Where would you go and what would you buy? Alicia, the owner of the market where I help out and use the modem has six hundred dollars and change to purchase 2 laptops for 2 grandsons. They surf the net and play video games. I would believe 15.6" size offers the best value battery RAM and storage for the buck? Above all else I must avoid possible land mines where I buy something then find out it's bad after they get here. Alicia has the Spanish Windows 7 program plus profession office in Spanish.Links hints warnings tips and suggestions much appreciated!

For your purposes stay away from the Chromebooks. You won't be able to load the Microsoft suite of programs on it. They get great battery life, but have very little storage and weak chips. They're great for doing email and searching the web, but that's about it. I have one, it's great to travel with but not for anything like working on my pictures. I have to wait to do that until I get home.You will have to work with word programs like Google Docs, the same goes for spread sheets - all of it is stored in the cloud and you don't have decent access at home to use those.When buying a new computer be sure to find out what programs it comes with. If if doesn't come with MS Word and Excel, you'll have to pay more for those. Right now on Amazon they range from $200 - $300 And if a sales person tells you that it does come with them, make sure they're not just a temporary demo load that will stop working in a couple of months until you pay for them.Also check on removable / exchangeable batteries. Very few if any laptops have that feature anymore.Also, I don't think you want to mess with Windows 10. Now everyone don't get your panties in a wad over that comment - I'm saying that being somewhat familiar with Mex, that I don't think he want's to mess with WIN10 so he needs to make sure what he's buying before he gets a surprise and no one to help him when he gets home.It is interesting what comes up if you type CHEAP LAPTOP into Amazon. Bill

Some like Chromebooks because they start up faster, are cheaper to begin with. https://www.cnet.com/search/?query=Chromebook

You are not going to be playing any high end games on a $300 dollar laptop. It will be good for surfing the web and doing homework and such. Instead I would look at an I pad mini or some other tablet. Both my kids have one and my 5th grader gets a ton of use out of it. She watches TV, plays games, chats and videos with friends and surfs the web on it. The only time she uses the laptop is for homework. Given the choice between the two the tablet would be the route I would go. Walmart has the mini for about $275. One thing to note is if they cant hook up the internet all the time the tablet might not be the best route to go.

MEX - I replaced all of my old TABLETS and XP PCs with sales on HSN and QVS... Most of them offered the top of the line HP and DELL laptops deals with extra things included and 5 easy payments of around $100 a month... All was 3 day service.... They all came loaded down with software included and good deals on renting programs which seems to be the way they are done these days...This DELL I am using here is INSPIRON 17R5737 with INTEL CORE i7-4500 CPU - @ 1.80 Ghz 8.00GB ram 64Bit X64 based processor...That was the only way I get the top of the line units with time payments with no interest...This thing screams compared to my old DELL XP-PLUS M90 Workstation machine I was using...Roy Ken

One caveat about HP & Dell LTs is there 3 wire power supply. You can NOT use an aftermarket power supply with them. I like running a after market DC-DC power supply in the MH. With a HP or Dell, you'll need to fire up an inverter when off grid.Richard

If You Had $300 To Spend On A Laptop... | Good Sam Community

FordDiesel250
Explorer
Oct 24, 2016
I would go to Wally World and purchase two Asmus I believe is the brand and walk away with a couple of good putters.
Bill_Satellite
Explorer II
Oct 24, 2016
Asus?
Heisenberg
Explorer
Oct 25, 2016
The Asus Vivo at Best Buy is an excellent deal for this price range.
road-runner
Explorer III
Oct 27, 2016
RLS7201 wrote:

Look closely, at the DC connector, there is a outer shell and inner shell that carries the power to the LT. HP/Dell LTs look for a coded signal on the small pin in the center. When the coded signal is not present, the LT will function but the battery will not charge. Now you know.
I confirm all of this for Dell laptops. That signal wire has a habit of breaking from flexing at the DC plug, resulting in the message that the laptop will run, but the battery will not charge.
Tvov
Explorer II
Oct 27, 2016
+1 to what bighatnohorse posted... I buy from NewEgg all the time, they are great. If you can't buy from NewEgg directly, you can use their site to look over a wide range of laptops and read reviews.

Forum Discussion

If You Had $300 To Spend On A Laptop...

About RV Must Haves

Related Content

Dometic 300 toilet

Help me spend my money!

Spending winter in RV

HOT 300 degree 4l80E

Wanting to spend some money