Once again, your daily hardware buys

Special UK and PCWorld
Hate them or love them, PC World sometimes has the best deals available in the UK. More interestingly, they allow you to walk in and buy items at the stated price. It is possibly true however that non-geeks will pay a premium price if they don't know exactly what they are looking for. For the rest of us however, PC World can prove to be a real goldmine. Note that these deals are NOT available online

As advertised in Saturday's SUN newspaper, you can get a EI laptop featuring an Intel Celeron 2.6Ghz Processor, 40Gb hard disk, 256Mb RAM, a 15" screen, shared graphics, a modem, CD-Writer/DVDROM drive, five USB ports and Windows XP for only £499.99 (£425+VAT). At this price, you can expect the EI laptop to be fairly competitive with an Athlon XP 1800 like the one on offer at Savastore (Watford Electronics). The Combo, large screen and ample memory and hard disk space are more than welcomed and will be sufficient for office users and students alike. It is a limited offer which ends soon. Normal price is £599. Similar offers are available at Tiny.com and ebuyer.com.

Available at Curry's as well as PC world, the Albacomp 2440 is a very basic PC to say the least. It is based on an Intel Celeron 2.4Ghz processor with only 128Mb memory, a 40Gb Hard disk and a DVD Rom. It includes a 17" monitor, two USB ports, Windows XP home and three free PCI slots but no LAN port. Usual price is £299.99 without the monitor.

If using a refurbished computer (with guarantee) suits you, then why not have this Emachines system for only £299. Built around a Celeron 2.3Ghz, it features goodies like a 17" monitor, 256Mb memory, six USB ports, a 80Gb hard disk and combo drive as well as Windows OS. If you only want a base unit without monitor, then you might choose the Compaq 7390. Unlike the previous products, it offers a Pentium 4 2.8Ghz processor and a firewire port on top of the usual specs (80Gb HDD, 256Mb memory, 6 USB, integrated sound, LAN and sound).

The price of laser printers has been tumbling to new lows thanks to manufacturers like Samsung who is selling the award winning ML1510 for only £44.99. This black only laser printer features a 600x600dpi resolution, 2Mb memory, 14 pages per minute print speed and a 250 sheet paper tray. The only draw back is that the cheapest toner I have found for this printer costs the same as the printer... Is this the beginning of the disposable laser printer era?

Finally PC World has an external combo DVD/CDRW drive for sale at £49.99. The aptly named Artec Combo is manufactured by taiwanese giant Ultima. The drive itself features a 52x24x52 CD-Writer coupled with a 16x DVD reader. Everything runs on USB1.1 and 2.0 interface. It has a 90ms access time and a 2Mb buffer memory. Bundled software include Nero Burning. Artec Combo's price is a full 15 quid cheaper than any found in the UK.

Note that you should take the newspaper where the ad appeared with you to get any special pricing.