This would be my first blog post for the month of May. I’ve been pretty much occupied the past several weeks with various types of work. At the same time I’ve been eyeing on a new laptop for the past several weeks to replace my loaned Acer Aspire 3683 laptop (technically it’s my brother’s laptop). After looking at this brochure, I’ve already decided which laptop that I’m going to buy since the spec and the price is within my budget:
Compaq Presario V3751AU on Brochure
At RM2199, it’s quite an affordable price to pay for a decent laptop with the technical spec listed. However, I needed more financial leverage since I wanted a monthly installment over the full amount which I needed to pay. I don’t want to pay in full cash because it will affect my monthly budget and savings.
So I started making some analysis on ways I could do to finance my new laptop. At first I wanted to apply for the RM125 per month under AEON Easy Payment scheme. However, after getting the information and did a rough calculation, the total amount I would have to pay under the Easy Payment plan would be (RM125 X 24 months) is RM3,000! WHAT? That’s RM801 more than the selling price! I’m not going to pay the credit company (in this case AEON Easy Payment scheme) that amount. On top of that, there is another 0.84% of interest per month equivalent to 10.08% a year.
My second option is to reduce the throat-choking Easy Payment scheme interest to a personal loan. The idea was to apply for a RM3,000 personal loan and pay back on a monthly payment. There was 2 option (CIMB Cash Express Micro Finance and AEON-Cash Personal Financing) since a lot of personal loans are not meant for small amount. I had to eliminate CIMB Cash Express because it’s a financial killer. At 24% interest yearly, it is one of the highest interest personal loans ever based on my findings. As for AEON-Cash Personal Financing, I had to apply for an AEON Credit Card in order for my loan to be approved. If I went for this, I would have to wait for another week or so to get my credit card approved and so on so fourth. Not what I had in mind.
My third option is to use my Petronas CIMB Bank credit card I just received a month ago. Utilizing the 0% monthly installment, I can just buy a laptop by just dividing the price of RM2199 with 12 months. That would make RM183.25 per month and best of all, interest free. The only issue is there aren’t many shops that provided this facility. Most of the shop I found have Maybank and Citibank 0% interest free payment plan. I’m not going to get another credit card for my financial sake. From my reading in forums and some blogs, I find that in order for me to get an interest free plan with CIMB Bank, I need to find a shop that uses a CIMB merchant processing machine. So, my quest for searching for the right shop begins.
After searching high and low at Low Yatt Plaza, one shop that I’ve found charge 4.5% on top of the laptop price before dividing it with 12 months. I didn’t go for that one. I finally found a shop that provides me with the monthly installment facility using my credit card. The shop wasn’t as busy as any other shop; in fact I was the only customer inside the shop. After dealing with the sales guy for 15 minutes, my transaction went through and I was on my way back with my brand new Compaq Presario V3751AU.
At home, I joyously unpacked my new laptop:
My New Compaq V3751AU package
Unfortunately the package I bought only got me an original Targus HP laptop bag and a RM35 optical mouse. By the way, the laptop I bought only comes with FreeDos so there was no Windows or any other operating system. I had to add more money if I wanted an operating system installed. This is where the hassle begins.
My Brand New Compaq V3751AU Unpacked loaded with FreeDOS
It took me one night for me to install a fresh copy of Microsoft Windows XP and then another 2 days for me to search for all the drivers since the package doesn’t include a driver CD. Even worse, the system is configured for Windows Vista when I tried searching for the drivers on HP Compaq official website. After searching around, I’ve gathered all the necessary download and bundled all the driver’s link into this single URL link:
http://fuseurl.com/8g
I downloaded most of the drivers but only a few of them really work. Here’s a list of it which I did managed to note down that really works on my Compaq Presario V3751AU:
- SP34842A - BlueTooth Driver
- SP35333 - Wireless Assistant
- SP37950 - Network Controller Driver
- SP35414 - Webcam Driver
After all the driver was done installed, it was then time to make the transition to transfer all my working files from my previous laptop to my new laptop. I’m not the kind of person who uses back-up software because I know there will be a point where complication will arise. So I did it manually using a portable hard drive and thumb drives:
The Manual Side by Side Laptop File Transfer Process
It took me my whole Sunday weekend to complete the transition. Performance wise, since the processor is a dual core processor, there is a huge improvement when I’m running heavy multiple applications. The temperature is cooler and the CPU utilization is less likely to reach 100%. My only problem is I can’t play my Simcity 4 most probably because of my display card issue.
My Compaq 3751AU on Windows XP is ready for action
Why I didn’t choose Intel Core 2 Duo over AMD Turion 64 X2? Based on my finding from benchmarking charts, using Intel Core 2 Duo is slightly ahead of AMD Turion 64 X2. Then again, I’m looking for a bargain and not performance so I think I made a good choice.
