I have a Lenovo Yoga and an ASUS. I really enjoy them both. They can both be used as tablets as well as laptops

I don't know where you are located but do some shopping/browsing online, at most stores even Walmart you can compare, you can put check marks in what size or brand you want to browse and you can read the specs and reviews of other customers, then you can either order online or go to the store, I always do my homework first. However I do 90+% of our shopping online and most often with Free shipping, and no tax. Also here in the USA most PC/Tech/Office stores are having back to school sales galore, our Sunday paper is full of them.

Have you tried running malware scans on it? I'm the IT manager where I work and I usually recommend amazon and even factory refurbished when it comes to a laptop. You have 3 months to return it for any reason at all and when they "refurbish" the laptop they wipe it clean and reinstall the OS and all the appropriate drivers for that particular laptop model. Good Luck!

If Walmart is convenient just go there, else, use their website. Back in the early days of DVDs the kid invited me to buy all three, take them home, try them out and return two. I am guessing you could do that with Laptops today were you so inclined but I doubt it would be necessary for the uses you mention. I do those things and Netflix on the cheapest, smallest, laptop plugged into a flat-screen and a remote mouse.

Here are just a few for you. If it were me I think I'd go with the Refurbished Toshiba 2-in-1 (Laptop/Tablet), but that's me. You really didn't give us a Budget, I thought $400 was a good starting point, although there are some that are much cheaper. Just remember, you get what you paid for!

HP 15.6" Screen Size, Intel i3 Processor - $379
Acer 15.6" Screen Size, Intel i5 Processor - $379
Refurbished - Toshiba 14" Touch Screen, Intel i5 Processor 2-in-1 (Laptop/Tablet) - $369

HP 15.6" Touchscreen, Intel i3 Processor - $399
Dell Inspiron 15.6" Touchscreen, Intel i3 Processor - $379

If you travel with it, a 14" or even smaller display is easier to lug around and use in tight spaces (like on planes).

For the light use you describe, a Chromebook might also be suitable and would be less expensive. There have been recent discussions here on the topic and several happy users have described their experiences. If you and your husband are open to doing things just a bit differently than with Windows, this might be a good solution. The special purpose operating system and apps are intended to be easy to adapt to.

I've had my Chromebook for a week now, and I still like it. It does everything that I need to do. Still have more to learn, so I've ordered a book.

I wasn't shying away from a Chromebook in my list I provided. Since there was no $$$ Amount attached, I just listed some in the Under $400 range. To many people $400 isn't a bad price. Yes, a Chromebook can be much cheaper in price than at Windows PC. There are lots of Laptops under $200, Chromebooks and Windows.

I recently bought an Acer refurbished which converts to tablet mode. It has a solid state drive, Windows 10, and just updated itself to Anniversary Edition (version 1607). I bought it from a seller on eBay, and I have loved using it. My main computer is a desktop upgraded to Windows 10 from Windows 7 on which I do banking, make purchases, do taxes, etc. The laptop/tablet is more for fun, but the SSD really makes it fast in booting up and shutting down. I use it strictly on wirless, so other than charging, it's totally portable. Battery life is terrific! Full HD display on 12" screen.

I too have purchased Refurbished Acer Laptops and love them. I paid $350 a piece for our 15.6" Acer Laptop (bought the wife one too). The Laptops were loaded except for not having an SSD Drive. I found out that the model I purchased could possibly have an open slot for an mSATA SSD Drive, and they did. So I've upgraded our laptops to 256gb SSD Drives, leaving the original 500gb Hard Drive in place for Storage Drives. Also upgraded the RAM on both, another 8gb for a total of 12gb. Ours aren't 2-in-1's, just Laptops.

We've had our Laptops a little over a year now and they are running like Champs. I saved a lot of money buying them refurbished. These came with Windows 8 Preinstalled. I quickly upgraded them to Win 8.1. They've both now been upgraded to Windows 10 since July 29th, 2015. They're both now running the Win 10 Anniversary Edition without a problem.

I've added this post basically to point out that there is really nothing wrong with buying Refurbished as long as you get a Warranty along with the Laptop. Think ours had a 3 month warranty from the seller!

I helped Grandms to purchase her new 2-in-1 Laptop/Tablet. Another one of our friends had also purchased a New (Not Refurbished) Acer 2-in-1 Laptop/Tablet and is loving it. She too helped Grandms to decide! Think she had purchased the Newest and best out there, lots of $$$$. Refurbished is a much cheaper route to go. They can be about half the price of New!

Wow! Check out this deal, just saw it on my home pg.

https://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/HP-Notebook-15-ay091ms-Signature-Edition-Laptop/productID.2855526900?tduid=(659deba0250a4588a5a85eb5caa5dfb0)(261853)(2811279)(EDGE_ENUS_DHP_SLIDE4)()

What is so 'Wow-able'? Give us more information. You see, Walmart has a HP 15x [something] for $279.

Wow=8GB RAM = Super fast! and 1T Hd= a huge hard drive for the $$$$ did you not scroll and read the specs?

For the use of an average person, the 8GB of RAM doesn't translate into faster speed at all. RAM is the size of the workbench and if someone only has a few windows open and isn't doing memory intensive things like video editing (but not watching), it won't matter.

What does affect speed is the CPU. This unit's specs say it's an i3-6100U. This is a slow and very sub-par CPU compared to what's found in most PCs. That's to be expected in a low priced model.

aputernut...did you not scroll and read the specs?

Ah, no.

RAM=memory=speed and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. And on a laptop it should boot up ready to go in about 5 seconds, mine is a big dt and boots in 30-40 seconds w/ 8GB RAM which is expandable to 16GB and would no doubt take flight LOL

Adding more RAM doesn't actually speed up a computer, but merely provides sufficient memory space so that it doesn't have to resort to using Hard Disk space for RAM.

The only thing that additional RAM does is allow your computer to do more things at once, not actually make it faster.

The 'speed' of a processor (Gigahertz value.) determines the speed of the Laptop / Computer and only that.

"RAM=memory=speed and don't let anyone tell you otherwise."

Oh my! This isn't correct.

I agree with zep. Assuming a PC isn't under-built (like <4 GB of RAM), the speed determinant for basic users is really the clock speed of the processor. The amount of RAM makes no contribution to speed at all for an adequately equipped PC. You could double the RAM in this PC and see no difference in its operating responsiveness for normal use.

The clock rating of the microprocessor DOES matter when assessing speed. This one is 2.3 Ghz, very much on the low end of what you find in the market today. Translation = compared to others, it could seem sluggish with some tasks. That's what I found when I looked it up and so why I made the comment I did a few posts above this one.

Not getting too deep into computer operating system, in a nutshell, a computer loads a portion of the application (instructions) and data ( for both operating system and application to use) from slower speed, cheaper, long term storage memory (such as hard disk) to faster speed, more expensive, temporary working storage memory, RAM. Then computer dumps the less frequently used instructions and data back to long term storage space to makes room for next batch of instructions and data.

A computer with too small amount of RAM could spend lots of time transferring (page swapping) data and instructions back and forth between hard disk and RAM instead of executing programs/applications.

Therefore, If everything else is equal, such as clock speed of microprocessors, data bus size, CPU, applications being used, page size...etc., adding more RAM will definitely increase speed.

Okay, we have had Landzdown (Corrine) helping us with this current lap top. She worked all her magic and we still do not have it working better. So he has decided for sure he wants a new one. We don't want to spend a bunch....Iooking at maybe less than $300. I see a lot of you recommending the refurbished; I have had good luck with re-furbished; he won't agree but if I get re-furbished I can get Windows 7. He is very unsavy with computers and I really do not have time to try and figure 8 or 10 out and I am his problem solver. I would have bought a new lap top for myself years ago but I didn't have time then to re-learn! lol Based on these comments, do you think I'm wise to go ahead and get one from say Office Depot? They have some Windows 7 still. I don't need a large memory for what he does but I would like for it to at least load up quickly and not have to wait for every page change. I am sorry but I couldn't follow your speed recommendations. What ram do you recommend?

OMG! why would anyone want a refurb. a messed up PC fixed, when you can get a brand new one for the price you are looking for and please believe this W10 is a combination of the best of W7 & W8 with added features making W10 very user friendly, fast and efficient, buying a refurb. is like buying a used car, it may have been in a flood for all you know.

Lea, there's no reason to be apprehensive about later versions of Windows. Especially not 8.1, the user interface is very similar to Win7 .

My view is that minimum RAM is 6 and anything over 8 is excessive for the average user. The amount of RAM in normal use has no effect on speed and will have no effect on how quickly the machine boots up. If in use there are only a few windows open, it will also have no effect on the time delay to switch from one to another.

If price is more important to you than features, as it is for many people, you'll have little choice concerning how the machines are equipped. You'll get what you get.

Read!

http://computermemoryupgrade.net/memory-influence-on-performance.html

Sorry, anne, internet searches lead to word matches, but not knowledge, experience or insight.

Just FYI, looking at the memory space allocation right now (do you know how to do that?) of the 8 GB on my PC, after a few hours of off and on browser use..........

2.8 GB are in cache - offline workbench space with information immediately ready for requests from the microprocessor

5.2 GB are available.

Meaning, if I had 3GB of RAM, my PC's performance this morning would have been about the same as it was with 8GB. Having 4 GB in total would provide some buffer but 6 would be better and 8 is plenty.

More RAM avoids swap files to the hard drive, but with the undemanding uses most people have for their PCs, especially those who only browse websites, all but the most very under-equipped of PCs don't have a problem. I tend to keep a lot of windows and tabs open, so closing those as you
go cuts down on RAM usage. For someone whose PC usage is light on RAM
demands, having more than is used does nothing at all. Nothing at all.

(PS, another mistake people make when doing internet searches about topics they have limited knowledge of is to grab and run with the information found without considering the source they're relying on. And without putting it into context, difficult when the subject matter is new to the searcher. Who is behind that website? What's its provenance? It looks pretty anonymous to me. I don't fully disagree with what's said but the writer makes indirect suggestions of problems and offers BS to sound authoritative but without being definitive.)

"Other than the specific applications that hog your RAM, if you think
bumping your RAM from 3GB to 8GB is going to increase the speed of a
regular application-like a video game—you should think again. The only
thing that additional RAM does is allow your computer to do more things
at once, not actually make it faster."

I didn't do a web search for info I already knew. I did it so I could post an informational source for others to read and thus I wouldn't have to deal with you directly. There are a myriad of similar informational sites throughout the internet that should be visited on a more regular basis by all...whether new to the internet or experienced users. Enough said.

If you want to give information for others to read, offer same from a respected source. Here's more of what Lifehacker says (the source of zep's quote) and why:

Do you Really Need More than 4 GB of RAM?

Don't really want to start another argument, but I am still trying to find a laptop for my husband. I have decided against re-furbished, per his request. I do not want to have to learn Windows 10 or 8 as I am his go to support. I am thinking now that a chromebook might be the answer as I have some experience with the Chrome OS. My new question is what is "SSD"? Also I know that there has been much discussion on here about adequate RAM; (Elmer Fudd, that was a helpful link about), but what else should I be looking for while shopping? I don't know anything about Intel or Quad core?

No need for Quad core, Intel/AMD are the Processors, I have both but prefer AMD, SSD=Solid State Drive, is the hard drive. With a Chromebook, which is a cross between and little tablet and a laptop, you get a small hard drive and enough RAM but not enough for a laptop. A chrome book is cheap and so popular, but not for me. I hope this helps?

Nut, why do you prefer AMD? I don't believe there's a discernible difference to the user other than speed. AMD processors are cheaper and tend to have lower performance specs, that's all that's different.

Lea, I think all the information you need has been covered in this thread.

1) Pick the size you want - 12-14 inch are easier to travel with and handle, larger screens are easier to see but bulkier and heavier.

2) Decide how much you want to spend

3) Look at available sources - Amazon, chain stores

4) Buy it.

Ignore the descriptions and equipment specs. Ignore which Windows version (if you go that way instead of Chrome). Windows 8 and 10 are easily configured to look and act exactly like Windows 7 and XP, so ignore that.

Good luck

elmer, I think you mean to say "2.8 GB are in use", instead of "2.8 GB are in cache". I don't recall I have seen a computer with such a high amount of cache, it would be super expensive if there is one.

Lea,

What is your budget? There are enough experienced users here that could come up with a list of features for your new purchase.

elmer is right, if you know window 7 you should not have any problems learning window 10 or 8.

I think I have decided on this: Acer Chromebook 15 C910-C453 (15.6-inch HD, Intel Celeron, 4GB, 16GB SSD) on Amazon. He wants the larger screen; he does not travel with it. All he uses it for is some occasional shopping, checks the weather, reads e-mails, and he plays solitaire! I am assuming that I can get a regular solitaire game added to it. Since it is Chrome, does that mean I can get apps from the Google play store?

That sounds good for what you say he uses it for, so n/p go for it!

"elmer, I think you mean to say "2.8 GB are in use", instead of "2.8 GB are in cache"."

Yes, you're right, my error in doing it too quickly. Though it is a cache of sorts, that was the wrong word to use.

I have a 15" Chromebook. It's very easy to set up to do basic things -- email, web browsing, etc. If you want to customize it, that takes a little more work but their help system is pretty good. You can get apps from the Google Play Store. The music app is wonderful -- the speakers are good, and much better than on my Mac. The only problem I've had is when I hadn't cleaned out my email for a while -- it was running slow. I did that, and it was fine again.

I like it a lot!

I'm on my Third Acer Laptop. The newest one I'm on now is my favorite. I got a great deal on it and with a couple of Hardware Tweaks this laptop (8gb more RAM and an 256gb SSD Drive) moves right along.

Hope your hubby loves his New Acer Computer like I love mine! Does this Laptop have room to expand (SD Slot), 16gb isn't much space these days! I'm not sure, 16gb may be plenty of Space on the Chrome OS? I'm sure 4gb RAM will be plenty, just the 16gb SSD that worries me.

Your husband may start keeping photos or more games. To keep the laptop for longer duration, I would at least bump up 16gb SSD. It is a relative cheapest memory. If you could up to 8gb RAM, and 256 GB SSD as bug did to his, it would be awesome.

I wouldn't know how to do it. He definitely will not play any other game! I can't imagine why he would like playing ONLY plain ol' Solitaire, but he is weird like that! lol But he does put his deer camera pics on the lap top. I doubt if he will keep that many though.

If the laptop you buy him, has an open usb port, you can move all his photos onto a flash/thumb drive for safe keeping, and any files you wish to keep.

That's True, I was suggesting an SD Card, but a Flash Drive using an USB Port would work also. No One ever thinks they'll need more storage space, but your Operating System will be taking up some of that 16gb SSD Drive.

I never buy a Tablet unless it has a Micro SD Slot for this reason! Many manufacturers put the Operating System on plus a bunch of Trial Stuff and IMO, what I call Garbage on the Tablet. Laptop Manufacturers do the same thing, but usually on a laptop you hard drive is larger. In this day and age, 16gb just isn't much space!

My Current Acer Laptop I upgraded had 4gb of RAM and a 500gb (5400rmp) Hard Drive. I upgraded the RAM from 4gb to 12gb. The Hard Drive, I upgraded from the 500gb (5400rpm) to a 256gb SSD. I also replaced the original Hitachi 500gb (5400rpm) to a Western Digital Black 500gb (7200 rpm) Hard Drive for Storage only. The Operating System and Office Package are on the 256gb SSD Drive.

I bought my wife an Identical Laptop and did the same upgrades to hers. They are very nice laptops with an Intel i5 Processor, and pretty much all the bells and whistles. With the upgrades, I still have under $500 each invested.

Anyway, I'm sure your husband will enjoy his new laptop. Surely won't hurt to have a Spare Flash Drive or SD Card Hanging around the house, just in case! The upgrades I've made are because we use our computer for quite a bit more than Solitaire and are not a necessity for your husbands laptop at this time!

The laptop arrived today! REally speedy! I had second thoughts almost immediately as I realized that he was going to have to change his e-mail address!! Then I had trouble getting the solitaire game added, but I worked it out. I have the game and the gmail walked me through the process of linking his other e-mail to the gmail account. Now for those of you who have Chrome OS, what new site would be good? I am going to get the weather channel app for him too. Thanks for all your help!

Sorry, I don't Have or Use the Chrome Operating System, I have Windows 10 on all of my computers. Below is a link for some recommended Apps for the Google Chromebook Operating System. Chromebook Apps

BTW, glad you like the newly found speed of the Chromebook!

There's lots of good information on the Google and Acer sites. Sounds like you are settling in just fine with it. Changing email address was a pain, but you can set up your old email addy to be on the Chromebook. I did that, and took my time changing my email addy.

One more question for you Chrome users. It has been mentioned that I didn't get enough memory. Do I not even have enough memory for even 40 or so picture? I loaded my husband's pictures onto a flash drive from the old HP laptop. I wanted to add them onto the Chromebook. I couldn't figure out how. I got a notice that I was eligible for 100 g of cloud, I think that is what it said, and that I would use that for 2 years. Is that what I'm going to have to do. He just likes to show off some of the deer on our place so it would be nice if he had easy access. I could just put them on a flash drive, but that raises another issue. I wanted an SD slot so that he could load his pictures onto the Chromebook from the camera. How am I going to be able to do that? Thanks everyone for your patience with me!

Lea,

The SSD Drive on that Laptop is only 16gb. The SSD Drive is the Hard Drive (Storage Space). Memory is a totally different thing (RAM Random Access Memory). Your computer uses RAM when your doing things on the computer. Once you turn the computer off, the RAM dumps whatever you were working on (this is why you should Save your Projects before shutting it down). A Hard Drive (in your case an SSD Drive) is where that information would be saved.

I believe the Specs I looked at showed you had 4gb RAM, that should be okay for now. The SSD Drive was only 16gb, which you could burn thru quickly. Some, but not all computers can be upgraded easily (not sure about yours). It could be a possibility the SSD Drive could be upgraded to a larger SSD Drive. I would advise you have this done at a computer shop if you've never done anything like this before.

Sounds like you can use 100gb of Cloud Space for Free for the first 2 years. After the 2 years there will most likely be a small fee to use the space. Each Cloud is different and may charge a little differently. You could save a lot of stuff in this Cloud Space, Pictures, Videos, Music, Movies, etc...

As for the SD Slot, I believe the Specs I looked at showed this computer has an SD Slot. Check around the edges of the Laptop, most have a Mock SD Card in the Slot that needs to be removed for use (keeps the Dirt Out). After using the SD Drive I'd reinsert the Mock SD Card for safety.

You can put his photos on a USB Flash Drive and view them any time you want by plugging the USB Flash Drive into an open USB Port.

Storage is all up to you. You can:

1. Increase the SSD Drive Size
2. Use the 100gb Cloud Space
3. Use an SD Card
4. Use a USB Flash Drive

This is where I can't help you a lot. I'm not sure how you access Files and Folders on the Chrome OS. I'm sure there has to be an APP for Viewing Files and Folders (you may have to be downloaded the APP, not sure).

I did find out that I can Download and Install the Chrome OS on any computer for Free. I may do this in the future (gotta' find some free time) just so I'm able the help Chrome Users better! I've never used the Chrome OS and have never worked on a Chromebook Computer (yet).

I have a chromebook (love it!) and just experimented with putting a picture on it. This is how it worked for me. I opened Google Drive, clicked on "NEW" in the upper left corner, selected "Folder" and named it...surprise..."Pictures".

I emailed a picture to myself at my gmail account., Opened the message on the chromebook and right clicked on the picture. Selected "Save image as" and Google Drive opened. I clicked on the newly created "Pictures" folder. To the right of "New Folder" at the bottom left is the current name of your picture (usually meaningless). I rename the picture (i.e. "deer nibbling on ear of corn"" and then clicked "Save" (bottom right).

If you wanted to save the picture to an SD card, you'd do similar but you'd also see the card drive after you clicked "Save image as" and you could select that media instead of Google Drive.

At present Google gives you 15 GB of free storage. An average picture is said to be about 3 MB so you could store about 5,000 photos in the free space (assuming there were no other documents, etc. also claiming space).

When I have more time, I'll play with existing pictures on an SD card and explain how to transver them to Drive.

I don't think the suggestion to replace the SSD "hard drive" is advisable. They're expensive and the task of finding one that will fit and then loading the OS on the new drive isn't one for hardware and linux beginners. Someone lacking experience (whether the owner or a "tech") could easily turn the device into a paperweight.

Keep it simple and cheap. If it has a card reader, use an SD card. Or, a USB thumb drive (they're larger and easier to physically handle). Leave well enough alone.