... if you feel comfortable buying that way. I prowled UBid.com for laptops for a while and managed to snag a good deal, a HP Pavilion 5135 for under $700. My unit came to me with no cosmetic damage of any kind, and was probably new but just overstocked. There are risks, to be sure, but also deals to be had. Caveat emptor.
Incidentally, I installed Mandrake 8 on it, which worked right out of the box -- video, sound, USB Zip drive and ethernet PC card (haven't tried modem or suspend mode) worked fine with no additional downloads or other fooling around required! (I'm not a Linux expert) After upgrading to 192MB of RAM it purrs quite nicely under this distro. Since Linux drivers for new notebook components take time to appear, buying refurbished older models may be a way to save a lot of setup pain...
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... if you feel comfortable buying that way. I prowled UBid.com for laptops for a while and managed to snag a good deal, a HP Pavilion 5135 for under $700. My unit came to me with no cosmetic damage of any kind, and was probably new but just overstocked. There are risks, to be sure, but also deals to be had. Caveat emptor.
Incidentally, I installed Mandrake 8 on it, which worked right out of the box -- video, sound, USB Zip drive and ethernet PC card (haven't tried modem or suspend mode) worked fine with no additional downloads or other fooling around required! (I'm not a Linux expert) After upgrading to 192MB of RAM it purrs quite nicely under this distro. Since Linux drivers for new notebook components take time to appear, buying refurbished older models may be a way to save a lot of setup pain...