Refurbished Laptops
For people who want the latest high performance laptop, but don’t have enough money to buy one new, one option is to buy a refurbished laptop. These are notebook computers that have been returned to the manufacturer because of some defect, but have been fixed and fully inspected by the engineers working at the company. Once they are pronounced good as new, they are sold on a secondary market for people wanting a discounted machine. Consumer electronics manufacturers have been doing this for years with other types of products such as televisions, DVD players, and stereos, so it is only logical that laptop manufacturers can take advantage of this system as well to recoup the money they spent making the product. After all, once it has been refused by the person who originally bought it, the device can no longer be sold as “new”, which drops the price considerably.

One company that is active in selling cheap refurbished laptop computers is Dell. At the Dell Outlet, shoppers can find pretty much any model of notebook that Dell offers for sale, including the XPS, Inspiron, Latitude, and the Precision. Prices for these refurbished computers are usually hundreds less than the original retail price, but there’s one caveat. One of the great things about Dell is that you can fully customize your computer, down to the last megabyte of memory. But these laptops are already put together, so you have to pick and choose which one is the closest to what you’re looking for. But if you find one that has everything you need, then it’s a no-brainer to save a bunch of money and buy a refurbished one.

Hewlett Packard/Compaq also sells refurbished notebook computers this way to customers all over the world, including the US, UK and others, through their HP Business Outlet. Many different models are available from this division of the company, but again, the computers cannot be customized, so you have to choose from the available inventory. It is always advisable to call ahead to make sure that the computer you have chosen is in fact still available.

So if you want a nice laptop and don’t mind having one that’s only “slightly” used, consider buying a refurbished wholesale laptop. They will usually come with a warranty from the manufacturer, and provide the chance to save hundreds of dollars and own a high end notebook computer that was previously out of your price range.