Does anyone have any experience with this? It would save me a lot of money but I also don’t want to flush it down the toilet.

27 points

Amazon is a marketplace.

If you go to the flea market and buy a laptop that is bad, does that mean everybody selling laptops at the flea market is selling a bad product?

There are solid sellers on Amazon and there are shady scam sellers on Amazon.

My advice for your best chances of buying what you are expecting to buy is to go through an authorized reseller of the laptop you are looking for. I bought my last laptop from Newegg and got what I paid for.

permalink
report
reply
5 points

Very good point and thank you. I’ve simply not bought a computer in a long time so it’s not clear where I begin.

permalink
report
parent
reply
4 points

Go to Newegg, look for ones sold by Newegg. They also have a marketplace model, so picking a laptop from them can make a difference should you have the unlikely outcome of an issue. Newegg is pretty solid with customer service.

permalink
report
parent
reply
17 points

I try to avoid Amazon for my personal shopping, but I’ve bought literally hundreds of renewed/refurbished laptops and Chromebooks on Amazon for work. I have not had a single DOA or switcheroo in over 200 laptops from different sellers except one that has a broken screen, which was ready to return. You are very likely not throwing your money away by buying via Amazon, though that doesn’t mean it’s necessarily the best place to buy.

permalink
report
reply
5 points

I just have gift cards to use so it wouldn’t cost me anything for an inexpensive one really to buy there is why I’m looking. I will also look at my community store.

permalink
report
parent
reply
15 points

That’s kind of a no brainer then. Amazon already has your money, might as well get something from it.

permalink
report
parent
reply
14 points
Deleted by creator
permalink
report
reply
3 points
*

Another thing I’ve noticed on Amazon is oftentimes you’ll get the first generation of a product. I bought a smart space heater from there quite some time ago and by the time I’d owned it for a few months it was already unsupported, then six months after that it was impossible to connect to (it lost WiFi and I had no means to reconfigure it).

Had I purchased elsewhere I probably would’ve received the fifth or sixth generation. If I do buy from Amazon now I’m always super picky about details.

permalink
report
parent
reply
3 points

Thank you. That’s a good point.

permalink
report
parent
reply
10 points

I bought all my devices refurbished from ebay.

on my xps 15 I saved $1500 alone. still runs fine almost 10 years later.

permalink
report
reply
2 points

Ok great thank you.

permalink
report
parent
reply
10 points

I would not buy anything electronic from Amazon used or new. You never know what you are getting (Real thing? Counterfeit? Working? Quality repair parts? Undisclosed customer return? Sold by Amazon or third party? Who knows — they mix stock at the warehouse).

Most manufacturers sell their own refurbs on their own website and they come with a warranty.

permalink
report
reply
1 point

Thank you.

permalink
report
parent
reply

Ask Lemmy

!asklemmy@lemmy.world

Create post

A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions


Rules: (interactive)


1) Be nice and; have fun

Doxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them


2) All posts must end with a '?'

This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?


3) No spam

Please do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.


4) NSFW is okay, within reason

Just remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com. NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].


5) This is not a support community.

It is not a place for ‘how do I?’, type questions. If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.


6) No US Politics.

Please don’t post about current US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world or !askusa@discuss.online


Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.

Partnered Communities:

Tech Support

No Stupid Questions

You Should Know

Reddit

Jokes

Ask Ouija


Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu


Community stats

  • 11K

    Monthly active users

  • 2.9K

    Posts

  • 98K

    Comments