Laptops under $500

[traveller]

Hi all,
Need some collective wisdom and advice :)
Wife currently uses a Asus netbook for emails and the odd work from home (MS Office stuff). It runs on Win XP and done its duty well for the past 4-5 years.
So I am looking at a replacement for her around $500 mark. I was looking at a Asus Transformer T100, which runs Win 8 and some of them have prepackaged MS Office.
The prices are $600 in store or around $500 on line. http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/ASUS-Transformer-Book-T100-Tablet-PC-10-1-Touch-IPS-64GB-SSD-Windows-8-1-Dock-/331117639956?pt=AU_comp_laptop&hash=item4d18263914&_uhb=1
Has anyone got experience with these transformer t books?
Any other worthy contenders?
Performance is not a prime consideration, just web, email and the odd MS office stuff.
Thanks
Bo

[multiweb]

I got an HP notebook years ago for $450.00 with a 320GB HD and 8GB RAM, Win7 pro 64. I'd say you can get a decent notebook still for $500.00. EOYF are coming so you might catch some good deals soon.

ASUS are a good brand. Not sure about the detachable screens though.

[mithrandir]

See what you can get from Toshiba. I'm always prepared to spend a bit more to add another of them to my collection.

[04Stefan07]

If you are looking for a laptop under $500 I would recommend getting a tablet instead.

Transformer tablets are very good and for basic tasks it will have no problems. It performs very well and the design is beautiful. If you need more power obviously the next big step would be getting a Surface Pro but they start at around $1,100.

The price of the one you linked is cheap, it's about $100 more at JB.

[dannat]

the T100 is a tablet -actually a good machine for the money, i have a cheap asus w series 8" tablet -underpowered but ok for 250. i use it for email, ebooks, browsing & it does the job
i actually like the MS surface range -the attached keyboard is slim yet usable -a guy at work has the pro

alternatively buy the cheapest machine you can find, spend $40 on Ram upgrade & $50 on a 60Gb SSD, it will run fine

[traveller]

Thanks all for your suggestions.
I have used toshiba and HP before and have a HP pavilion i5 as my main imaging and processing computer.
Wife's needs are quite basic and looks like the transformer will be more than adequate for the job, esp as it has office pre installed.
Will look around a bit more. The suggestion for eofy is a good one.
Thanks agin,
Bo

[joe_smith]

JB HIFI (http://www.jbhifi.com.au/computers/offer1/) have 20% off sale now

[Renato1]

Problem with a lot of laptops is that the prepackaged MS Office is often a trial one.

I'm not sure why you are upgrading, if your wife's laptop is working fine. I'm typing this on a 12 year old Toshiba laptop my wife bought for $65.
Regards,
Renato

[joe_smith]

A bigger problem is they are prepackaged with MS Windows :D

[AussieSky]

What about 'pre loved' ?

http://www.reboot-it.com.au/toshiba-tecra-a11-core-i5-520m-2.4ghz-2gb-250gb-dvdrw-webcam-laptop.html

[wasyoungonce]

I had a lot of trouble with cheap Toshiba lappies. Their new "leadless solder" doesn't flex and they are having a lot of motherboard component leg to PCB cracking and intermittent faults.

Their new "support-less" case or frame designs (same as Dell) exacerbate this issue.