Neverside

Help ole AC pick a new laptop

Hey guys --

I've finally decided the time has come for me to buy a laptop... I've lost count of how many desktop PCs I've built, but I have very little experience with laptops thus far. Anyhow I'm hoping some of you guys can give your feedback on any of the latest and greatest laptops you might know of that fit my needs (since I've found it to be strangely difficult to find much useful information online - the majority of what I find when searching on google is endless pages of for-sale listings for laptops... and the majority of reviews I've found are obviously biased to their advertisers).

Anyhow, I'll give as much info as I can about what I hope to find in a laptop. Mostly I'm looking for good leads to check out from actual people, instead of anonymous reviews I've found on the internet

Price
- $1000-$2300

Must haves
- SXGA+ or UXGA screen (at least 1280x1024 - 1600x1200), medium-large size 13-15", preferably not widescreen (they look odd to me), looking for the deepest/richest/brightest/most crisp image possible (will be used for graphic design - of course hehe, and "some" gaming/movie watching)
- Touchpad mouse (no eraserhead - they make my fingers unhappy lol)
- Keyboard with good feel/size
- 2+ USB2.0, 1+ Firewire
- Non-integrated graphics card (i.e. Radeon Mobility 9000 or better... with 32MB+ video RAM)

Strongly prefer
- Pentium-M/Centrino 1.2GHz+
- 7200RPM drive, 40GB+ (rare I know, would be cool though)
- 802.11 b/g integrated wireless
- Reasonable battery life (over 2 hours, 3-5 better)
- Not "too" large/heavy (will be carrying it every day)
- 2+ year warranty/support
- Quiet/less noisey (i.e. fan only kicks in when actually necessary)
- Decent internal soundcard
- CDRW/DVD-ROM combo drive
- Durable construction
- Limited preinstalled (aka overpriced) RAM (will add my own from Crucial or something much more cheaply)

Would be nice but don't care much
- DVD-RW drive (my brother has one already so no biggie)
- Stylish look (power/function over look)
- Decent speakers (will primarily use headphones or external speakers)
- Side-mounted CDROM (not front, as I tend to hit the eject on my brother's front one at inopportune times hehe)

Don't want
- Office software (already own)
- Floppy drive (don't need, can add external later if necessary, ok if it's there but I'll never use it)

Usage
- A lot of writing (emails, tutorials, TF posts, etc).... graphic design..... reading (pdf manuals, ebooks, newsletters, etc).... minor audio/music recording or sequencing while on the road (also live softsynths during shows, sound design, etc)..... and of course a bit of entertainment/games, though lower prioirty (my home system is plenty good for actual serious gaming).

Well, that's about all I can think of I'm crossing my fingers that someone might go "Oh! I know just the laptop you're looking for!" haha If the best you can do is mention a few better-quality places (including print/magazine sources) to get accurate reviews of laptops, that'd be just as good as well.

Thanks!

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-- Dave
Neverside Admin

absolutecross.com

forget the onboard mouse completely and purchase an actual "laptop mouse". Saves you a hell of a lot of trouble when it comes to precision and sanity.

just my $0.02

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Yeah, I'll likely use an alternate pointing device many times, but no doubt there will be times when I won't have room/convenience to use anything but what's on the laptop itself (i.e. on the train, airplanes, car trips, etc) so I just wanna make sure I don't get stuck with the dreaded eraserhead in that case hehe

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-- Dave
Neverside Admin

absolutecross.com

Actually, here is what I use, and it requires no space except fitting into the palm of your hand:

$20 at my walmart:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2777210461

As you can see in the pictures, it fits right into your hand, almost in a gun position, and has three buttons. It's a killer killer mouse, and once you get used to using a trackball, it's just as natural and easy as a normal mouse

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Please read Sig Guidelines

Well it looks like you know your equipment pretty well why dont you just come up with how much ram, processer speed, etc you need and find a laptop that has it...Those mouses are nice noprofile ive used ones just like it

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"Dip your feet in your own pool of knowldege before asking someone else to bathe in theirs"

That's a pretty cool mouse I'll have to give it a try sometime. Thanks.

Well the specs are only half the equation really... from experience, I know a computer can appear to have the perfect hardware specs on paper but when put to the test in real life, things can work much worse than expected. For instance, I think I could configure almost all these exact options into a Dell.... but from what I've heard lately, many Dells have been having various serious problems lately, less-durable construction than other brands, and they outsourced much of their support staff to India (I heard) so it's gone down the tubes (maybe there are some good Dells though, lemmie know hehe.... plus I don't especially need support - though it'd be nice to know it's there).

99% of all laptops on the shelves at all the computer stores in my area (Orange, CA) are terrible, and I don't know many people who own (recent) laptops, so I don't have much of any way to check out "good" laptops in person. Also most of the stores here bend to the "MHz myth" and only try to sell the top clock speed models, and not many Pentium-M's.

Anyhow... again thanks for the help -- keep it coming
Peace.

___________________

-- Dave
Neverside Admin

absolutecross.com

Instead of worrying about getting a laptop with a Firewire port, just get a PCIMCA card that has firewire ports on it, it's rare to see a laptop with firewire in it for some reason. It also seems to jack the price up, no clue why.

If I was to ever recommend a laptop, I'd say go with Toshiba. They are #1 in laptops, and the only below them, would be IBM, they are neck in neck. I wouldn't get anything else.

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Ok thanks so far guys. At this point thus far I've been leaning towards one of these....

Acer TravelMate 803LCi - approx. $2000 + tax
Good: I love the screen... my local MicroCenter had a lower model (800 LCi) that has the same screen. Good specs. Review tests show strong performance. One of the longest centrino battery lifes in tests. Can get with 3 year warranty included.

Not so good: some people say it get a bit of a too-warm spot on the left palm rest, as the harddrive is placed directly below that area (5400RPM drive). Also some have said its VGA output (external screen) is a bit blurry (not something I plan to use much anyhow)... lastly the default wireless drivers evidently underperform - though using a driver available from Dell fixes it. Only 1 of 2 RAM slots is user accessable (would make it hard to upgrade to 1GB RAM). Not totally sure on Acer's quality - a few bad comments, though mostly good I think.

IBM ThinkPad T40, model 2379D5U - approx. $2250 + tax
Good: Price is only a few hundred dollars more. Has the SXGA+ screen. Even better battery life. The 2nd DIMM is open for easy RAM upgrade. Can get with 3 year warranty included.

Bad: slower 4200RPM drive (although it's 20GB more).... I've never seen an IBM in person haha - I'd love to be able to see the screen quality before buying (screen is one of my top priorities)... performance hindered some by 32MB graphics.

I also looked at all the Toshibas I could find... I didn't really dig any of them (namely none of them had very great screens)... though I almost liked the Toshiba M35-S359 that I saw today at MicroCenter (price would have come to a few hundred under the Acer after extending the default 1 year warranty to 3 - also it has lower graphics ram and CPU, and XP home not pro).... its screen was "almost" crisp hehe

So basically it's a question of - The Acer is the better performer, but is it good quality? The IBM looks pretty rockin' for not too much more $... though is the bit lower performance worth it since it's IBM? And also - does the IBM screen look excellent?

Guess I have more reading to do... if anyone has any insight that'd be great though

Peace.

___________________

-- Dave
Neverside Admin

absolutecross.com

iv got a dell laptop... on it right now..lol. Umm they are ok if your just useing it for checking out stuff on the net,chat,and it handles photoshop prity well. I can even play some games on it. but it dosent work so great with games because it lacks much needed ram and gfx card..

my dads got one of them nice military issued ones that are buit proof... things prity sweet. but i dont know much about it...he wont let me use it lol

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what Dell model is it? and how old?

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-- Dave
Neverside Admin

absolutecross.com