22-05-2005 07:35									#1
	Buying laptop: any lighthouse? Suffering from ads?

Hello, and thanks for any help...

This summer I'll buy a laptop, around 900-1000 $US / 700-800€ (or maybe second-handed). I do play games at times, but what comes before that is:
- "Multimedia tank" ready to face future applications
- Reliable/robust/whattever enough (might be what I'll use to do some future job so... what is needed?)

What about the brands? I never bought a laptop, and built custom... but now it seems I have to pick a laptop brand (grr). IBM? Toshiba? Ford? What's the point of those, and how to chose?

Warranty-wise: normally I've always been ok with the manufacturer's normal warranty. Wise with laptops?

I didn't check computers components since... 5 years? So, is nowadays' DDRAM double of SDRAM 100MB? hehe
Here's my present idea of balanced comp (minimum specs):
1.5MHz (Pensium M or Athlon)
256 RAM
DVD + CD burner
30-40 Gig hd
video card: not a clue! These things change too much...
14-15" screen
wireless


Thank you very very much, especially for this brand thing...

	22-05-2005 07:50									#2
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www.ibuypower.com

If you go with intel, make sure you have a Centrino/Sonoma chipset.

	22-05-2005 07:51									#3
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quote: 1.5MHz

Get a 8086

	22-05-2005 07:55									#4
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Why do you assume he's gay, Q3?

	22-05-2005 09:39									#6
	Support Apolyton, buy Call to Power 2

Thinkpad.

Go for Pentium-M or some other CPU that doesn't use up a lot of power.

Usually your notebook doesn't have to all that high-powered.

	22-05-2005 09:59									#7
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

quote: Originally posted by Urban Ranger Thinkpad. Go for Pentium-M or some other CPU that doesn't use up a lot of power. Usually your notebook doesn't have to all that high-powered.

Thinkpads are great if you have money to throw away. Otherwise, go for a Toshiba.

	22-05-2005 10:11									#8
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powerbook

	22-05-2005 11:33									#9
	Suffering from ads?

I've got a thinkpad with a celeron-M for my dad.

	22-05-2005 11:44									#10
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quote: Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia powerbook

They're great. I love mine.

@ Q3 – I was referring to those horrible cases on the page you linked to. They looked like Julian Clary designed them.

	22-05-2005 12:35									#11
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i love mine too - ive had it for a year and a half and i dont even know what to do if the computer freezes, or how to force restart it.

	22-05-2005 13:01									#12
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You'd better be very careful about the graphics card. Pick the one with the biggest RAM you can afford because you won't be able to upgrade it. My laptop is an ASUS, which is quite good, but I don't know about the wireless part. I personnally don't like IBM thinkpads because I hate their little red button which is supposed to be a mouse and prefer larger touchpads that don't hinder you when you're typing, but they are solid computers nonetheless.

	22-05-2005 13:07									#13
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quote: i love mine too - ive had it for a year and a half and i dont even know what to do if the computer freezes, or how to force restart it.

I like the 2 finger scrolling thing.

	22-05-2005 16:30									#14
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Thanks all

Athlon or Pentium?

How do you see the best quality/price with 2 comps with similar specs? I see 2 comps (Toshiba vs IBuyPower.com), similar specs and prices...

	22-05-2005 17:04									#15
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I'd go with Pentium-M or Celeron-M. I don't think that AMD can compete in the mobile processor department yet. ( Though I think they PWN Intel at the desktop, and probably server levels )

	22-05-2005 17:22									#16
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quote: Originally posted by LDiCesare I personnally don't like IBM thinkpads because I hate their little red button which is supposed to be a mouse and prefer larger touchpads that don't hinder you when you're typing,

One of the reasons I like the Thinkpads is because it's too easy to double click on a touchpad.

	22-05-2005 17:33									#17
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I am thinking about getting an Apple laptop. Is the ibooks any good?

	22-05-2005 17:34									#18
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

Ibooks are toys - though you can get Linux running on them.

	22-05-2005 17:47									#19
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

Urban Ranger, why do you see them as toys? Seems like a computer like any other, except with Apple hardware and software standards (which are quite high)...

	22-05-2005 20:21									#20
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Trifna, I have a Toshiba Satellite laptop (have had it for about three years now). I have two main gripes with it.

1. Driver support sucks. Point in case: the video card. nVidia comes out with new drivers every couple of months and I want to be uptodate. However, their drivers don't support the laptop video cards - they expect laptop manufacturers to adapt their drivers to whatever video cards their laptops use. Toshiba hasn't updated its drivers since 2001, whereas Dell, which uses the same nVidia video card in some laptops, follows the updates far more closely.

2. Hard drive. The one that came with the laptop died just as the warranty expired. I did some research online, and apparently it is a very widespread problem with Toshiba laptops - the hard drives are unreliable. I got a new one and it is doing well. Replacing the drive manually was a breeze (did they make it easily accessible, expecting it to fail? ), but still the loss of the hard drive caused major inconvenience.

	22-05-2005 20:55									#21
	Re: Buying laptop: any lighthouse? Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

quote: Originally posted by Trifna I didn't check computers components since... 5 years? So, is nowadays' DDRAM double of SDRAM 100MB? hehe Here's my present idea of balanced comp (minimum specs): 1.5MHz (Pensium M or Athlon) 256 RAM DVD + CD burner 30-40 Gig hd video card: not a clue! These things change too much... 14-15" screen wireless Thank you very very much, especially for this brand thing...

Umm I'd go with 512 RAM.. when there is little RAM than it will have to access the HDD very often and Notebooks have very slow HDDs.

If you want to play games make sure the graphics card is not "shared memory" but has its own memory. You know, even Civ4 will be 3D.
I doubt though that there will be one with own gfx card in that price range.

As for screen resolution. XGA (1024x768) is very little to work with.. better is 1400x1050. Especially when you are working with several apps at the same time.


About brand: Acer is very popular here. Maybe Asus is worth a look as well. Don't know about Dell, but you should probably check as well.

	22-05-2005 20:59									#22
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

quote: Originally posted by Trifna Urban Ranger, why do you see them as toys? Seems like a computer like any other, except with Apple hardware and software standards (which are quite high)...

The iBooks are rather underpowered.

	22-05-2005 21:04									#23
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quote: Originally posted by Urban Ranger Ibooks are toys - though you can get Linux running on them.

you can get linux running pretty everywhere, that however would only make it even more of a toy though

	22-05-2005 21:06									#24
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quote: Originally posted by Atahualpa you can get linux running pretty everywhere, that however would only make it even more of a toy though

You can go ahead and tell Brin and Page that.

	22-05-2005 22:45									#25
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quote: Originally posted by LDiCesare I personnally don't like IBM thinkpads because I hate their little red button which is supposed to be a mouse and prefer larger touchpads that don't hinder you when you're typing, but they are solid computers nonetheless.

Unless you get an X-series (ultraportable), touchpads and trackpoints are both standard. You choose which one you prefer.

UR:

quote: One of the reasons I like the Thinkpads is because it's too easy to double click on a touchpad.

You can easily configure disabling that (I did) on ThinkPads.

PowerBooks and iBooks are both underpowered and overpriced. They're using the G4 chips from 2001, for christ sake. And they don't even get decent batterylife out of it.

They're cheapily made with cheap parts. The iBooks had a notorious problem with the motherboard (IIRC, there was a class action lawsuit). And Apple is once again recalling PowerBook/iBook batteries that may overheat/explode, made by the paragon of Quality -- LG...

At least IBM uses Sony batteries.

	22-05-2005 22:49									#26
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Both PowerBooks and Thinkpads are very well out of reach for the price range Trifna stated...

	22-05-2005 22:55									#27
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I recently bought a Toshiba Satelite. I upgraded the memory and it works fine. It doesn't have the same chip you want (it has a 1.3 Celeron M), but it works great for me so far!

	22-05-2005 23:49									#28
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quote: Originally posted by vovan Hard drive. The one that came with the laptop died just as the warranty expired. I did some research online, and apparently it is a very widespread problem with Toshiba laptops - the hard drives are unreliable. I got a new one and it is doing well. Replacing the drive manually was a breeze (did they make it easily accessible, expecting it to fail? ), but still the loss of the hard drive caused major inconvenience.

Well for what its worth, I had my Toshiba for 5 years now and I didn't have a single problem. I could be true that Toshiba hard drives are unreliable, but I doubt it. I don't know where you read that. I hope its not consumer reviews on Amazon, Cnet or Epninions, because they're worthless. First, they're not statistically representative. Second, people can write anything they want in these reviews. Another thing, I'm pretty sure Toshiba hard drives can be found in plenty of other brands, like IBM for example.

	23-05-2005 03:41									#29
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

quote: Originally posted by Atahualpa Both PowerBooks and Thinkpads are very well out of reach for the price range Trifna stated...

Actually, I might have a few good second handed occasions. I know some websites where people sell laptops, and I see affordable ThinkPad fairly often.

But are ThinkPad worth their bucks? They seem more business-oriented, and businesses are ready to pay higher premium due to the impact it can have on their revenues anyway.


PS: For those interested, I found interesting out-of-mainstream websites
http://www.abspc.com/app/config.asp?mono=1850
http://www.monarchcomputer.com/Merc...duct_Code=80302
http://resellerratings.com/
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...MP=OTC-d3alt1me

	23-05-2005 07:19									#30
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quote: Originally posted by Trifna But are ThinkPad worth their bucks?

There was this one random German guy (he's got a German version of Windows on his Thinkpad) I helped who kept saying that Thinkpad is the only notebook anybody should buy.

I reckon they are expensive, but they last a good long time.

I heard bad things about Dell ones.