hi. When you get to Singapore, I would recommend checking out Lim Sim Square, which is 5 storeys of nothing but mobile phones, digital cameras, PC's notebooks, laptops, etc etc. It's a little overwhelming though, so I would advise doing your homework first and deciding what sort of spec you would want, and then you can check out which store will give you the best deal. We just bought an LG there a couple of months ago, and were able to get some extra memory and a carry case thrown in. Also, as someone else mentioned, make sure you get international warranty, and don't forget to claim the tax back at the airport!

DunRoaminTheUK

I would say opt for a MacBook (depending on whether they are cheaper in Australia or UK?) as they are capable of running XP and MacOS X through the use of a currently freely available beta product called "Boot Camp" (soon to be incorporated into the next release of MacOS X). Also, the MacBooks seem to give the buyer more for their money and they are smaller and more compact than the equivalently priced (and technologically inferior) Dell's.

There are also products on the market called VMWare Fusion and Parallels (of which you can buy the Fusion product here for $40 as a pre-order product) which allow XP and MacOS X to run alongside each other using true concurrency. XP cannot do this and is simply another advantage provided by going Mac, which you admitedly might or might not use?

Also, if you are planning on living here I would say buy here as the implications for warranty when having bought abroad might provide you with a headache that is simply not worth it.

BTW, I mention XP and not Vista as even Microsoft are starting to admit that Vista was simply not ready for launch (and it's not yet supported under boot-camp). Parallels is capable of running Vista as a guest O/S but only the business versions which are highly priced.

This may all sound highly technical but it's worth future-proofing your purchases against a time where perhaps your daughters will appreciate having these type of advantages? I guess it depends on what your daughters will be doing with them and just how old they are now?

The beauty is that they have a choice to run one or the other or both at the same time (XP and MacOS X).

Hutch

There really isn't anything to be gained from buying abroad - it's only in places like Tokyo that you'll make real savings, besides the fact that you'll have to haggle with someone who doesn't speak much English and can spot a tourist mark a mile off.

Amongst the best deals you'll get in the UK are at ebuyer.com . I've used them a hell of a lot and found them excellent. You can pick up a Vista laptop for exceptionally good prices. For instance £350 (inc. VAT) gets you an Acer Aspire with AMD Turion 64 MK38, 1Gb RAM, 80GB hard drive, DVD-RW, a 5in1 Card Reader and Windows Vista Home Premium (great operating system).