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Structural Integrity of Laptops?
d_m_i_t_r_i asks: "As a laptop-toting college student, I'm
very interested in just how much abuse my laptop can stand up to.
Just how many pounds of books can I stack on it? How hard can I bang
the corner, before it will cave in? Things like that. Does anyone
review the cases of laptops for their structural integrity? Are
there any sort of statistics out there of things like strength tests,
dropping from a height, etc?"
PC/Computing used to run a series of pretty nasty tests on laptops once a year - stuff like spilling coffee, oven-roasting, ladder dropping, and so on. Is that magazine still around? I cancelled my sub when they dropped Penn Jillette in like 1994.
I've had a nice DEC Ultra 2000 for a few years, and it's held up to all sorts of abuses. Currently, I usually carry about a Dell Inspiron.
In practice, I can stack three large upper division mechanical engineering related textbooks on this thing and carry it around for 14 hours a day. This system is only a year old, and has minimal damage. The corner with the fan outlet is mashed in a bit, and there is one small stress fracture on the top of the display back. Other than that, you should expect an average system to hold up to two years of general usage. One thing you'll almost always have to deal with is the damn rubber feet coming off all the time. I don't expect my system to stay put on a desk anymore, and I haven't been able to find an adhesive powerful enough to keep those stupid things attached.
If you're really paranoid, find a big aluminum breifcase to carry your system in. You can find them for under $50 on E-bay if you have the time to waste.
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As someone who has owned and travelled with a Toshiba 3500, Libretto L50, Gateway 2500, Dell i5000, and now a Dell i8000, it all depends on the model, not the vendor.
Thee 3500 (i386) was fairly solid, being old. (And expensive as new.) The Libretto was also okay, in that is small. If you are really worried about how much your laptop has to withstand, smaller (less mass) is definetly better. The Gateway was average, no glaring issues but it was plastic-y and flexed too much.
By far the best was the Dell i5000. This thing was big, but for its size it was solid, and it was built really well. Quality in design and manufature was the hallmark of this one, and it is still my favourite for use, asthetics, and ruggedness.
When I upgraded to the Dell i8000, I was SO dissapointed. The i8k is a low quality piece of creaking plastic-y junk compared to the i5000. Now dont get me wrong, the i8k blows everything else away WRT speed, graphics, expandability, etc. Its a worthwhile upgrade to the i5k on paper, but in use, I am dissapointed with the low build quality. They could have done a lot better on this one.
BTW, I always wanted one of these, but it just didnt seem quite worth it, seeing as my system is insured anyway, and I treat it carefully. Maybe for next time I fly, I will get one.
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I've had a PIII-500 for about 26 months now, and it's already been back twice, and about to go back a third time (as soon as I can part with it for a week). It has the 1400x1050 UXGA screen, which was basically duct-taped to the top of a smaller laptop body. As a result, the mounts for the two screen hinges are a joke. The cross-sectional area at the bottom is minimal, and the metal quality was pathetic, albeit from my minimal metalurgical knowledge.
First the left hinge-mount snapped. This rendered the laptop completely unusable. Sent it in for repair, they replaced the whole screen. Nice enough to transplant my stickers though.
Then, exactly two days (a weekend) before my trip to Europe for 2 weeks for GUADEC-2, the right hinge-mount snapped, same place, same ragged pot-metal edge, etc. Managed to borrow a laptop, just barely. Turns out that the geniuses at Dell figured that the right-hand mount would be fine after the whole screen dangled at odd angles for an extended duration (attempted workarounds, shipping, etc.), and left it. Fatally wounded.
Well, the current predicament is that now the left hinge-mount is still in one piece (not sure I can say the same for the right one for much longer...), but it's screwed into a completely detached section of the *FRAME*. That's right, the entire mass of some kind of metal to which the tiny little hinge-mount is screwed has totally sheared off. It's held in by the outer plastic shell. I've managed to limp along for a couple months now, but it's gonna get sent in in a week or two.
I *STRONGLY* recommend that any laptop you consider, you get your hands on one (a friend/coworker with one, even ask on a local newsgroup if you have to) and check it out for some of these brain-dead design flaws. I'm still considering Dell when replacing this one in another year or so, but I will be doing some heavy research on the 8[12]00 models available at the time, as far as structural integrity.
However, I've heard all sorts of bad things about the "feel" of Dells vs. other laptop brands, and I have to agree. For all the killer features and decent price they put into their laptops, it's almost universally agreed upon that the construction quality, as far as structural integrity and longevity, sucks.
Spend some time in the DellNet Forum, and probably the equivalent foraa for other manufacturers. You won't regret it.
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I own an old Sony Vaio 505TS (slimtop) and have dropped it... Too many times. From as high as 4-5ft, no problems. I don't have any bad blocks, and it has weathered a couple of coffee and water spills (nothing major). The magnesium alloy case does tend to wear in spots but so far it's not all the way through.
Bah!
...unless you want to permanently damage your screen.
Most of the consumer-level laptops (e.g. Satelites, Presarios, etc) are made with very flimsy plastic. That's nothing new, however, that is a very important issue if you even THINK that your laptop might have to withstand any kind of abuse. And the biggest problem I've seen is with the screen lid. On the cheap laptops, the plastic is so thin and so fragile that the screen can be damaged by simply applying pressure with your finger to the outer screen casing. Nevermind putting a couple of books on top of it while jumping around.
By no means do I encourage this, but next time you're in you favourite mega pc store (FutureShop in Canada, I guess Circuit City or Staples in US), touch one of their cheaper laptops. With your palm holding the outer edge of the screen, apply some pressure to the OUTSIDE or the screen cover with one of your fingers. See how much it takes untill you can see a discoloured blob on the inside of the screen, right in the place where you're pushing.
Stop as soon as you see the discoloration. Any more pressure and you can permanently damage the LCD. Oh, and the notebook should be turned on while doing this, otherwise nothing shows.
Now if they have some corporate level notebooks, do the same. Try something like a Tecra, Armada, or the T series. I can guarantee you that you will not be able to do it. Well, if you're very strong, you might, but the amount of pressure you have to apply is much, much higher than on the consumer level notebooks.
This fact alone goes a long way to show (IMHO) how much better built some notebooks are when compared to others. And that's a general sign, it does not only relate to the screen side. A cheap notebook will have crappy components everywhere, while the more expensive ones are significantly better built.
BTW, one of the reasons I bought an Armada M700 is because of its very slim, rugged construction. Magnezium lid (short of cracking it open, nothing will damage the screed), and very high quality plastic everywhere else.
Well, that's my 2c worth...
The only structural problem I've had with the many laptops i've owned/used over the years was with the monster Dell 7000 I used for a year. I broke the little plastic cover, on the part of the (main) case immediately below the LCD. These flimsly little pieces of plastic covered the scews on the case. they are no more ...
My current VAIO PCG-F560 is a truly awesome machine. I've had it for 18 months and have 'tortured' it numerous ways as spilling coffee on it, closing the case (without powering it down) and then letting in run for hours in my briefcase (it got VERY hot) and dropping it once. NO PROBLEMS at all. SOny engineering is heads and shoulders above the Toshibas and Compaq's i've owned. Dell machines are the worst of the lot yet, as indicated above, are still very resiliant to abuse.
Most laptops can't really take any abuse, I remember a test done a few years ago, by PC magazine I belive, they dropped pretty much all major manufactuers laptops from a height of 3 feet on concrete, they all exploded/shattered whatever. Suffice to say, they aren't designed for abuse, the LCD is very touchy (being made of glass and having a flouecsent tube to light it) and the cases are made of plastic and packed tight. If you are going to abuse the laptop, try and get one that is at least a little tough, Sony makes there cases out of magnesium, which helps (least for stacking stuff on them). Or if you have the extra money get a Panasonic Toughbook.
Get a pansonic toughbook, these things rock! If you want a laptop that can reliably survive being dropped, kicked, and generally bashed around then these things are hard to beat ;)
The "demonstration" model was brought in and the salesman just gets it out of the bag and throws in onto the desk as you might a normal book, then he picks it up by the narrow end and hits the desk with it. The laptop still powered up and worked fine with no damage or screen problems.
I wish I could afford one - they are expensive, but if you are prone to droping things, it might save you money in the long run.
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I work For a local college who has a substanial laptop program. 50% of my job deals with fixing them. A few Points to remember
-Structral integrity exists only in the laptops completed form, them bend and flex quite abit unless they are all togeather.
-Putting your stuff on the keyborad is a bad idea. you forget its there, and close the unit, or drop it, Cracked case, cracked lcd, broken keyboard, eask $2k dammage (and you may think who does something that stupid, i see it atleast once a month.
-Drop survivability, good on carpet, not so good on floor. lucky damage is a cracked case (relatively cheap to replace, or can be crazy glued if small) ulucky is a cracked lcd
-laptops will take a fairamount of small bumps, and stacking, but keep in mind hard disk platters dont like alot of motion, so remember to backup regularly.
-Peter
I own a panasonic toughbook model CF-47. fairly awesome beast with magnesium encased LCD panel and body shell, gel encased hard drive with shock absorbing mounts, motherboard on shock absorbing assembly, water resistant...the works. dropped it 3 months after i got it from a 3rd floor window onto concrete (dont ask how) along with my motorola flip-phone (old model ...huge..they dont make em anymore). both of them survived. motorola phone had a tiny scar on the flip cover where it scraped against the concrete after it bounced several times. the panasonic toughbook bounced twice and the CD drive and floppy were smashed to a pulp. i replaced the cd drive with a dvd rom from a gateway and powered it up. smoke curled up from the machine so i powered it down, unplugged the floppy and repowered it up. worked fine. ignored the floppy since i never use it anyway (it was an LS-120 but what the heck).
8 months later my panasonic toughbook's backlight went. since its impossible to find anyone repairing them (and panasonic told me to fly a kite..no warranty) i converted it into a desktop and attached a monitor to it.
bottom line -- if you buy a toughbook make sure you HAVE A WARRANTY.
I've already gradauted college and I've been carrying laptops since high school. That makes you a young whipper snapper, who is less 'l33t than I, young poster. ;)
;)
I have had the best results with a nice Kensington backpack case. It's got a little padding -- it's mostly the G's that kill a dropped laptop, so unless you are using a toughbook or have a massively padded case, the relitive amount of padding doesn't do a damn bit of good. Plus, it's on your back, which makes it hard to bang into things.
Sometimes you can drop a laptop and have it all survive, sometimes you can't. My old laptop was dropped twice. Once it killed the hard drive, once it didn't. Both were from the same height, more or less.
Your laptop will last quite a while if you treat it right. It's best to err on the side of cautiousness. Keep it in a laptop bag when you aren't using it, don't stack more than a book or two on top of it, etc. My last one lasted 5 years before the IDE controller died.
The main statistic that you can get is the number of g's that the hard disk can take. It'll be some number like 3,000 or 5,000 or maybe even more when the drive is powered down. This translates into varying numbers of feet that you can drop it before the drive is useless. In most laptops, either you or the serviceperson can replace the drive, however, and it's usually economically sound to do so.
There are, AFAIK, no statistics about the LCD screens. If your LCD dies, you just got yourself a desktop with a built-in battery backup. It'll die if you drop it, kick it, stack too many books on top of it, or any other form of abuse.
I will say that I rather like the latest Sony laptops. Sony is nice and posts the drivers for their stuff, so you can rebuild your system without getting all of the Sony crap with it.
You can always pay more and get a protection plan, although they try to keep costs down by making it hard to get repairs unless there's clearly a hardware problem.
Don't plan on the machine lasting more than 4-5 years, max.
Oh, and BTW... For chrissakes, take the fscking laptop out of your dorm room. I know far too many college kids who have laptops that just sit on their desks. Which means you paid a premium for the same grade of hardware and created a theft risk, basicly for convenience you didn't use. I *used* my laptop in college, took notes on it, wrote papers on it, etc.
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pay extra for the super warranty, i know of at least one company (toshiba) which has a warranty which includes 'if anything happens to this other than fire or abuse, we'll fix it' once a year for the term of the warranty
try to see and play with a floor model first, try to evaluate the strength of the case in a store: metal may dent, but (in general) it doesn't crack, plastic (unless really thick) will crack.
nearly all of the weight of the laptop should come from the structure, get a thick,heavy laptop
if all else fails, get some (additional) metal plates to reinforce delicate parts: i got a $25 386 laptop (formerly used by the IRS) from a swap meet once that had a large metal plate on the back of the screen holding it together... it may look ghetto-style, but it works
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Most severe laptop damage involves broken LCDs. Plastic case components seem the second most common point of failure, and hard drives actually seem to be relatively uncommon victims of laptop castastrophes.
Common ways of breaking the LCD included:
* leaving a pencil on the keyboard and closing the lid
* dropping something on top of the laptop screen with the screen closed, breaking the screen from behind
* otherwise putting pressure on top of the screen such that the screen breaks from behind (such as putting it in a briefcase with a mouse, and setting the briefcase upside so the closed laptop is sitting screen-down on top of the mouse pressure point)
* dropping the laptop
Contrary to popular belief, hard drives will usually survive fairly severe drops as long as they aren't running when they fall. They're also often suspended on anti-shock mounts in modern laptops. I never saw a signifcantly higher rate of failure in laptop drives than desktop drives.
Some laptops don't even survive themselves, let alone physical abuse. Laptop screen hinges are particularly a point of stress and must be well engineered. There was a time when PowerBook 5300 screens would spontaneously snap off, along with most the rest of the plastic parts on those computers; it turned out to be a design flaw in the plastics, and they were repaired for free with updated plastic parts.
Right now I'm using a 2001 iBook, and it lives in my backpack with 15+ pounds of books, etc. To prevent damage I put it in the middle of the books so that when I throw the backpack down the stress is distributed across the entire laptop evenly. So far the iBook's high gloss finish has been scuffed to hell, and all the little feet have rubbed off, but there have been no mechanical failures despite almost a year of such abuse. I treat my backpack with the laptop exactly as I did before I carried the laptop in it.
I've had a whole bunch of portable computerish devices over the years... here's the empirical evidence on abuse-ability...
In reading this, I'm thinking it has more to do with the bag than the machine - when you're trying to protect a multiple thousand dollar investment, DON'T SKIMP ON THE BAG and you'll be much happier!