Laptops traditionally command a high price tag than desktops and their resale value is undisputed.

You may have entertained the idea of buying a used laptop. Personally I recommend against doing this as new ones are easily under $500 these days. However, if you’re insistent on going used, here are a few tips.

Go Dell

I champion Dell products routinely and in the used laptop territory I do the same. The reason is because it’s stupidly easy to find a laptop’s specs just by service tag alone.

Example: Someone on craigslist or eBay is selling a Dell laptop. You want to know every single thing you can about the unit before making a bid or calling, etc. If you contact the seller and get the alphanumeric service tag (which is on the bottom of every Dell laptop), you can quickly find the specs of the unit (beyond the seller’s description) by doing this:

1. Go to support.dell.com and click on “Drivers & Downloads”

Looks like this:

2. Choose the service tag option.

Looks like this:

3. Enter in the tag and click Go.

Looks like this:

4. On the next page click the “Product Support” link at the top.

Looks like this (the link is to the right of the small flag where it says “You are here”):

5. On the next page click “System Information Configuration” (located at right)

Looks like this:

6. On the next page you have three tabs, that being “Service Contracts & Warranties”, “Original System Configuration” and “Current System Configuration”.

The ones that matters are for the warranty and original sys config.

When on “Original System Configuration”, every single frickin’ thing that was put into that laptop from the factory is listed. Even the screws have a part number.

Why is this information important? It’s so that if anything breaks, you know the exact part to ask for.

Under the “Service Contracts & Warranties” section, this will list verbatim whether the laptop is still in warranty or not.

Some sellers do lie and state a laptop is in warranty when it isn’t. However, from the Dell support site you can see for yourself easily if the unit is in warranty – AND – how many days are left – AND – what type of warranty it is (mail-in, next-day, etc.?)

All this info is very useful.

What if the seller states he “doesn’t know” what the service tag is?

The seller is an idiot and/or or the unit is stolen. Don’t buy it.

What if the service tag I get shows a laptop completely different from the one listed?

Return contact and state the service tag belongs to a completely different type of Dell. Seller is most likely trying to sell a stolen unit – or – purposely fudged the tag to claim the unit is still in warranty when it isn’t.

Buy a laptop with warranty still in effect

It is always recommended to only buy a used laptop that has an existing warranty. This way if anything breaks on it, it’s covered.

The #1 most expensive part on a laptop is the LCD screen. Always has been and always will be. If you buy a used unit and its screen is dim, flickers, has odd colors, etc. – SEND IT OUT for repair.

The minimum remaining warranty you want on any laptop is 30 days. That’s all you need to find out whether or not anything is busted.

Remember, all original equipment is covered. This includes the optical drive, keyboard, trackpad – all of it.

If you buy a Dell, I can say from personal experience that customer service never gives any grief when there’s a hardware fault with an Inspiron or Latitude.

Furthermore Dell always eats the shipping cost. They are one of the few computer manufacturers that do.

Example: You discover the optical drive is busted. You call Dell for another one under warranty. They will ship you a new optical drive with a waybill slip inside. You take out the new drive once it arrives, put the old drive in the box, seal/tape it, call DHL or other carrier listed on the waybill for a pickup, they come and get it – on Dell’s dime (that’s what the waybill is for). The waybill sticks right to the box over the old one. It doesn’t get any easier.

Buy a laptop that has its original “recovery CD”

What some sellers do is wipe the drive and put Linux on it because they lost the original Windows disc, i.e. “recovery CD”. This sucks because in reality Windows may run best on that laptop over Linux (due to proprietary hardware with proprietary drivers).

The first thing you should do with any used laptop is immediately do a “slow” format of the hard drive (this will mark any bad sectors) then pop in the recovery disc and install the provided Windows OS. If you like it, stick with it. If not, wipe it out and put on Linux.

Assume a laptop is always slower

A laptop’s hardware is designed to emit the least heat possible so it doesn’t damage any components in its tight space. The drawback is that you end up with a slower computer.

If for example you pitted a 2.0GHz single-core desktop vs. a 2GHz single-core laptop, both with the same RAM, the laptop will be slower. The laptop’s video card won’t be as good as the desktop, the 2.5-inch drive will be slower than the desktop’s larger 3.5-inch, and overall operation of the laptop will be noticeably slower.

Laptops are not about speed but rather portability.

New laptops (as in new-right-now) do have better processors now that darn near have the performance of big boxes – but not the used ones.

Got any more tips? Did I miss anything?

Let us know in the comments – particularly if you have an Apple Macbook, Gateway or HP laptop. They have different ways of finding information for used units. Are they as good as Dell’s or worse?