Best laptop for an eleven year old?

[FreddoBaggyMac]

I'm planning on buying a laptop for my daughter for her birthday this year and would really appreciate some advice! She'll be using it for her homework (mainly word processing) and also to play a few games such as minecraft and sims. I'd like to pay no more than about £300 (preferably less!), would something like this be any good? Can anyone give me a link to anything better? Also, should I consider netbooks rather than laptops??? Many thanks in advance for any help you can offer.

I don't know about that one, and am totally untechy, but dd (also 11) has a Toshiba satellite, which cost me £230 in a John Lewis special offer, and tbh, it's always worked far far better than my Sony Vaio ever did -at 4 times the price!

my kids have chromebooks - currently £170 on amazon. They are great for kids because they are largely virus resistant - both DD and DS managed to completely bugger up laptops through watching movies with malwware on - and Im pretty good at protecting laptops and scanning stuff, but the last attack was so bad I still haven't fixed it! (virus wiped off the drivers)

DD has had hers for 2 years at A level, and has been fine with it. The only issue is printing, which you will need a wireless printer. Or, in our case, send it to mum 5 minutes before you leave the house....

They are fast and I've yet to encounter anything they cant do. DS2 plays minecraft on his.

Fab advice, thank you so much. Do you know if it's possible to play sims on a chromebook? You can't load discs onto them can you??

no, you need a windows PC to run SIMS, you can only run games that are apps through chrome. A chrome book has a different operating system. DS runs minecraft app, and plays other app games, but nothing from disc. Chromebook has no disc drive.

Thanks, she really likes sims so am probably looking at a laptop rather than a chromebook. Will check out the Toshiba satellite mentioned by Dranksangria...

there is a SIMS 3 app, and no doubt will be a SIMS 4 app soon. They are free.

Free, wow!! Are they as the same as the versions that you buy for a pc? I'm guessing that there must be lots of in-game purchases involved... will check it out. Is the word processing etc just as good on the chrome book?

My reservation about the chrome book is that I'm unsure if they are fully depend on the internet to work... Can you use word on them if you are not connected to the internet?

its not word, its google docs and yes, you can use the docs when not online. There is storage too - "only" 20GB usually (but my last state of the art desktop - 10 years ago - had 20gb storage and I never filled it!)

The issue is then how you would print a document if not connected to the net - Ive not tried to connect my kids chromebooks to the PC direct, but presume you could?

I have no idea how good or bad SIMS app is. But go onto the chrome app store and take a look at whats available.

As I understand the technology, because the Operating System is all held on the cloud there are no software updates to the PC and virus protection is built in. So when they go looking for movies online, they wont get loads of pop ups and malware, because there is no software as such on the chromebook.

Thanks so much Fannyfanakapan, you're advice has been really helpful x

Second a chromebook, they are ace and google docs and drive afe so easy to use plus you can see all your info on all your devices.

We have a pc, ipad, smartphones and Samsung galaxy s but everyone wants the chromebook.

We got a Toshiba netbook for Ds1 paid £85 second hand of ebay, it's perfect for him. It supports word for all his homework, and he plays minecraft on it too.