HP 15-g163nr, AMD AMD Quad-Core A8-6410 APU, 8GB RAM, machine vs Toshiba Satellite L55-B5276 Intel® Core™ i5-4210U

Actually for games the Toshiba with the Core i5-4210u and the integrated Intel HD 4400 is the better choice. Although the A8-6410 has 4 cores, they are rather weak in overall processing power compared to the dual core i5-4210u. The integrated Radeon R5 graphics core is almost equal to the Intel HD 4200 which means it is less powerful than the Intel HD 4400.

For general usage though the A8-6410 will be fine since none of the tasks you listed are processor intensive or graphically intensive.


As for the reliability of HP (or any brand name), it can be hit or miss depending on the specific model. I never had experience with an HP laptop. I have only owned an IBM ThinkPad (before IBM sold their division to Lenovo), a Lenovo IdeaPad and a Dell Latitude laptop. Never had any issues with my ThinkPad T41 other than the fact that the battery failed after 4 or 5 years of usage. My IdeaPad Y470 developed issues about 6 months after the warranty expired. First the battery capacity was cut in half almost over night. One day I was getting over 3.5 hours of battery life, the next day it was about 1.75 hours of battery life; but the battery is easily replaceable. Then the Geforce GT 550m graphics chip failed later on and caused the laptop to crash within 30 minutes regardless of what I was doing, even when left idling. The Dell Latitude 3540 will be a year old in January 2015, and I have had no problems with it thus far.

If you do a Google search on the phrase "consumer affairs bad reviews" and your choice of brand name, then you will come up with the number of "Top Complaints and Reviews...". For example:

Dell =2,354
HP = 251
Acer = 496
Lenovo = 351