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Comparative Laptop Reviews?
clambert asks: "A few co-workers and I are in the market for a new laptop, but it's been incredibly difficult to try and explore what's out there. How do Sony's warranties rank up against Dell's? Can I get Wi-Fi and Bluetooth on the new Toshibas? What model IBMs feature DDR memory? There doesn't seem to be an AnandTech/Ars/Toms for the notebook market, and short of filtering through all the marketing hype on every {brand}.com, its tough to find out what systems offer what specs. Are there any comprehensive resources out there for those of us in the market for a new laptop?"
It doesn't have all the wireless stuff, but serveral models do. I am very happy with toshiba, had two and they are solid
right in front of you.
Epinions Laptops
Just got a new Tecra 9000. CD-R/DVD, 1GB RAM and a 1.2GHZ processor. I love it. Using XP and RedHat and both work flawlessly.
Pretty solid bang for the buck...
Epinions Laptops
http://www.notebookreview.com/reviews.html
Dell laptops are very good and reasonably priced - this is being written on one.
But have you noticed just how much advertisting dell do in print and online media? Often they have the inside front cover and two or three pages inside a magazine. This makes it almost impossible for the publication to say anything bad about their products.
As I say, they are generally nice machines, but perhaps this has something to do with the lack of comparative reviews.
Indeed, even for whole systems it's very hard to find comparative reviews these days (i.e. a Dell XYZ versus a Gateway ZYX), and I would gather that the reason is that there are so many options out there, and the models change so frequently (or are badged in a country specific way, which we see a lot in Canada), that it's impossible to stay current (not to mentioning very difficult to get them all together: Pretty much limited to the very large publishers like ZDNet). Instead, the review sites target whatever new singular piece of hardware is out: A nice granular little review for a timely piece of hardware such as the new Athlon XP 2.2 or the WD 8MB cache harddrive -> It's easy to review something so contextual as you know what the readers are looking for.
how about an apple ibook. budget beast, does the job for most things, bsd under the hood and you're away in gui-land :O)
Im posting using a HP OmniBook Xe3, dvd/cdrw combo drive, p3/4, 15 inch monitor at 1024x768, 20gig hdd, integrated ethernet/modem, running win98/mandrake seamlessly, it's been great for me! competitive price too!
Sorry folks, but Sony is and has for a long time been selling consumer products. Sony offers 90days limited warranty (aka if anything goes bad even if its thier fault they'll have to torture you into not wanting to get it fixed) Now, You can buy a Dell 3 year Next day onsite warranty that will pretty much pay for itself. Plus Dells just run Great!
If you are going to use the notebook computer as a mobile device (meaning that you travel with it), then I recommend checking out mobilecomputing.com. One of the best resources for notebook computing and PDA's also.
Listen the regular cnet and zdnet sites usually have reviews of laptops. They are not as tech centered or as unbiased as other sources IMHO. However, they make for a good starting point.
_ __
If you are going to use an alternative OS (linux or BSD for examples obviously) then check out a quick google search first to see people's impressions of the compatibility. This is a good idea anyway since people often sprinkle general comments into these and give you an idea of the quality of the product.
Finally, unless you are going for a Dell please go to a computer store and browse. Laptops are very personal machines and pointing device preference and the feel of the keyboard beneath your fingers as well as general layout of special buttons and the brightness and clarity of the screens are something you need to get a feel for first-hand.
If you get a Dell or other mail-order product it also gives you a point of reference so you know what to look for. For example if you try a box out at a store and realize you can't live without at least 15" screen or something.
I have Dell Inspiron 4000 and have been very happy with the quality of the product. SuSE 7.3 installed with no issues and Sax2 did a better job than Dell in figuring out my video settings.
Castle Wolfenstein looks damn good.
_______________________________________________
ACK
From my experience (2+ years in retail computer sales) the best laptops you can buy are ones that you cannot see, like a Dell or a Toshiba Tecra. (This is changing, however, their Satellite's have gotten very good recently, check out the 5005-s507, s504, or, if you want to go all out, s607) I would try cNet, they usually have some ok reviews on notebooks, or browse the opinion sites, keeping a air of cynicism since some of these people will bitch up a storm because they didn't know how to turn on the computer.
Personally speaking, if it were my money, I would go Toshiba. Great unit, low price, warranty extensions available through them for 3 years full accidental damage, the whole bit.
Couldn't be any happier with my PowerBook G4. Runs Mac OS X great and works well with Mandrake 8.2 PPC. Plus it's one cool looking notebook! 8-)
iBooks are nice, but they use G3 CPUs... Mac users are waaay better off with a G4.
I've previously had Compaq and Dell laptops. I've had a IBM Thinkpad A21P for about a year now. - I must say that it is the best laptop I've ever seen/used. It's display is a dream. Sound,graphics card, pcmcia, networking (miniPCI + Dlink DWL650) worked out of the box when installing linux as well as FreeBSD (installing Win2K or NT means hunting for drivers online ).
/m
First you must make sure the laptop is 'Linux-Ready'. Take a look at the Standard Certification at LinuxCare. So that you can see whether your favourite Linux distro fits with your laptop of choice. Then proceed to google for the linux support for the rest of the devices.
From Netcraft....
The site slashdot.org is running Apache/1.3.20 (Unix) mod_perl/1.25 mod_gzip/1.3.19.1a on Linux
Cruise TT
Yes, I know - only one mouse button.
;) ). There's a Firewire port in the back so you can plug in your DV cameras and the like - again, sat there in the living room with my wife and tweaked my daughter's birthday party video.
But otherwise, my Powerbook is a great machine. I can put Yellow Dog Linux on it if I want just Linux. Or if I want a good BSD system, like the song says, "Boom...there it is." Runs the major apps I care about (MS Office (yes, I know...but it's a business thing), Adobe Acrobat), runs the apps I make (Perl), has a great display, DVD playback, and if you plug in a monitor in the back, you can make it work as a secondary monitor (instead of just a mirror, which is kind of cool). Instant sleep-off, sleep-on just by closing the lid. (Most Windows based laptops I've seen get *very* pissed off when you put them in sleep mode, what with the PCMCIA slots getting redected and all.)
Modem, 1 G/100/10 Ethernet built in, Airport built in (you can turn it off if you're worried, or get an Airport and bridge it to your local network at 128 bits encryption - sitting in the living room surfing the net was never so much fun
Other than the mouse thing - and you either get used to doing Control-Click for secondary mouse stuff, or when you have it at a desk you plug in a little USB mouse - it's been a rock solid machine.
Oh, and it plays Icewind Dale great too. (Baldur's Gate runs all right, as long as you boot into OS 9, because the bastards haven't Carbonized BG I yet.)
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
It is a great machine. XP runs fantastic on it, although the DVD player causes it to crash occaisionally. Forte also causes the mousepad driver to crash somehow.
But linux doesn't run on it at all - you've been warned!
If you have the cash, I highly recommend the Dell 8200. I just got mine to replace my aging Toshiba Tecra 8100. I have a number of Toshibas around the shop here and after dealing with Dell I am in the midst of replacing them all. Dell has a better warranty and seems to be a litttle more solid a machine.
I had to send my Tecra back twice in the first week, once due to a back DVD drive (which they would not let me replace) and again as it was overheating.
The Dell on the otherhand has been flawless so far. Fantastic screen and performance with a 1.6Ghz P4 and a GeForce4 Go 440 scoring in a nice 5100 or so on 3DMark2k1 SE with the Q3 (1.3) timedemo on 1024x768 getting an amazing 140 FPS. I very rarely go to LAN parties due to the very noticable lack of beer but the next time I do I am taking this thing rather than my Tbird 1.4 with Radeon 8500. Sure, the desktop is just a little faster, but not by much.
The only downside with the dell is the weight. It is a beast compared to the Tecra, but it is a 3 spindle design.
I also have a couple Inspiron 4100's around if you would like a review of that.
Hope that helps
tinfoilmedia
Most of the sites mentioned (like Ars, Anand, Tom's, and so forth) are targeted towards the "enthusiast" market. They're the people who go out and but new motherboards, video cards, and so on, and they tweak constantly. You don't see too many reviews of actual, brand-name computers on those sites unless they are doing something truly unique.
Laptops, for the most part, appeal to two groups of users - corporate shops and students (granted plenty of exceptions). Enthusiasts don't seem to buy as many laptops, probably because of the performance compromises virtually all laptops make. You can't readily upgrade anything on the typical laptop except for RAM, HD space, and Cardbus devices. There's no CPU swapping, no video card upgrades, and overclocking is kind of pointless on a laptop (though I had a PowerBook 3400c once that I overclocked from 240 to 270 MHz).
What coverage there is of laptops has usually been in the "mainstream" print publications like PC Magazine, but they don't even go there too often.
When it's a situation like yours, with multiple co-workers getting laptops, usually it's a pretty simple answer - your IT department will give you a Dell, Compaq, IBM, or Toshiba and tells you to love it. At least you guys get to pick!
As for our shop - Compaq Evo N600c laptops. They're pretty slick. As for me (IRL), I use a TiBook 667 as my main computer at home, and it's most wonderful indeed.
-- Josh Turiel
"2. Do not eat iPod Shuffle."
i am impressed with the screens dell is offering in several of its notebooks. they have 14.1" and 15" UXGA screens that have native resolutions of 1600x1200.
i have a dell inspiron 8100.. its great.. though kindve expensive for what power there is.. slackware dropped right in.. geforce2 go is ok.. ive only had it for 6 months and the only problem is that the screen may be off in a while because the hinges seem to get looser and looser all the time.. i dont know though, maybe all laptops do that...
Holy Jesus! What are these goddamn animals?
Is it possible to buy a DELL, IBM, H-P, Fujitsu-Siemens or Compaq Laptop without MS Windows being pre-installed on it? If so, where? If not, why does nobody complain about it?
Click here for example
"I don't think it's selfish, to eat defenseless shellfish." -NOFX
My coworker and I are both using Dell's that are replacements for our orginals after only a year. My replacement is bunk and going back, my sony should be here tomorrow.
Both are inspirons, the majority of the problems with ours can be traced back to a flimsy case which allows flex, connectors work loose and more than likely solder joints as well.
The problem is that the person isn't looking to find a laptop that can run anything: they are looking for a laptop with great specs. I don't think that's the way to buy a laptop.
;)
When my wife and I decided to buy a laptop, we sat down and discussed what we wanted to do with it. After that, the specs wrote themselves, and we could move on to finding compatible machines.
For example, she wanted to run Evercrack. I wanted screen real estate for work application. So a 3D accelerator, 512M RAM, and 1600x1200 display were part of the specs.
Did I eventually want to run Linux on it? If so, then maybe a laptop with no proprietary hardware (as it turns out, I don't want to run Linux on it, though, at least not for a while).
Finally, after determining what we wanted to do with the laptop, we spec shopped for the machine, using C-Net, USENET, vendor sites.
In the end, we narrowed it down to the high-end Vaio and high-end Toshiba. Both had comparable specs, the Vaio was slower, with larger screen size (same resolution, though) and a slightly better 3D card (mobile radeon 7500).
We went with the Toshiba, though: GeForce4Go (but the video card can be swapped out, apparently, which was a big plus), SD/Smart Media readers built in (for digital photography and swapping files to my Zaurus), Firewire. So we got a machine with great specs, but that does what we need it to do (plus more).
Of course, the Everquest thing should have tipped me off. I think I've used the laptop once since we've gotten it. Silly wife.
Vincent J. Murphy
Spandex Justice
n/t
As somebody who's been using laptops for the last ten years as my primary machine, and as a guy who's surrounded by mobile salespeople and execs who live on laptops, the reason why you don't see comparison reviews is because most of us are zealots about one or two brands.
The salespeople at my shop are absolutely married to their Sony Vaios, because they look sexy, they impress clients, and they're very lightweight. They don't care about things like driver support or warranty, because the tech crew handles that, and they always get a new one every year anyway.
The network admin crew loves Dells and Toshibas, because they're solid as rocks and the driver support is much better, with pretty regular driver updates.
You're already seeing lots of people slap up their opinion here, but notice that it's all opinions - not hardware comparisons. Us Slashdotters are subject to the same hardware fanatacism that my cohorts are subject to. Whether you want integrated 802.11b, big hard drives, big memory support, whatever, you can always find it in any brand. Everybody's doing basically the same thing, and the performance is within 10% of the next guy.
What's your damage, Heather?
Look here for a side-by-side comparison of desktops and lappies.
--geethree
What's that?
Oh, *right* - that thing I voided with a screwdriver that first day...
Actually, I've never needed to use the warranty on my vaios - I have 2 of them. Damn solid little machines. They've literally been all over the world, usually rattling around in a backpack without any special padding or protection. The older one is held together with tape in places, but it performs like a dream.
Cheers,
Jim in Tokyo
-- My Weblog.
I have a Dell Latitude C400. It works great and is very light. I guess it all depends on if you travel with it or not. It was also well priced at $3600 cnd funds (taxes and shipping included). I travel a lot so I neede something compact but powerful at the same time. It also has wireless option too :-)
I haven't used Sony, but they have a SuperSlim Pro series that is very light-weight and seems to have good features, including FireWire and video out.
I have used and supported Dells and Toshibas extensively at our University, however, and they both seem to be rock solid machines. Although the Dell might have a slightly better looking display, I think I favor the Toshibas a bit more. They are a little sleeker looking and they just seem to be incredibly stable. (We are running Toshiba Satellite 1805's (new), 2800's (old) and 2060's (moldy)). Kudos to them for redisigning their touchpads, which have incredible accuracy in their newer models.
Note: We are a Windows 2000 only shop.
...is that in three or four years you will have to invent a reason to buy that really cool newer version, as your old computer will still be running just fine...
With all due respect, stay out of Wi-Fi, it's a proprietary virus created by Microsoft. It's only there to make them retain control over the pc market.
Less "flamebait", more "truth too close to home", perhaps ?
But have you noticed just how much advertisting dell do in print and online media? Often they have the inside front cover and two or three pages inside a magazine. This makes it almost impossible for the publication to say anything bad about their products.
I subscribe to several magazines, and yes, some do seem to be lenient on their advertisers, but there are some publications out there who stick to their guns and call a spade a spade -- one recent review blasted Dell for shipping a P4 system with DDR SDRAM rather than RDRAM due to the performance hit. So making a blanket statement such as this is not accurate.
...we are from the government - we are here to help...
Yeah, I used to be the corporate sales guy that everyone assumed could spend 10 seconds online and have boiled down the entire laptop market to give my customer the scoop on exactly the price and feature point in the market that he/she wanted. Now you know what it's like out there...
FWIW, I mostly sold Asus, which are a monster product, but I had to provide most of the support myself. For retail customers the Toshibas are great products, lot of third party accessories available for cheap, and if you spend $1500 to $1700 you can probably get what you want.
Spring for the extra warranty, otherwise you might be flushing $2000 down the toilet if you break the thing 366 days after you bought it.
:)
I tend to favor the main brands (Toshiba, Acer, IBM Thinkpad). You'll find that most Linux-ready laptops are also the better-made onee. I think this is because the linux laptop FAQ is weighted towards laptops that use decent hardware that has drivers available, so you get less off-brand internals.
After 8 laptops (varios purchases, various sources), my two recommendations are:
1) Make sure it has a 3 months warrenty. Most problems happen immediately (manufacturer flaws that appear during the first days of use). Most accidents happen during the first month (while you learn the 'stresses' your laptop can handle).
2) Never get reconditioned (or used) laptops unless they include a new battery-- battery replacement is expensive.
A.
The real challange is to find a Laptop with
Linux pre-installed. There are a couple companies,
but they are way more expensive ($500 last time
I checked) than mainstream laptops with Windows.
---- join dshield.org Distributed Intrusion Detec
From what I understand, there are only three or so
notebook MANUFACTURERS. Dell, Sony etc. take these notebooks, slap their trademarks all over
kick up the price by 50%-150% and force you to pay the M$ tax.
Scan http://powernotebooks.com to build your own.The above link has a perfect score in http://www.resellerratings.com (makes me a _little_ nervous) but they have a nice range of books from minimal SIS chipset based to the lateses P-4 DDR units with 64Mb DDR radeon video. All in the $800-$1700 (US dollar) range.
For a narrower range of notebooks but with better prices, pop over to http://www.mwave.com and poke on notebooks in their catalog. mwave has very good ratings in http://www.resellerratings.com (more realistic IMHO) and will let you configure your notebook without the M$ tax.
Is there anywhere that will custom-build me a laptop? I know it will be quite expensive, but as long as the price of the laptop is less than the price of the equally powered desktop plus $750 I would greatly consider it. I'm just one of those my computer my way kind of people.
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
I own a Dell Inspiron 4100 (Geforce 2MX Go 32Mb version) with 14.1" SXGA screen (1400x1050). I've added an extra 256MB of ram (384Mb total) and a Cisco Wireless adapter (PCMCIA) and I have to say that it's an amazing machine (especially since I went with the DVD/CDRW combo drive) and everything works fine in Linux. I wanted a machine that is fast, that can play neverwinternights when it eventually comes out, that isn't like carrying a brick of led and that had decent battery life.
I was sort of lucky, since Dell first fucked up my order and sent me the Radeon version, so I got to see both versions. The battery life was pretty good. Radeon version could do 2h11m of straight DVD playback, while my current version can watch any normal length DVD's (did't really do any stress tests yet).
The LCD is extremely sexy and displays everything perfectly. I also didn't have any dead/lit pixels in either I received. The speakers are below average compared to my ATP3's at home, but that was expected.
The keyboard feels great! I read on http://www.zdnet.com and http://www.cnet.com reviews of different laptops and they always said the Dell's had really good feeling keyboards and they weren't lying. You also have both a touchpad and the little thingy in the middle of the keyboard. There's also 2 sets of clickable buttons. Which is nice since they are nicely positioned depending on which mouse you are using.
One last thing: I was considering a Toshiba 5k series, however I read that it was a BIOSless machine. You might want to be careful if you go with toshiba, not to choose that series if you plan on installing Linux on it. Go to: http://www.linux-laptop.net to see success stories of installing Linux on different kinds of laptops.
I can honestly say that everything works on mine, except for the modem (but I didn't even try configuring it yet, nor will I ever).
Dell customer services suck the bat though. They are completely clueless. When I called to report that they had fucked up the order, they kept me on hold for a while. Just to give you an idea, I fast forwarded the DVD the Matrix to the kung fu part at the beginning of the call and I was able to watch the entire movie from that point on while on the phone with them. 90% of the time, they kept me on hold. If I never worked in a call center and didn't care for the actual poor sucker that got my call, I could of weaseled out a easy upgrade, but I'm not that kind of person.
Hope that somewhat helps!
Fish
I bought a Toshiba 4090 XDVD about 2 years ago. The laptop had a lot of features for a good price. However, the mobile celeron chip kept overheating! It took 8 months for me to convince Toshiba of this. I sent it back to them 4 times and each time they said "Oh, it looks ok to us."
After filing a complaint with the Better Business Bureau, I got a call from a real person (not a phone support) at Toshiba. They were curious what was the problem. I explained that I had a BS in Computer Engineering and an MS in Electrical Engineering, so I know how to debug a system. This thing was overheating. The person overed me a full refund. One week later, they announced a recall on the Toshiba 4090XDVD with mobile celeron. Evidently, Intel changed the specifications on the mobile celeron package and Toshiba didn't test this new module.
Toshiba saves money by not testing. I will never buy one again. I bought my Sony Vaio the next week and love it. Thinking about getting a TiBook now though... yum.
If you've got the dough and want something that'll last with some "ooo" factor, get a TiBook with OS9, OS X and YellowDog Linux.
That's what I got in January when they finally started to deliver a CD-R & RW burner in 'em. (I HATE not being able to back-up.)
I can only recommend it. My G4/667MHz 512MB RAM 30GB disk is great.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
Toshiba Laptops are some of the best laptops I've ever worked with. The integrated periferials make these laptops very mobile. This really helps out our users who are running from site to site.
Thus far, Toshiba's warranty is one of the best I've ever worked with from and IT standpoint. The 3 year system guard protects against virtually everything on the machine. Service for these laptops has also been very flexible. It has been my experience that as long as it's not a vital part (motherboard, lcd screen, etc.) the replacement parts can be shipped out to you. That in itself saves a TON of heartache especially when a big whig has a bad cd drive.
And yes, you can get WiFi and Bluetooth on the new Portege models as well as the Satellite Pro 6100's.
I just bought a 1.6 p4, and it's dual-booting XP and RH7.2. I'm still tweaking the X driver for the GeForce2 mobility, and the modem's probably a Winmodem so I use my old PCMCIA 33.6, but everything else SMOKES.
You are not the customer.
Not sure about other models, but the new Inspirons have upgradeable video (e.g., pull out the Radeon-M and replace it with a GF4-go).
Can't remember what it's called off the top of my head, but they have a standard connect for it now.
I have to agree and expand on the parent post. First, not sure there is anyplace "good" to get laptop reviews, so finding out from the /. crowd should work out better. In both cases you will get lots of words, but on /. you can hear from longterm users like me and others.
During the past 8 years I have owned two (that's all, 2) laptops, both are Toshiba. The first one was a T1100 and it kept working until I broke it tinkering inside the case.
The second one, a SatellitePro, is about 6 years old and has had almost daily use, only now starting to show some stress (cracks, etc) and has been to the shop once for a defective battery. Bought my son one when he was about 12 yrs old, he recently replaced it (Toshiba was still working fine) with a Dell. The Dell has been sent back for various repairs several times in the past year.
My SatellitePro is now my livingroom websurfing machine. Will be replacing it with another Toshiba this summer.
Also, at work I have used Panasonic (the CF series is great if you don't mind paying a premium for a ruggedized machine), also used Dell and NEC. Hated the Dell and NEC, both seemed slow for their processor and memory, but the biggest thing was they just did not feel "solid" like a Toshiba. Fo a long time I refused using stuff from the office and took my own machines everyplace.
The prices of Toshibas are reasonable, just make a casual comparison at Best Buy or a similar store.
Bottom line: Toshibas always work.
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
I simple took a visit to Apple's homepage and once again realized that they are the creators of the finest laptop computers around.
As simple as that.
I used to like Dells, but I've seen too many of them with missing keycaps and other annoying problems on airplanes and in airports.
I prefer Thinkpads, but price is always an issue with IBM.
Reviewfinder.com
You can search freetext, or browse by model and manufacturer.
In my foolish youth, I use to build PC's for friends and family. After creating a support nightmare for myself, I have since only recommended one brand and those are Dells.
I probably referred about 10 friend/family to buy a Dell and nobody has ever complained.
In an older job, I use to make the hardware standards for the company and had to pick from the various Dell models. We always had problems with Dell changing their core configuration which would really hose the standard images we would ghost onto the machines. For instance, Dell would suddenly start shipping their laptops with the C version of the PCMCIA ethernet card.
However, for home use, I see no reason with going with anything else but a Dell. "Dude, you're so going to get a Dell"
Live web cams
Can I get Wi-Fi and Bluetooth on the new Toshibas?
Anything with PCMCIA slots will take a wireless card of whatever flavour you like. Last I looked all the Toshibas had 2 PCMCIA slots.
if anybody finds a model with more let me know!
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
One thing I hope you realize is that no one here has anything good to say about Sony laptops. That is because they are the equivalent to one of those suped-up Honda Civics you see with the suspension dropped down and neon lights around the license plate and a mysterious "R Type" logo on the side. All show and no performance. It seems like you are in the market for a Windows capable machine, so I would suggest the Tecra line from Toshiba - they are great machines and aren't as bulky as the Dell laptops. Thinkpads are good, but compared to the Toshibas they are not as feature rich for the buck.
Sound waves should be free!
I'm not sure how Toshiba can make good on selling milling technology to both sides in the cold war. Propellers are obsolete anyway now, but it's the thought that counts.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
PCWorld has a Top 15 list broken down into Power and Value categories. They also cover the pros and cons of each.
I'm currently using a A21p (850 PIII) as my main machine. I've had it since March '01 with no probs.
:)
Reason: 1600x1200? You cannot really argue with that.
Also, these IBM's have video in too! (Tosh's don't by default (I've just checked))
The previous one was a 770z (March '99? I think I get a new one every 2 years. That had a 300 PII I think), which at the time had the highest resolution (1280x1024) and that's still going strong on someones desk (the battery's dead by now).
Previous to that, it was a Tosh' Tecra something-or-other 166 (Nov '98) which is still running as a router somewhere in the organisation. (how's about that for reuse then
Unfortunately, there isn't anything with a higher resolution of 1k6 x 1k2 yet (prove me wrong) but I'd get it as soon as it came out.
Other collegues typically have Vaios (crap video cards (CStrike-wise)) and Dells (the little Inspiron 2650's ok, but too small).
& the one I've got my eye on is the A31p but I'll wait for the 2 or 2.1 Ghz P4 (Q1 '03 roll-out, methinks) + it'll take the Ultraport camera I got for the last one too!
After saying all that bollocks, I think that if this is your first laptop, the main things to ask yourself is:
"How long's the warranty? (Y'know you'll drop it more often/earlier if it's shorter)"
"Trackpoint or scratch&sniff?"
"Will it scale up my display on the LCD if I drop the resolution (IOW: play CS) , or does it only show up the middle 30% of the screen?"
"Can I carry it easily? (e.g. I don't feel like a dickwad with a 3kg 'top in a rucksack, or am I a neo-PHB who looks cools with a teeny briefcase)?"
"Will it run Linux/BSD/OS-of-choice?"
I'll shut up now & get on with....
XOR EAX,EAX
PUSH EAX
RET
.
.
;lame I know...
-- Mod me down. I am not a karma tart. ffs,gag
You need a chisel to work the mouse buttons on the Dell...like an old Timex Sinclair. You will definitely irritate everyone around you with the noise.
Dell Inspiron 8100(with Radeon M7500 GFX). I get ~3700 in 3dMark2001 which isnt too bad for a desktop but I think pretty impressive on a laptop!! It is my main machine these days using an 802.11b card to connect to the net and my desktop PC. No complaints to date.
DUDE! Not legal in most U.S. states!
Anyway, Sony's service does really suck--I watched the guy in the next cube go through two months of hell with them (over his personal laptop) until he threatened a lawsuit and they gave him his money back.
I would not get a Dell what so ever. I am on my third replacement laptop in a 5 month span(1st replacement started sparking and the second replacement was shipped to me broken), and the problems that I went though with Tech Support and Customer Support was just horrid. I would not wish the problems that I had on any one. If you are a home user, expect to get the shaft like I did on getting good service. (I don't want the replies that say "I have had my Dell Craprion for 11 months now and I have not had a major problem and I have had great tech support and I will always buy Dell." That does not work here in my little area at /.)
If I was going to buy a laptop today, I would go with a Sony. All of there other electronics are great buys and seem to last for ever, so why would they not opuy the same quality into the computers.
And for warrenties, remember what Chris Farley said in Tommy Boy about warrenties......
I have used Toshiba, Dell IBM, and Prostar...Seen Compaq, Winbook, and Others...
:::
I Service many brands from many different sides of the spectrum. And Here's my Advice...
Look at These 3 Points.
1).Sturdiness
2).Functionality
3).Support
If Buying for myself, I would List the Dell's, IBM's and Prostar Laptops. Then start Elimating the ones you don't want or cannot afford. Then Way the Value of these several points.
IBM - Great Power Managment, and You know they will be there for you.
Dell - Nearly as great power Managment and a Great Case, and rugged design.
ProStar - Great Hardware Choices go into the Design of there Laptops. ATI, BX Chipset, are a few I've Seen. A there Displays are the Best I've seen. That, and they are more affordable than some others.
Check out www.notebookcomputer.com
::: Good Luck
Just go to Apple and click on "Hardware," then "Powerbook," then "Tech Specs." It couldn't be any easier to find.
In my dream world, every manufacturer would make it this easy to find information on their products. It baffles me that they don't have an "I know what I'm doing" button, or something to allow the informed to cut through the crap. Ever try to get info on a VW? You'll endure cryptic informaiton arrangement, no-way-out slideshow-style information presentation when they do offer details, and Flash Out the Ass(TM).
Guess I'll go buy a Nissan to stick my TiBook in.
I've had several Sony Vaio notebooks, and have been very happy with them. They are not the cheapest, but the build quality is good and they look the part, and they work nicely with other Sony kit.
I've currently got a PCG-GR215SP. I want to put Linux on it but am afraid that it might have proprietry hardware that will screw up the install. Has anyone reading this got Linux running on one of the latest Sony Vaio machine? I know people have done it on earlier ones, but can't find anything on the web about installing on a machine like the PCG-GR215SP.
Try "Ask Slashdot" You'll have to sort out the good opionions from the useless ones, but you'll get plenty of answers.
What's HTH ?
This is my second Toshiab with a Geforce and I am happy with them. The new one I got now has 1.6 Ghz, 512MB DDr, GeForce 4 (Games!), Bluetooth, FireWire and too many slots and connectors to list. It is more a mobile desktop replacement though, if someone looks to work without power cord I guess you need something else.
I'm in the market as well and I found this article pretty helpful. To summarize, unless all you do is hack audio/video, it's a waste of money to get a P4-M w/ DDR memory, despite the faster bus, etc. Photoshop and AutoCAD tests were actually faster on the PIII-M.
I was leaning toward the Toshiba Satellite 5005-S504 until I read this. Running linux is a must, so now I'm considering a Dell Inspiron 8100.
Both of the above have UXGA (1600x1200) displays. I originally tought I wanted a Powerbook G4, but am not convinced that I can be productive on a 1152x768 display. My development environment looks like this: Left 1/3 of the screen is an Eterm running screen. Right 2/3 is XEmacs. A higher resolution means more code visible at a time and/or a more readable font.
At the end of the day, many of us would like to check the laptop for "linux compliance" before actually purchasing the machine.
I found these 2 site quite useful:
Linux on a laptop
UniX with Mobile Computers
Not always the latest & greatest, but I can recommend looking at TigerDirect for cheap notebooks, especially their "web-only" specials. I recently picked up a 800mhz/10gHD/128M RAM/WiFi/13" new (not refurbished) IBM R30 ThinkPad for $800. Can't complain about that. Runs Linux just fine too. :-)
I also shopped around on eBay for a while but found used prices a lot higher than new or factory reburbished equipment.
Shop around!
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
I've had many an IBM Thinkpad (701, 750C, 720?, i1721, and now a 600E), every one with Linux on it, and every one worked like a charm.
You can't beat IBM for laptops. Look at the X-Series or the older 240/240x.
http://chrismetcalf.net
I have this IBM 770Z as my main PC right (Poor college student). Its SOLID as anything I've ever used. My roommate has a Dell something or other, and I'm afraid I'm going to break it everytime I touch it. I can pick up my laptop by the corner, and it feels solid. Albiet, it weighs a lot, but hey, it sits on my couch most of the day. Docking station is pretty nifty, but only one USB.
I know this is an old Laptop, but I've seen IBM's new line and it seems very similar. Performance wise, well mine sucks, but its still running WinXP Pro! (A feat itself!)
--sig fault--
I got mine from Circuit City a couple of weeks ago. I had every intention of removing OS X and putting Linux on it, but I've yet to do it. OS X rocks! I've got X installed and Gnome, so I can run most of my Linux apps. I could run Office X on it, but I seriously doubt I'd ever pay for that.
I've been using a DELL Latitude LS lately - upgrading the HD to something larger and running RH7.1 linux on it. OK, it only has 800x600, but it is really small and fits in a Timbuk2 cycle courier bag easily and has survived a few crashes (on the bike - rather than SegFault). The Dell warranty has replaced a few bits and pieces (a faulty fan and keyboard) - but thats not bad compared to previous laptops. The Dell warranty is the main selling point for me.
My main gripe is that they come with ms windows - which is a pain in the arse because I don't really use or need it.
I looked at using a Sony C1VE (european edition), but it looked like it wouldn't last 5 minutes although I it scored well on cuteness factor.
I found http://www.linux-laptop.net very handy when setting up linux on various laptops...
callum
I definitely agree with this. Notebooks are literally closer to the user than desktop machines and it's impossible to get the "right" notebook simply based on performance specs. You really need to play around with a few brands/models to get a feel for what you like. Also a high performance machine is useless if you really have a hard time with a trackpad (I personally do) or if it's too bulky to tag along with you everywhere you go (if you really need portability).
I recently bought a notebook that uses an 800 mhz Crusoe processor, and realistically speaking it's slower than the equivalent intel p-whatever. It also only holds up to 256 megs of RAM, and doesn't have 3D graphics hardware.
But portability, battery life, a trackpoint (I like my hands in a fairly constant position), and a good screen are really important to me. I couldn't care less about performance as long as it's fast enough to write documents, do light coding, browse, and email/IM. I added the 802.11b option and the machine's perfect for running all over town with.
The 10-20% performance difference between laptop models is nothing compared to the ergonomics and quality of the hardware. Remember, this isn't a box sitting under your desk which you can connect any keyboard or monitor to - once you buy it, you're going to have that box sitting on your lap, be staring at that screen, and be using that keyboard for hours per day. (Unless you're using it docked all the time, in which case it's more like a luggable desktop.)
:-), but aside from that it's a a pleasure to use. Lightweight, excellent quality, gorgeous screen, and everything Just Works smoothly out of the box with a tolerable operating system, unlike the many hours I usually spend getting all the random quirky hardware in a PC laptop working under Linux. And there's no Windows Tax.
That's why laptop owners are so religious about their machines - this is an area where idiosyncratic unexplainable personal preference really is the most important factor. It's also why comparative laptop reviews are generally useless. Go out and get your hands on a bunch of different machines - that'll tell you more than any magazine article.
That said, PC Magazine's Support and Satisfaction Survey will give you some useful hard data on laptop reliability, and reading lots of comments on epinions can give you a dim impression of common trends in owner experience.
My personal experience: I bought a ThinkPad T21 about a year ago, but I found the keyboard painful to use and had to sell it. (Which is a shame, considering how good previous IBM and ThinkPad keyboards have been.) Compaq has a good keyboard, but Compaq sucks for build quality, reliability, and service. I tried HP and Toshiba models at a local store and was unimpressed with their ergonomics and general quality. I recently used a Dell Inspiron 4100 for a month - it was cheap, and the three-year CompleteCare service plan is awesome, but I found the machine itself to be mediocre in every way. Mediocre build quality, mediocre ergonomics, mediocre screen, a little too heavy, and really ugly.
I'm now using a PowerBook G4 - it has a few quirks, the main one being that it's not i386/Linux
Consumer Reports magazine has good, scientific, and fairly unbiased reviews of computer hardware every now and then. They usually have repair statistics as well, very useful if you're looking for stability and durability.
It's 1.5 years old now, but I've had no problems with it. SuSe 7.3 installed with no problems with any of my hardware. Earlier versions needed tweaking to get up to speed. It's been to Burning Man twice, which is not a laptop friendly enviroment and been carried all over the place. The only downside is it's a heavy beast, but there are lighter models. Weight was not an issue for me.
or the clod w/ a clumsy g/f (that would be me ;)) nothing beats a Panasonic Toughbook, series of ruggedized notebooks, i have had dells and compaqs in the past, both of which were horribly mauled, covered with coke and had various parts of the casing broken or cracked including the lcd casing on the dell...
.45 round .. mine can supposedly be dropped from 3 feet on concrete and still work.. while i haven't tested that much(and i live in a basement w/ a concrete floor ;)) it has fallen at least that far onto hardwood w/o so much as a flicker on it's sexy screen
what i learned from all this and the absolute void of customer support at any major retailer was to buy a laptop that didn't break, sure it's a little slower and a little more expensive but my toughbook will last forever =).. it has gel packed harddrives, special stretch connecters inside, a magnesium lcd case and mine is just the executive version, there are militarized ones that cna take a
as for linux, i have mandrake 8.2 on there right now, usually it runs 2000 or XP but i decided i was bored a couple afternoons ago
anyway check out http://www.panasonic.com/toughbook for more info, yes ther eis flash.. sure it hurts but the specs are there in as well
Or if I want a good BSD system, like the song says, "Boom...there it is."
;) )
Uhh... that's "Whoop there it is"...
Airport built in (you can turn it off if you're worried, or get an Airport and bridge it to your local network at 128 bits encryption - sitting in the living room surfing the net was never so much fun
The Airport antenna is built into every new Mac (desktops and laptops), and they all have an internal slot for the Airport card, but the Airport card itself is an extra $100.
If you are looking for a high end laptop, I would definitely check out Dynamism. They have great service, and offer some very cool machines. There comparisons are purely spec based.
Spencer Ogden
*Disclaimer - I work for IBM*
...is that unlike Desktops, they are not the sum of their parts. Desktops are all about "speeds and feeds", for the most part. Processor, HDD, RAM, VidCard, etc., etc. Notebooks are more about when, where and how you use the system. Do you travel => 50% of the time on your job? Do you need a robust platform that you can take home occasionally? Do you need a compromise between power and portability? How much battery life do you need and do you need swapable components or will a built in CD ROM handle your needs. Do you work with highly sensitive information? Do you work in a wireless office? IBM's suite of Notebooks is designed with these types of user requirements in mind.
IBM's are easily differentiated by Letter designation. X's are ultra portable, T's are powerful and portable, R's are budget T's (a little heavier and not as flexible when it comes to components), and A's are powerhouses, possibly desktop replacements, that you wouldn't want to travel with on a regular basis. IBM offers features on their notebooks you can't find anywhere else:
Wireless components - Many ThinkPad notebooks come standard with integrated 802.11b wireless technology to let you interface with an existing wireless network. Since the antenna is built into the screen bezel, reception is better.
Security - Select IBM NetVista desktops and ThinkPad notebooks feature the IBM Embedded Security Subsystem, designed for use with IBM Client Security Software - two solutions that comprise the heart of the IBM Secure Client.
Awards - ThinkPad notebooks lead the pack in design and innovation.
Also, IBM has finally heard the cry of all those user who hate our highly praised TrackPoint pointing device and added a touch pad to our new models. I don't have the time to list all the design points here, but if you're looking for a state of the art Notebook, regardless of your computing needs, you can't go wrong with a ThinkPad.
For the past few years, my money would go to a Dell. I've always gotten good support from them, and the products are top notch (not to mention that they run Linux like a champ).
I bought a C810 and I'm so glad I did. The Inspirons are a little better for multimedia, but my C810 isn't at all bad either with a 32MB Nvidia chip and a 15.1" screen.
One thing I really REALLY need in a laptop that I am buying is no friggen OS pre-installed. I have only had self built PCs and even when I used windows ... well, I got it the cheap way. Now, my copy of XP is a student license and I don't even use it - and I sure as heck don't want to pay for it twice when the price of the laptop is already pretty damn expensive. This is not a pro-linux troll - its a statement that I am a cheap bastard!
After that - price is my major litigating factor. I am just not in the money. The current laptop I am looking at can (humerously enoug) be found @ www.walmart.com. Since my girl works @ wal-mart I am hoping to get the 10% off it so its only a $900 laptop (p3 1ghz, dvd - not a bad little laptop for the price).
Built in 802.11b is important, bluetooth not so much - but I can live w/o tho since I can get the adapter
The ultimate network admin tool needs HELP!
In the last month Anandtech had begun reviewing laptops with the same rigor with which they approach everything else! While they have only covered 3 laptops so far, I think the reviews are exactly what a technical person wants to read when they are trying to make an educated decision.
They have covered the:
Asus T9
Toshiba Satellite
and just today:
WinBook N4
I am really glad to see someone as trusted at Anand filling this niche!
-OctaneZ
This fall I got a Dell Latitude 8100 with the big ol' 15" screen and 1.13 Ghz processor. I have to say that I've been fairly disapointed with the overall machine. It seems poorly designed and is extremely heavy (granted, I've got 2 batteries but its like 20 lbs and my shoulders are starting to become lopsided from overcompensating with the messenger bag). The keyboard scars the LCD screen which has already been replaced twice; nice keyboard, nice LCD, there just isn't enough space between the two. The tech support has been pretty good, but the fact that I've had to have three visits in 6 months isn't very encouraging. My advice: get an Apple laptop, they're a bigger babe magnet then you could possibly believer and really have a way of tying a room together.
I recently purchased a laptop. I looked for a site as you mention and something like pc-world will have comparisons of about a dozen laptops, but it didn't really provide me with what I needed. Mostly I tried to figure out which one I wanted based on key features. For me, the key features were
* Relatively light (although not a sub-notbook)
* 14" screen at most (adds to "light")
* DVD/CD-RW
* At least 1 gigahertz
* GOOD VIDEOCARD (Geforce2go with 16MB or better)
* At least a 20GB hard drive
* Good battery life
Based on these features and a LOT of searching, I personally decided on either a Toshiba 3005-S304 or -S307. What I found in stock was an S304. For what it is worth I bought the "3 year extended warranty" from CompUSA (actually, they "threw it in" for the $1500 price tag, no guarantees you will be able to get the same deal).
I am quite pleased with the Toshiba.
I have heard about "maintenance horror stories" with Sony laptops, but don't know any of them first hand.
I've been using a Sony Vaio PCG-505GX for a couple years now. It screams. It runs Red Hat 6.x and 7.x beautifully.I wouldn't trade it for the world, unless I could get a similarly sized and functioning ThinkPad (because unlike most people I actually prefer the eraser).
My only objection is that now that the disk drive is failing, I can't get any support from Sony. Period. The online support docs, if you manage to get just the right search, indicate that the drive isn't replacable, the nearest service center is San Diego (I live in Raleigh), and there are no authorized dealers nearby (yeah, I know, CompUSA sells Sony laptops...but refuses to fix them).
You can make snide comments about neon lights and so on, but I think those comments apply to the PowerBook and similar fruity translucent systems than to a silver/purple Vaio.
Now for an appeal: If anyone here knows how I could replace my disk on my own and set up the OS with a new suspend memory to disk partition, please let me know. I only bought the laptop for $900, but I see no reason to trash a good piece of hardware if a way can be found to extend its life.
What is your Slash Rating?
I used to work in tech support for dell. And as many know, if you can still support a company after you have worked for them, then that itself is something to be said.
I recently was in the market for a laptop, and was looking at the sony(memorystick slot for my camera) and the dell( because I trust them).
I ended up going with the Dell because for the money I could get what I wanted for less. But also because I know what goes on at the Support Tech level and I know how the warranties work, and I can't imagine having a computer(that I didnt build) that I could count on getting support for.
I had a similar problem of not being able to find good laptop review sites, so I made due w/ Cnet and the like.
:).
-Adam
Weight was important, but I didn't want to make huge sacrifices in screen size or usability. Originally I was looking at the superslim/superlight Toshiba (the 4000 I think?), but while screen size and weight are great it lacks built in CD-rom drive. After a lot more looking, I dug up the Fujitsu Lifebook S series. It got great reviews (especially for service), and it was some wonderful specs. It's the lightest laptop that I came across that had a swappable drive bay, 3.4 pounds w/ the bay empty I think. The only thing it doesn't have is built in WiFi, which does suck, but at least I can get a card for that. Anyhow, I fully recommend it based on my 1 hour of usage so far
Most websites and paper magazines seem to be focussed on the price/performance ratio, where performance is measured in CPU speed, memory, screensize, etc. This doesn't do the job in many situations you would typically need a laptop for. Though batteries have improved over the years, any laptop is bound to die after a few days without a external power supply; in many cases even hours.
I'm looking for a laptop with modest specs, but more importantly, consumes a small amount of Watts, and recharges quickly. So my question is: Where can I find a decent comparison of laptops wrt. battery life / power consumption?
Just depends. Set up a standard minimum set of reqs and find a notebook that has it. Me, I got a HP Pavilion. Worth it. But had I found a better price for the same or similar enough hardware, I'd have purchased it.
I love my 8100 Inspiron. Wait where's that rebate check?
Yes, i got the 1.7 GHz model and added a gig of ram to mine, i was lucky i purchased this the day they started advertising it because apparently they is a huge line of back orders now, and most shipments are being delayed by a few weeks. Its great for most of the stuff i do (3d modeling) as far as running linux on it though i was having some problems getting stuff like the smartmedia reader working. But most of the stuff that i actualy use seems to work ok. Definatly worth the 2500 i paid for it though. (drools over 1600 by 1200 resolution) -pookie
The Blade Itself
...for non-Windows systems. IBM used to offer them, but stopped because the demand was so low. It's my understanding that if you buy a Notebook with Windows, but do not accept the Windows EULA, uninstall it and install another OS, you can get your money back for the unused Windows OS. I don't know how one goes about this, but I've heard that it's possible...but may be more trouble than it's worth.
On another note, if you want to run LINUX on your notebook, IBM's the way to go. Most ThinkPads are certified for almost any release of LINUX.
My thnkpad 560x is getting long in the tooth, (233mhz, 64 ram) but it's still by far the best computer purchase I've ever made. It's very thin and light, durable. I would buy the comparable model today if I needed a new notebook...only drawback for me has been a lack of internal cd rom, but it just makes for a lighter machine. My boss' Toshiba 8100 is a workhorse as well, but a little too clunky, esp. since I'm used to my 560x. Hope this helps you.....
That last one's very important; I find myself more and more waiting on that damn hard drive, while my P3-mobile is just barely ticking over.
For what it's worth, I recommend a Titanium Powerbook or an iBook, if you don't need the G4 in the TiBook.
Michael C. Hollinger
The one thing i would like to see done with laptops are Standards.
I Would like for the motherboard of my thinkpad to be easily replaced with the one of my toshiba without any major modifcations. Right now everything is so propeitary that if something breaks you have to pay an arm and a leg to get the part replaced, and theres only one person who sells it..the manufacturer.
I personally would like to be able to build my own laptop like i build my own computers. Just pick a case, a lcd, a motherboard, etc and be able to throw it together myself. That way i could really customize it, and be able to replace/upgrade parts on the fly.
Which never worked. There was always some fancy -- and basically useless -- technology that my clients just had to have. One reason I'm no longer a consultant!
In my position I have to setup and repair many different laptops from the big manufacturers. Dell, Gateway, Toshiba, Compaq, HP, Acer, Sony...I'll stop there. I'd have to rate Dell at the top in terms of the quality of their machines, options, and service. Gateway number 2...they have the best looking displays of them all, but the quality is not as good as Dell and their service is much worse. Dell gets me a part in 24 hours...Gateway can take up to a week. I could recomend either of those two without any hesitation. Toshiba SUCKS and that's all there is to them. I've had problems with every one that's come through my hands(20+). Compaq - Don't think I really need to say much about them, save to say that if you ever get a replacement part for them, they never follow up. HP - Ha. Acer - The couple we've had are alright. Not the fastest...they're mostly in the slim laptop market, meaning that your extra drives are external...haven't had to deal with their service. And that leaves Sony on my list...I'd never buy a Sony PC product. As far as I know you can only get XP on their new systems, they don't provide drivers for any other OS's...and some of them are XP only anyhow. They lock out much of the functionality of XP to start with...No Administrator login, and the admin access you have, isn't. Dell and Gateway both offer price reductions on multiple machine orders and are generally well priced. Of the brands I've listed I would recommend one of them. If you're looking for an open system that allows you to install whatever OS you want as well as adding hardware...they're the best and the easiest.
-michael
I have a Tecra 8100. I have two big complaints:
1) Bloody loud.
2) Really really bad keyboard layout. What idiot placed "home" to the next to and to the right of the backspace key? I can't say that I ever got used to the other page movement keys either in their column on the right. But that Home just causes permanent issues... I should really just bind it to BS and lose the functionality altogether. I would be much more productive that way.
I use Fujitsu Siemens, good quality, reliable, all seem to have built in 56K modem and 10/100 network.
Mine is an old B series (1.3kg ultra portable) new models have blutooth.
C series models are certified for linux (suse).
Mark Snowdon
I dunno bout Windows, but my PCG-505GX works great under Red Hat 6.x/7.x...didn't even have to get a new pcmcia driver :}
What is your Slash Rating?
Go AlienWare. They by far have best service and warrenty that I have yet to encounter. Not to mention the coolness factor. Who else has a 2.4ghz LAPTOP for under $3000?
with mac os X a powerbook or an Ibook can also be an option: most major comercial suites are available (e.g. MS Office, Corel Draw/Paint/Wordperfect, Adobe, ...) as well as a very large amount of unix tools, utilities and softs
Many hours of autonomy (I usually have an operativity of 3.5 hours on my powerbook), much more of any other single battery notebook (of course a 1.5Ghz pentium drains more power than a 667mhx ppC)
a very interesting design, that's my personal opinion but usually people are impressed by the metallic look of a poeerbook ;)
IMHO, you should approach this like any other purchase. What tasks do you want your laptop to perform? Define the job, the software you want to run, then pick the best machine for the job.
Once you get past that, get some real world opinions from people who have had the machines you are thinking of.
In my case, I wanted a laptop that would run linux well, had a native resolution of 1024x768 with at least a 14" screen, was thick enough to support larger format hard drives, had a decent feeling keyboard, a DVD and a CDRW for as little cash as I could get away with. I wound up with a Compaq 17XL570, and it has been great. Over a year old and not a hiccup yet.
Linux is unix training wheels, while BSD *is* unix.
And even when they did the cost was the same as winblows. So you might as well pay the tax and install a dualboot so you can play games in winblows. (That's what I did on my 8100)
- Eric, My web site
- Eric, InvisibleRobot.com
they want to use the things for.
Because I "work with computers" friends are always asking me what to buy. When asked "what will you use it for?" Their eyes glaze over and after a few seconds the answer comes out "I dunno. Email and games, I guess." So I tell them it doesn't much matter what they buy. Go get a Dull, or a Cow Patty.
If you really want all those neat things do a Google search and buy whatever comes out.
But remember, whatever neat toy you get will be yesterday's technology before you get the credit card bill.
I've been very pleased with an Acer TravelMate 340T that I bought. I heard somewhere that they are the manufacturer of the guts of Viaos. In any case, I've used my acer laptop at my primary machine connected to the rest of my gear with an 802.11b for over a year now and have few complaints.
A little over 2 years ago, I bought a Dell Latitude CPt-C, 400 MHz Celeron with a 14" screen, an extra battery, memory, and a 2 year warrantee for about $2000. The computer had its little quirks like all technology, but aside from its flimsy case which could not support the weight of the oversized screen, the stiff power supply cable which broke, the computer functioned well.
... shades of Blade Runner, 2 months after the warrantee expired, the computer went absolutely dead. Not a sound, not a blinking light. I wrote Dell and they offered to fix the computer by replacing the motherboard for $700. I thought that this was a bit excessive and wrote them back asking for other alternatives (e.g., a good deal on a reconditioned laptop etc ...).
... it has been over 3 months and apparently the folks at Dell are still laughing so hard that they can't physically write an answer to me. This is a more than a little curious behavior however considering that I work at the largest hospital in Europe and part of the national University and the volume of business we do with Dell is truly astounding.
Until
Well
The bottom line is that you should consider the hidden costs of owning a laptop and of doing business with companies like Dell.
I was in the same position a few months back and tried out the Yahoo Shopping Consumer Reports. I thought, basically, "this information is difficult to find and 3 bucks is ok for a well researched overview". Guess what - the report was not only subpar, but contained numerous factual errors and was already 6 months old. I asked my money back, but they didn't agree. Talk about false advertising.
:-(
Anyway, they removed the "Notebook Computers" report shortly afterwards. So: Don't buy info online without a money back guarantee.
If you are interested in GNU/Linux laptops, you can narrow the search quickly via
Linuxcare Lab's certification reports. As usual, GNU/Linux-related docs are useful descriptive than the manufacturers'. =-)
-Paul Komarek
Most of these replies are of the "You should buy an 'x'" or "You should figure out what you want and develop a list of requirements" type. What he asked for was an objective source of comparitive data and analysis. This doesn't seem like an unreasonable question or expectation, though it doesn't sound like any good sources exist. I'll give Cliff the benefit of the doubt and presume he knows how to decide what features he needs and how to evaluate different floor models. What he's after (and what many of us have been after) is a shortcut to the facts that can bypass vendor marketing. Every vendor is careful to present specs that highlight their strengths and minimize weaknesses. You can't blame them, either. Their job is to make the systems as well as they can, and then sell the shit out of them -- there's no hidden agenda. An independent evaluator can provide a sanity check on those specs. We've all made purchases or wasted time on systems because they sounded better on paper than they were in reality. So, Cliff, it sounds like you are right: there aren't many decent info sources.
</rant>
I got an iBook2 back in Jan., and I really, really, really like it. It runs OS X well, as well as Illustrator, Office, etc, natively. Other comments further up the tree recommend the Apple TiBook, and I concur -- if you can afford it. I can't, and thought that I probably wouldn't be as happy with the iceBook, but I was wrong. The machine simply purrs. The G3/G4 thing really isn't that big of an issue if you're not trying to run complex filters on huge images in photoshop or rendering 3d stuff. The only thing that bothers me is that the hinge tends to creak rather alarmingly from time to time, and has been doing so since I got it. Any other iBook owners had this problem?
I have a Dell Latitude CPx with a 600mhz P3, but it still sucks because of the low bus speed at 33mhz.
Or at least I has been told that the bus runs at 33mhz, haven't checked the specs myself but anyway, it is really. oh well
my sig
Personally, I'd wait two weeks (until WWDC) and see what shows up here.
~jeff
Yes you can get both on a Tecra 8200 or better (BT is an option).
I've been thinking of getting the Dell for a while now. It is the only machine with a 14.1" UXGA on the market, and since I want to display digital photos and enjoy very clear text using sub-pixel rendering, this is currently the best option (I'm looking forward to even higher pixel densities in the future).
The post by Fish was interesting in that he got to try both video cards that come with the 4100. I didn't understand the pros and cons of each though.
Radeon version could do 2h11m of straight DVD playback, while my current version can watch any normal length DVD's
Does this mean that the Geoforce is more energy efficient? It costs $100 more - I thought it would actually be less efficient, but more powerful. But since all I want to do is watch DVDs and display still graphics, I thought the ATI might be good enough. However the UXGA screen may be more taxing so the Geoforce may be better. I like ATI's better relationship with Xfree86 though. Could you elaborate on the choice between these cards?
Finally, does anyone know how loud the 4100 is after the update for the clicking hard drive is installed?
Thanks, Dara
Hello. I have experienced a complete nightmare concerning Toshiba Laptops. As far as different 3rd party hardware(BreezeCom Wireless Cards) and software(RH 7.1, FreeBSD, W2k), I have had no problems. The biggest problem I have had with them is the displays, and that is the worst problem you can possibly have with a portable, aside from a total hardware meltdown. I am on my 3rd replacement unit, and even this one has a defective LCD. Get an IBM, in my opinion.
DISCLAIMER:
I don't believe what I write, and neither should you.
Otherwise you're just paying for all the advertising and marketing budgets.
Deleted
I recently purchased a refurb laptop from Dell. I'm sending the 8100 back today because the screen frequently scrambles out.
After several conversations with Tech Support, Dell's Resolution dept agreed to take the machine back for a credit of the purchase price but not shipping costs(to or from). Mohammad_Ajmal@Dell.com in the Resolution Dept informed me of two unknown facts:
1) The 15in UltraXGA TFT displays are known to get fuzzy, it isn't a problen with the screen, I should get used to it.
2) Refurbished PCs are sold "AS IS". "Despite what the legal warranty states". I am able to send the PC back because it is less than 14 days from purchase.
BUYER BEWARE
1) DELL is selling junk as refurbished machines
2) Former used-car salemen are manning the resolution dept, they will attempt to convince you that you are an idiot for not keeping you non-working Dell.
3) Dell has no downside to selling refurbs, it doesn't matter that the PC doesn't work, consumer is stuck with shipping charges.
I've always been happy with Dell. In my executive roles, I have approved over $1M in new Dell purchases. Customer service was always priority one. I hope the Refurb Dept is some rogue element and is not an indicator of Dell's evolution.
ianctlr
clambert asks: "A few co-workers and I are in the market for a new laptop, but it's been incredibly difficult to try and explore what's out there. How do Sony's warranties rank up against Dell's? Can I get Wi-Fi and Bluetooth on the new Toshibas? What model IBMs feature DDR memory? There doesn't seem to be an AnandTech/Ars/Toms for the notebook market, and short of filtering through all the marketing hype on every {brand}.com, its tough to find out what systems offer what specs. Are there any comprehensive resources out there for those of us in the market for a new laptop?"
/. spoon-feed me since I'm too lazy to look up notebook specs myself?
m l
d List.jsp?comm=CS&plin=Portable%20Computers
e goryDisplay?cgrfnbr=2035724&cntrfnbr=1&cgmenbr=1&c ntry=840&lang=en_US
Hi! I'm a lazy p.o.s. lard-ass who is too stupid too lookup information for myself on the web about laptop configurations. Can I have
Jesus! Comprehensive resource? It's called your brain your worthless coprolite! How was this question even allowed to be posted? Oh, that's right. We now have CaptTaco and his minions pandering to drooling morons who can't reverse a cranial-rectal inversion.
How do Sony's warranties rank up against Dell's?
I don't know dimwit, why don't you look it up on their WEBSITES!
http://www.sonystyle.com/vaio/notebooks/index.sht
http:/www.dell.com
Can I get Wi-Fi and Bluetooth on the new Toshibas?
I don't know dimwit, why don't you look it up on their WEBSITE!
http://www.csd.toshiba.com/cgi-bin/tais/pc/pc_pro
What model IBMs feature DDR memory?
I don't know dimwit, why don't you look it up on their WEBSITE!
http://commerce.www.ibm.com/cgi-bin/ncommerce/Cat
short of filtering through all the marketing hype on every {brand}.com, its tough to find out what systems offer what specs.
gee, all I had to do was to goto Dell's website to configure a system to the specs I wanted. and if I didn't understand what the technology was, I either clicked on the link that explained it or called up their 1-800-624-9896 and spoke to a technician. Ditto for Toshiba, IBM, and Sony. IT's called PRE-SALES TECH SUPPORT, you lickspittle excuse for a manager retard.
Yeah? So what if this is flaming? It's one thing to ask for opinions, it's quite another to be too damn lazy to look up information that's easily retrievable on the web. Don't like it? sod off you pissant bugger!
As long as we are on the subject of rabid laptop testimonials, I'll tell you about my laptop.
A Tadpole SparcBook 2, from 1993. A neat little thing I got from my company and it still works great, though I no longer have a working battery for it, it is neat to boot up for nostalgia's sake. Built in SCSI, AUI Ethernet, etc. Anyway, the funny thing is my home was robbed and the laptop stolen. I tried to call pawn shops to report it, and they all had the same question (so, is it a Mac, or a PC, I would say "saprc, running solaris, and they would ask "is that a DOS program? Does it say anything about intel on it? A latop *has* to be either PC or Mac, so you probably have an old 286 or 386 or something" Describing this thing to pawnshops was painful., eventually I just said if it is a laptop and you can't tell what the hell t is, it's probably mine). As it turns out, no one would buy it and they guy got caught two years later and couldn't even figure out how to turn it on, and I got it back intact. Still works great, though I'm looking for a cheap PC laptop replacement, since the SparcBook 2 is getting long in the tooth. Mac platform looks like they approach Sun quality on laptops, but is too expensive, oh well.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
Anyone have anything to say about Gateway laptops? I am considering getting one of their new models that look quite sleek and are reasonably priced.
Well, for laptops comparative reviews are still
possible, for desktops they do not make sense anymore.
There are two major computer publications in my country (Germany) and several minor ones.
One does comparative reviews for desktops and sucks (Computer Bild), because they just tell you "buy this" and do not show that many alternatives. The other (c't) has a special topic issue about once a year where they try to educate you about hardware, prices and configurations for gamers, office workers, multimedia, etc. They are great (or at least, they suck way less than any other publiction in this respect).
For laptops comparative reviews are still possible if you differentiate by price, but it is already impossible to compare the whole spread of the market. But laptops are still too restricted, I, for once, would _love_ to build my own laptop from components. Less beefy processor, great screen, great keyboard, slim but wide to accomodate said keyboard, integrated WLAN antenna, 20G Harddisk is enough... The vendors are not that versatile even with customizable offerings.
Just out of spite I consider to buy a TiBook soon. It seems perfect for my needs, even if it is a _tad_ expensive, but hey I do not have to go with the mainstream Intel/AMD/MS stuff anymore. I am not dependent on certain applications and price is not as big an issue anymore as it was in highschool.
Marcus
BEST - IBM ThinkPad T-series - All other laptops are playing catchup to the IBM T-series line of portables. They have the best weight/performance/features ratio of any laptop on the market. IBM offers a fully 3-year warranty that covers your laptop internationally, no other mfg does this like IBM. Since this is /. I should mention that you can load your favorite *NIX distro onto one of these without a lot of trouble.
The biggest drawback to the T-series is the price - starting at $2400. If you can afford it, this laptop is king.
Sony Vaio - Beautiful laptops that run great until you have to get them repaired. The backlog on parts from Sony is a joke - 3-6 months easy.
Toshiba - They used to make great laptops, but have fallen in years past to mediocrity. A reasonable cheap solution.
HPaq - Forgetaboutit. Neither HP nor Compaq makes a laptop I would purchase, period.
Apple - The PowerBook G4 is beautiful, so long as you can stand running Mac OS. X is better... much better. The iBooks work well too. Apple repairs on laptops - mail it to them and get it back in a week fixed. At least you know it'll be done right.
Hope this helps. Best of luck.
Sapere Aude - Homer
my sister just got (didn't receive it yet) fujitsu c class, and it had very good price/performance ratio. (except for the winmodem!)
From IATA.org:
OSX: Kosciusko Airport, Attala County, MS, US
So Apple is Still in bed with MS... ooops! that is MS as in Mississipi, right?
No sig for the moment.
I've got a Sager 4250 with a great videocard and 1 GB in RAM, 4 USB ports, 1 Firewire, DVD/CD-RW, MemoryStick and SD card reader for a fraction of the cost of a Toshiba or Sony
I still have a 4- or 5-year old P2-266 Dell Inspiron 3200 hand-me-down. It works flawlessly.
1. Ran the machine in a horribly dusty environment for a while. The fan choked. I called Dell, then Airborne Express. 3 days later I had a fully functional laptop again.
2. 2 months before the warranty expired. My flight kicked me off for weather. They'd blocked all exits except through the metal detector, and I have my heads in the clouds as usual. The BING! as my laptop passed through woke me up, but the computer didn't work so well afterward. A telephone call minus a lot of snoopy questions from Dell gets me a new hard disk inside a week. Bigger, too.
Dell's service has always been top-notch for me, with this and my old desktop. They only insist that you run their little diagnostics utility, which is always inconclusive, after which they send me pretty much whatever I ask for. Re: example #2 -- "My hard disk seems to be dead." "Did you run the dx?" "Yes, it's inconclusive. Pretty sure the disk is fried." "OK, it'll be there in a few days."
I've spilled, dropped, reflex-grabbed the LCD screen to prevent a fall, etc, and it still runs like a charm after so much abuse.
My last experience with their support was in January 2001. The performance is decent, too. If I'm browsing the computers at Best Buy I point shoppers toward Dell.
Runs 98, 2k, Debian simultaneously with no sweat.
I bought a SONY VAIO F180 in April 1999. Great price, great design, 1 year warranty, because I registered immideately. I bought it in the US via Sony Direct.
;-).
May 2000, back in Germany , the right display hinge broke.
I called support in Germany about this and learned that Sony has no world wide cooperation with all its Sony minions, unlike, say, Toshiba (thats what my friend told me about Toshs).
So I called the American support and they blabbed about shipping it to Florida and stuff, so it would have been an open ended thing regarding money that I would have to spend. There was no way that they could just ship the broken part.
Faced with this dilemma, I opened the case myself. Cudos for Sony here, because it was real easy, but display hinge is made of the *cheapest* metal. Think desktop PC slot covers.
It wasn't even cheap on purpose, the metal was still way stronger than the glass cover of the LCD backlight, so the breaking hinge wouldn't protect the LCD from breaking to save me some money.
I finally repaired it myself by using a piece of desktop slot cover metal to solder the 2 broken parts of the hinge together, like with a brace. And I dare say it's stronger than the original part
2001 I had to fix the right hinge the same way.
2002 I read that Sony Germany now asks for $20 just to qoute you the price of a spare part (they dropped that policy by now).
So I love Sony for their design and components, but I dread their support.
I could go on and on about this:
When I bought the notebook computer above, I asked them if the modem would be usable under Linux, they said "yes". Lucky for me I didn't expect this, but asked to amuse myself and in a faint hope that it would work. It was a Windows only soft modem of course.
Anyway, the design of that F180 is still sleeek and many other laptop vendors have worse looking machines. It did it's job for 3 years now and is still very functional even though I do not treat it daintily (it's a tool, dammit).
I will soon buy the successor to that laptop, it won't be a Sony.
I dream of a TiBook, but probably go for Tosh or HP (even though their displays are suppose to be crap on _some_ models. I hate inconsistency.)
Marcus
It's got firewire, yeah...I've had no use for it so that I can't vouch for...it doesn't have a memory stick slot.
What is your Slash Rating?
CNET.com has a in-depth coverage of hardware, software, electronics, and more. Specifically, their notebooks section is strong and can be found at: http://computers.cnet.com/hardware/0-1026.html
OK...I've got the GX model with a Fugitsu drive. I don't have the original OS discs...they didn't come with the laptop when I purchased it because the previous owner couldn't locate them. That doesn't matter too terribly much, because I use Linux, but I'd like to know how you went about making it hibernate to disk.
What is your Slash Rating?
Linux on Laptops
It's mostly a collection of links to various people's pages on their experience getting linux installed on various laptop makes and models. I found it very useful....
Madness takes its toll. Exact change please.
Don't forget comp.sys.laptops newsgroup to read users' reviews. Definitely use groups.google.com :).
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
CNN has an article today listing what IDG condiders the top 15 notebooks.
Yoda of Borg am I! Assimilated shall you be! Futile resistance is, hmm?
Go to the fucken site and look for yourself. Its not hard.
I recently purchased a Titanium PowerBook G4 and am very pleased with it. Feature for feature it matches most laptops on the market today. For example, it has wireless, USB, Firewire, CD-RW/DVD, and a huge screen (15.2"). If you need a floppy drive though, you're out of luck.
What I like most of all is the Unix OS underlying the Aqua interface. I have the option to issue commands via the Terminal application should I choose for more control over the OS.
When necessary, I can run Win2000 under emulation (Virtual PC) for those programs not ported to Mac such as MS Project and MS Visio.
Price is comparable with high end laptops from Dell.
Finally, it's quite lightweight which makes life easier if you travel extensively and have to lug the laptop around airports all day long.
I have a Gateway 9550, which they stopped selling new last week. It's awesome. Redhat 7.2 installs, finds all hardware without any problems. Just needed to update Nvidia drivers.
The new P4 line looks sweet. But after reading some comparisons on a PIII 1.13 vs. a P4 1.4, I'll keep my PIII 1.13.
I have a lot of small business clients who request recommendations on what laptops to buy. :)
They don't always take my recommendations of course.
From the service calls I get, I can safely say the following:
Get IBM or Toshiba -- they are rock solid, never any problems.
The Dells, Gateways (whatever you do, NEVER get a Gateway laptop), and Compaqs have many, many problems.
One possible problem is that they don't actually make their own laptops.
They all outsource them, and are mostly quite bad -- overheating, systems, crashing, the screen turning itself off at random times. One Dell laptop had its internal speaker go nuts every time it was docked with the docking station.
Note though that IBM and Toshiba laptops don't have a touchpad, which some people crave (but they break faster, and most decent people prefer the nub once they get used to it).
Sony laptops are fairly good, but tend to be overpriced.
Apple Powerbooks are quite nice too -- stable, long battery life, feature filled, if you can stand using a Mac, but hey, they run Linux too!
One thing is that if you run a M$ OS, run a NT derivative (NT4, 2000, XP) -- 98/ME has issues with power management, and may cause your laptop to hang when going to sleep mode and standby mode.
"You have the option of insanity. I do not. And that makes me crazy!" - Brian to Angela, My So-Called Life
[p.s] This is my first post to
I have to agree with the original poster of this thread. There is no single place for the laptop reviews as there is for desktops and other desktop hardware.
I have been looking to buy a laptop for the last 6 months but have not converged on one yet. I have been doing extensive research over the past 6 months from multiple sources but still have not decided on one yet.
The resources that I have been looking are:
1. http://www.cnet.com (http://japan.cnet.com)
2. http://www.zdnet.com
3. http://www.vaio.net & http://www.sonystyle.com(http://www.vaio.sony.co.
4. http://www.fujitsupc.com
5. http://www.toshiba.com
6. http://www.ibm.com/thinkpad
7. http://www.dell4me.com
8. http://athome.compaq.com
9. http://www.tech-report.com (For new Mobile Processor reports)
10. http://www.designtechnica.com (For upcoming mobile news)
11. http://www.pcworld.com
12. http://www.apple.com/ibook/
After extensive research, the following are my brief conclusions:
1. There are three types of notebooks you can get
(i) Ultra-light weight notebooks ( (ii) Thin and light notebooks (4 to 6 pounds)
(iii) Desktop replacements (> 7 pounds)
2. The choice basically depends on what you plan to use the notebook for:
(i) For extensive graphics use
(ii) Frequesnt travel use
(iii) Desktop replacement (highly powerful)
3. The following are the leading vendors:
a. IBM Thinkpads have the best performance and good long battery life and long list of configurable options -- the biggest con is the price -- they are the most expensive out there. Try this www.thinkpads.com (requires registration) for discussing with other Thinkpad users. I myself have owned a thinkpad for five long years and never had a problem and the support has always been good.
b. Sony line of notebooks (vaio) are cool, innovative and competetively priced. They too come up with good form factor (Check out Sony Vaio QR series (Only in Japan) and Vaio U series -- just introduced) and good battery life. Most of these are small (except the new GRX line which is the biggest of all) and they have their problems. I have used a Sony Vaio FX series and have had bad KB and other sorts of problems.
c. Toshiba was the market leader some 6 years back and still has some solid line of notebooks -- Their Satellite S505 is a killer notebook and their Portege 2000 (the thinnest you can get). They too have their own mechanical problems and they are bit pricey.
d. Dell and Gateway -- I am combining these two together as both of them are quite similar. They have a wide range of notebook selection -- aggressively priced. I currently own a Dell Latitude C810 and its really good. But its not quite fancy as a Sony. I use it as a desktop replacement.
e. Compaq and HP (Will soon become one) -- Again they both almost fall into same category - Compaq has a Presario line of notebooks which are desktop replacements and come with the best possible processor and GPU. Their Evo line of notebooks is a lightweight option. HP has a Pavilion line of notebooks which is quite similar to the Presario line.
f. Fujitsu, NEC, Sharp, Panasonic -- All these Japanese companies have innovative notebooks. The notable one is Fujitsu Lifebook P Series... The smallest notebook with a CD burner -- comes for under $2000. I have used a Panasonic M2 and its also a good choice.
g. If you are interested in MAC, you have http://www.apple.com/ibook/ and I personally loved the machine but I have never used MAC and hence dint want to take the risk.
There you have it....
I sure wish someone puts up a good laptop review site.
Good luck in finding your notebook.
If you find a good site, please post it here.
http://www.linux-laptop.net/
The hardest things to find out about a laptop include, the amount of on-board cache, and the hard drive speed. When I bought my fujitsu c-6581 I thought I was getting a real bargain, then I found out about its 4,200 RPM hard drive. I was quite dissapointed about that.
Fast Federal Court and I.T.C. updates
perhaps a bit OT, but once i was repairing 2 sets of headphones with blown drivers, for a friend of mine.
one set was sony's cheap headset marketed to people who want to look kool with big headphones on their walkmans. the other set cost $160 dollars and were supposed to be hi-fi. when i opened them up -- the same exact drivers inside. the only difference between these two headphones was $100US and the shape of the plastic. ever since then, i am suspicious of sony in general.
There are no trolls. There are no trees out here.
I own an HP Pavilion n5270. I've had it since Feb of 2001. I've had Windows 98, ME, and XP on it without a hitch. Mandrake 8.0 even worked fine.
Back when I bought it, I was basically sold on the 15" display, the 20GB hard drive, the DVD player and the video out. Up until Feb of 2002, everything worked fine (less the occational dvd player lockup). Then a support for a key broke off (a little plastic thinggy that holds the key on and level).
Let me back up for a sec here. Mid January of 2002, I was working on my g/f's uncle's notebook (IBM T series). He basically just got it and spilt pop all over it. To make a long story short, the only thing that was actually fried was his keyboard.
I called up IBM and told them I needed a replacement. They only needed a name, an address, and a serial number. All they asked in return was that the broken keyboard got sent back to them (with included prepaid shipping).
Now back to the HP notebook. I wrote to HP requesting a new keyboard, or a simple piece of interlocking plastic (worth less than $.01). They stated that I needed to send in my entire notebook so they could assess it. I replied stating that I have been working on computers for many years now and I just need a replacement (mainly due to the fact that they could not give me a repair time frame). I also said I'd pay for any cost or shipping needed.
I recieved a reply stating that "The keyboard is not a user replaceable part. The unit will need to go into service." Doing some searching led me to HP Partsurfer. Selecting United States, and entering "F2363M" for the model number will bring you to what I saw. You can purchase ANY parts for the notebook here. I replied to them stating that I found it odd that something that was not a user replacable part could be purchased by a user (ultimately to replace something).
Anyway, after going around with their "support" people, I finally decided to replace the key support with another and glue it down.
The most astonishing thing I discovered was that this partsurfer.hp.com was gouging unsuspecting customers. If you click on the arrow next to "List all parts", you can see what I mean. When was the last time you saw a 256MB so-dimm for $650 or $1188?? Or an 800Mhz Mobile Pentium III for $950??? How about an 802.11b access point for $1135????? I don't recall prices EVER being that high. I understand a markup, but this is rediculous.
I was in the market for a new workgroup laser printer (and some workstations). Even after mentioning that I would take HP off of the list of possible vendors, I was still treated like crap. I hope they're happy with a small piece of plastic causing a $20,000 loss. Oh well, HP and Compaq will never enter into our product lists again.
-Clif
Let me translate:
"I want a new laptop and going to 5 or 6 websites to look up information is a lot of work. Will you please do it for me?"
I will never, ever, ever buy a Sony laptop again. Indeed, I intend to avoid Sony products in general from now on, on principle.
:-)
:-), but since it's spending most of its time on my desk anyway, that isn't a problem. And I can still use the Sony, despite the occasional screen glitch, for travelling. Gateway's service seems to be excellent -- when I needed a minor issue corrected (I wanted high- rather than low-density SDRAMs) they sent out replacement parts immediately, at no charge. Most importantly, the Gateway has a three-year warranty. If the Sony had had that, it would still be covered today.
I had (well, still have) a Sony VAIO PCG-838, purchased a little less than three years ago. Like most of the VAIOs it's an attractive little unit with a lot of functionality squeezed into a little space. It runs Linux like a dream and had few design compromises (one exception is the lack of an NTSC out jack, despite the fact that support was clearly built in -- there's even a TV/VGA key on the keyboard. Apparently Sony put no TV out ports in any model that had a DVD drive, for fear that the machines -- sans Macrovision -- would be used to pirate DVDs!)
This was, of course, a premium-priced laptop, near the top of Sony's line at the time. It cost close to $3000 "fully loaded". For this price, one got a one-year warranty. In fact, one got a 90-day warranty that would be "extended" to a year upon "registration."
This was the only drawback I could see to the unit. My previous experience with laptops was limited to a TI Travelmate which seemed to be in the service facility more often than in my hands, and (back in 1990) to a *mumble*-brand plasma-screen 386 portable (ran off AC power) that died on me six months after I got it, while I was in Eastern Europe and had barely a chance in hell of getting it fixed. These data, sparse though they were, suggested to me that laptops tended to break down despite our best intentions, which made a short warranty very unattractive.
But I liked the Sony so much that I let it seduce me. After all, it would be spending most of its time on my desk, not travelling, so it wasn't going to be exposed to a lot of stress. And Sony was a reliable company that made solid products, right?
Sure enough, the unit worked fine for about a year and a month. Then, all of a sudden, I started having trouble with the LCD screen. It would flicker into garbage, blink out, and so on, randomly. It was obviously a loose connection and nothing more, because moving the screen back and forth would restore the image, but it got steadily worse until the machine was effectively unusable.
I should have just opened it up and fixed it myself, since it was (just!) out of warranty, but instead I sent it in to Sony service. That was difficult -- if you have a unit that's out of warranty, they want you to pay $90 just to speak to a service technician on the phone. Even if you know what the problem is and just want to send the unit back for repair. I wasn't willing to do that and it took me several days of calling and cajoling to actually speak to someone who'd give me an address to send the unit to without charging me up front.
The service center returned an estimate for (!!!!!!) $2000, replacement of the entire LCD screen plus a bunch of other stuff. I spent a week in voicemail hell trying to reach someone live at the service center, then protested that I knew damn well that the machine, including the LCD, was in perfect working order except for a bad connection to the screen. The guy mumbled something about the screen "aging" (?!) but eventually, reluctantly, agreed to fix only the actual problem. They replaced (or said they replaced) the ribbon cable that drives the LCD. Total cost of the service, $300. (I wonder how many people and companies are suckered by Sony into a multi-thousand-dollar repair bill through this kind of BS.)
About four months later, just past the 90-day warranty on repairs, the problem came back.
This time I simply opened the screen myself and adjusted the cable until the problem went away. It seemed very unlikely, from the way the cable was attached, that it had ever been replaced in the first place -- probably they'd just jiggled it around until it worked, as I did. But of course charging for parts you don't actually replace is illegal, so that can't be, right? Well, I'll reserve judgment on it, I can't prove it one way or another. Besides, the ribbon cable itself was "only" $75 of the $300 service bill; the rest was labor.
The fix didn't last long, unfortunately; to keep the screen working I had to avoid closing and opening it too often, since the cable would work its way loose again. I kept the screws out of the unit so that I could re-jiggle the cable as necessary, and eventually achieved semi-stability by strategic application of adhesive pressure pads
In the meantime I poked around Usenet and discovered that this flaw was virtually universal among the Sony PCG-838 and other VAIO laptops of that era. They almost all, sooner or later, developed a flaky display as the ribbon cable came loose -- one tech said that 70-80% of the laptops deployed at his company showed up with the problem. Apparently Sony was even fixing it free, out of warranty, at some point. If so, they hadn't mentioned it to me when I sent the machine in.
But what really burned me up was when I called them up again, just to ask whether, in light of what I'd heard about the ubiquity of this problem, they might fix it the second time around for free. EVERYONE I SPOKE TO DENIED THAT SUCH A PROBLEM EXISTED. No, they had never, ever seen a laptop with a loose cable at a Sony repair facility. What about mine? Umm, well.
Anyway, I gave up on Sony at this point. I did some research and bought a Gateway Solo 9500XL. It's a nice solid unit, with a gorgeous 15.7" screen. It's big, and not exactly light (though it's still a lot more portable than that 1990-era plasma-screen "laptop" was
Moral: for a laptop, warranty is of overarching importance. Laptops break down more often than desktops, and more importantly, they can't be fixed with generic, off-the-shelf parts.
Also, Sony is evil. Why? (0) having a 90-day warranty that's "extended" to a year if you register; (1) making it almost impossible to reach a service technician for an out-of-warranty product without paying a massive $90 fee up front; (2) trying to sucker me into replacing the LCD screen for $2000 when they knew damn well that the problem was a loose connection; (3) charging $300 to jiggle a cable about and saying they replaced it when it's pretty clear from an internal inspection that they didn't; (4) later flat-out denying that any laptop of theirs had ever had a problem with the LCD screen ribbon cable, when a simple net search demonstrates that the problem is epidemic for some models -- this is the kind of thing that prompts class-action suits).
Gateway's Solo 9550XL is pretty sweet, if you don't mind its size and weight. It's feature-loaded (15.7" screen, 32M GeForce graphics, built-in 802.11b wireless, DVD/CD-RW combo drive, and of course FireWire, TV out, Ethernet, modem, etc.) and the battery life is amazing for such a powerful box.
Kiscica
Try the AAPLTalk System Shootouts:
http://www.aapltalk.com/shootouts
It's a couple months out of date, but should be updated soon, and includes a pretty comprehensive list of specs in given price ranges...
First thing I did was get rid of the XP Home installation (which you don't get the orignal CD, only a crappy 3CD pre-installed XP bloated with useless programs, i.e. Works, and such).
:), not their crappy bloated pre-installed XP Home!
:^)
Then I installed linux, I couldn't get the sound to work with either OSS or Alsa. No error, but no sound! Graphic chip is somewhat nice and S3 (it's a S3 Twister K) provides drivers for X !! Even a utility to switch from LCD to TV-Out!
Then, I installed Win98se (I don't care about overwriting the mbr, I have a floppy drive!) This is where the pain began.
I tried to find drivers for Win98 from Compaq site. My goooooooooooooood. If it's written Designed for XP on your laptop, don't oh don't try to find Win9x drivers on Compaq site!! You can find a few, but it's a real PITA.
I got my drivers from around the web, trying to find out who made the hardware in my laptop.
The worse part is emailing Compaq to know where I could find Win9x drivers. You specify you DO NO WANT Windows XP, and the link they send you back is for your shiny Presario 700 running XP. I tried twice to be sure I didn't get a newbie tech to answer me. Either they don't care, or they don't have a clue!
Finally, since I needed it for school and never got power management to put my laptop on standby in 98se, and didn't succeded in linux either, I decided to install XP Pro from an original CD (devilzown anyone
Now it's slow, it runs like I bought a 266MMX with 32 ram and I run Win95. (It's a 900MHz Duron Morgan with 256RAM). But Dungeon Siege runs "fine" considering the LCD
All in all, and I'm sure most of you already know it: DO NO BUY COMPAQ unless you get a grrrrrreat deal like I did. And on a last note, the deal would need to be even greater to consider buying another compaq.
So much rants.. now I look at my laptop sitting there and wonder where is the Classified Ads link on this webpage!
This system is my desktop replacement. I honestly can't tell that much difference between the 1.7 P4 that I had and the 1.2 PIII-M that's in this machine. It sits in a dock all day with my dual monitors so it's not even like I am using a laptop, regular kb and mouse and all...
I have to say I am pretty hard on laptops and this thing is a champ, it's taken a couple of spills and keeps on trucking. Very solid, doesn't feel flimsy. I have to admit it's not the most sexy thing but it has a DVD/CDRW combo and a lot of ram and does everything I would ever need it to do. It also has builtin ethernet and modem which is wonderful, none of the laptops I had before had this. It also has a wireless enet builtin which is nice because the card with antenna doesn't stick out the side of the note book.
If you need a solid notebook that has fairly universal modules (my wife and I can share CD/ZIP/Floppy modules) I would highly recommend the Dell Latitude line (I like the C610 - it's right in the middle of the road). Get yourself the completecare(tm) warranty and then when you sit on it and crack the LCD you are still covered. Remember I don't game on this so I have NO idea with regards to system perf. on that - okay it does run the sims okay :)
(plink) (plink)
About checking the web for peoples opions about how non-oem OSs run on the machine. I know many people know about linux-laptop.net, that site helped me many-O-times. One thing to be aware of is that the companies often sell basically the same machine under several different numbers, even in the same country. I found one toshiba, selling in the US under 4 different numbers!! of course 1/2 where 2 different versions of windows...but that didn't matter...I just installed linux anyway.
LinuxWorx
Spelling errors are intentional as are gramatical error
This is buried so deep you probably will never see it.
I have a compaq Armada E500 with the 1400X1024 LCD in a titanium shell,DVD,integrated 10/100, modem P-III 866 with 256 meg ram.
EVERYTHING works under linux, setting up Slackware was effortless, I have the modem working, everything else working and X 4.2.0+ had the DRI 3d acceleration for the ATI card working again..
No hardware on this INCLUDING the docking station works perfectly under linux.... it is an awesome machine for linux.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
QLITech QLITech Linux Computers I run on their 850MHz Emperor model, which is schweeeeeet.
Well,
I was nervous at first, but I thought hey, I'll install linux anyway, so what does it matter?
And guess what... I am *very* happy with it. It happily runs Debian for almost 6 (really!) hours before running out of power, it is totally quiet (no fan), it's slick, the airport card antenna is invisible, and stand-by and reactivation are almost instantaneous. And yes, the price is comparable to, even cheaper than 'comparable' Intel laptops.
Look into it, it's the first machine I love to carry around. There's is review here
Hi Rob!
Your post mentions your concern about keyboard feel and sensitivity. I have exactly the same concern, and I've been looking at Sager. (A longtime friend, recently assimilated into the MS Borg, is a big Sager fan.)
How's the keyboard? I like a clicky-tactile keyboard--I hate the light mushy ones.
Thanks!
Laptops are a very personal thing. The ergonomics are way more important than anything else. In fact, you should ignore all the "horespower and torque" ratings and just focus on this.
I chose my IBM because I tried a friend's and fell in love with the keyboard. I now prefer it to a desktop keyboard. I also really like the pointing device, especially in combination with the third "scroll" button.
The 14" screen is the perfect compromise- just big enough for all day viewing at 1024x768. Bigger isn't necessary, smaller is too squinty.
There's also an overall quality feel that's a notch or two above everything else, except Apple. Ti Powerbooks are beautiful.
As far as I'm concerned, IBM blows everything else away. In comparison, my bro-in-law's Dell feels like a piece of crap.
I'd still take a three year old IBM T-series over a brand new anything else. Speed, schmeed.
A laptop is about portability. Does the type of RAM used really make a difference? Do you need both Wi-Fi and bluetooth. (why would you?) What are you doing with your laptop? Are you plaing games or doing presentations, or programming? Is it a compliment or replacement for a desktop? There are too many variables to consider to adequately compare laptops. Toms hardware will tell you all about which gets a higher framerate in quake 3, but if you're not playing q3, who cares?
Something to be really careful with is screen size and native resolution. Bigger is not always better. As LCD screens get bigger, their native resolution is higher too. A 15" screen with 1200x1600 resolution sounds great, but in fact the text will probably be too small. Putting that screen at a more comfortable 1024x768, it may look horrible, because it's not the native resolution- text may be a bit fuzzy, and pictures not as sharp and clear. A 14" screen at a native 1024x768 will probably look better, with more readable text, even though it's smaller.
Most web pages these days are designed for 800x600, with some at 1024x768. So 1024x768 is probably best for most people. It happens to be the native resolution of most 14" laptop screens. Bigger screens are usually higher, and smaller screens lower. So 14" is probably the sweet spot.
I just bought a new laptop this week - a Gateway 600X! It arrives next week. I hadn't considered Gateway but this machine has exactly what I need, which Toshiba, Dell and Sony failed at. Also, the Gateway 600 series look beautiful which some of the others failed miserably at.
I used the review center at CNET.COM for info on the latest P4's, then I looked at my requirements which include XP Pro and Office (yeah, I know), 802.11 built-in (rather than some puny PC card with no range) and a big screen and a powerful graphics chip. A Sony memory stick slot was a requirement at first, but then I realized you can just get a PC card for this.
I was going to get a Toshiba but it seems that they don't have a good combination of my requirements. The top end Tecra's are nice but they have lame Cyberblade graphics chips. The Sony 590, Toshiba 6100 and Dell 8200 are butt ugly, and I would be ashamed to put them next to my wife's Apple Tibook.
Anyway, here is my analysis. The price is usually a customised one showing the extra's I added. All up the Gateway has killer features at a great price. I've never bought from Gateway before but I am glad I didn't settle for less.
Sony VAIO PCG-GRX590 $2999
Pro's - big 16 in screen, memory stick, free 802.11 card, Firewire, no legacy ports
Con's - weight, Radeon 7500 16 mb chipset, 802.11 is PC card with no built in antenna, butt ugly design, poor availability
Toshiba Satellite 5105-S607 $2499
Pro's - Geforce4 440 32mb, weight, nice design
Con's - no 802.11 included, poor battery life
Toshiba Satellite 5005-S507 $1999 (P3 1.2 ghz)
Pro's - Geforce4 440 32mb, weight, price, battery
Con's - no 802.11 included, P4 envy
Toshiba Satellite Pro 6100 $2529
Pro's -Wifi onboard, XP Pro with Office SB
Con's - SXGA screen, Geforce4 420 16mb, No firewire, BUTT UGLY!
Dell Inspiron 8200 $2880
Pro's -Wifi onboard, XP Pro with Office SB, Firewire
Con's - GF2 32mb, DAMN UGLY!
and finally the winner......
Gateway 600X $2627 (P4 1.5 ghz)
Pro's - big 15.7 in screen, 802.11 built in, XP Pro and Office SB, Firewire, good price, 64mb ATI 7500
Con's - very heavy
I have a Pismo/400 running Mac OS X 10.1.4, and it runs beautifully. I'm starting to get "hinge-itis" now, but that can be fixed. (I'm in Canada, so I can have a dealer do it for me. This is a good thing.)
One suggestion, though: beef up the RAM. Substantially. I have 192, and I'm paging out fairly often. I'm going to upgrade that to 640 this summer, most likely.
On the main topic, now:
I have several friends who have iBooks running X, and they're great machines. You won't be disappointed.
I have no doubt that both companies occasionally come up with dud designs, but my impression is that IBM and HP are more reliable and better constructed than, say the heavier Sony VAIO laptops.
I've heard horror stories about Compaq notebooks failing even to support! There's at least one recent model that's Win98/WinME only - no Win2k or XP support or drivers!
If you want to use Linux, use this as your initial criteria - it will eliminate a number of notebooks from the running as they use different video cards and sound cards from their desktop cousins and these cards often are not well supported in Linux (HP's Omnibook modem, IBM's 5xx and 7xx Thinkpads with MWave modems, etc.)
--Pat / zippy@cs.brandeis.edu
I've had my TiPB for over a year now and since I've owned it, its formed several stress cracks in the corners as well as on the hinges that hold on the screen. I am pretty rough with machines, so this is probably not likely to happen to everyone, but if you are a rough laptop user, the TiPB isn't for you, maybe an iBook would better server you. Don't pick up the TiPB with one hand on the corner, I believe this contributes to the cracking.
Other than that, its the best laptop I've ever owned. Great display, plenty of power, plenty of battery life, etc... OS of choice? MacOS 9. I use OSX on my desktop G4 and I have windoze98 for my gaming box.
Hope this helps =)
I agree. Some of my most personal posessions are on my laptop!
As far as portable computers go, i've got a 386 from ~1990. The display is broken, but the disk drive is unbalanced and vibrates real nice. Unfortunately, i can't take it on airplanes anymore because the security people demand that i demonstrate that it works. Freakin' perverts.
There was point in time when I wanted a PowerBook G4.. and well, I bought one (400mhz). However, I became fairly sick of it after a while.
The Ti case was kind of cool looking, but quite weak . Disite that fact that I treated it like a baby, it aquired a dent, scratches, a missing foot, and a slight curve to the monitor's backing. CD's also seemed to need a bit of help loading after a few month.
I also found the 5400 RPM harddisk and the 16meg Rage 128 to to be quite a let down as well.
No doubt, it was revision "a" machine, and this stuff happens with new toys. However, some of these case and hardware problems still exist in the current batch of PowerBooks. It was nice machine with a TON of features, however I can't seem my self looking at another PowerBook anytime soon. I think I'll stick with my DPG4 box.
"Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
Had my Dell Inspiron 8000 for two months when the video started acting skittish. Called Dell customer support. By 9AM the next morning the service representative was at my workplace swapping out the LCD. No muss, no fuss.
I currently dual boot XP and Mandrake 8.1. At one point I was tripple booting 2KL,XP and Mandrake 8. No problems. The ATI M4 viedo card uses the generic ATI Rage 128 driver though in Linux. After a year Dell finally put out a decent video card driver with OpenGL support. Of course, newer models use GeForce cards.
If you work for a big company you get a beefed up 3yr warranty if your company has an account with Dell (most do).
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
Everything you want:
2 optical drives, 66W/hr battery.
Pentium 4m 1.8ghz
Geforce 4 GO 64MB
Internal 802.11b (available)
Bluetooth PCMCIA (available)
1600x1200 screen (available)
60GB HD, 1394, SPDIF, Svideo, Twinview..
and DDR!
I don't need speed - the only things I burn CPU on are Microsoft Office and (in the past) The Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search. I need something I can carry on the train without breaking laptop-bag straps all the time, and without breaking my shoulder. The one good thing about overspec'd overweight devices is that since the folks back at headquarters are cheapskates and don't give us new toys every year, at least they don't get obsolete as fast
Over the years, we've used a variety of vendors - Toshiba, Dell, IBM, and back when we sold computers, OEM NEC machines with AT&T Death Star logos on the front. Unfortunately, we've always seemed to have been doing Toshibas when my machine was up for refresh - they've mostly been heavy unreliable pieces of junk that aren't made for the physical abuse that laptops get on the road, and they've got quirky power management that tends to have real trouble restoring from power-save mode without having to reboot half the time. Fortunately, my current-generation machine died, and the backup they've found me is one of the Portege7020s - the battery's ancient, so battery life is too short, but the machine's lighter and thinner than its faster predecessor :-)
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
It's too heavy - the things weigh 5 pounds or so. And the screen doesn't have enough pixels, though it's otherwise gorgeous. The battery life rocks - I don't know if I believe 5.5 hours in the real world, but it should scale pretty well with the 2-3 hour promises for many other laptops. So it's about long enough for an across-North-America airplane flight. Being able to connect the Firewire to the back and use it as a disk drive for your desktop Mac also rocks, and in traditional Apple fashion, there are a lot of things that just fit together nicely and make it a friendly environment.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
I purchased an IBM ThinkPad T22 2647-M6U, 1Gh P3, 32Gb HD, 512Mb, 1400x1050 TFT, about 7 months ago. I bought IBM because of the name and supposed service.
My experence with *this* T22 is awful. The keyboard died after 4 weeks of use (I'm a light typist). I had to wait two days for a replacement.
Then the first PCMCIA slot died. Tech support refused to service the unit unless I wiped the hard drive. So I had to back everything up. I tried using the "hidden" restore option; it corrupted the partition tables. IBM does not ship restore media with the T22. I had to wait 3 days for the CDs. Total lost time 5 days.
This week the hard drive has begun to go bad. Again, IBM will not service the drive unless I run a diagnostic which stresses the drive. They will not cross-ship. So I had to go and purchase another drive to attempt a last-chance disk mirror. Total time so far, 2 days.
Downtime for me means lost revenue.
Maybe I got a lemon, but they treat their knowledgable customers like children. This is positively the last time I give Big Blue anymore of my money; I will steer others away from IBM.
I heard IBM does not even make TPs anymore, they are made by ACER.
When the keyboard died on my *used* Dell laptop, they sent a guy to my house the next day! "Warranty" to IBM seems to mean "Prove it's Broken."
My advice is, be careful. Service is Job #1.
I understand the humour in the question but I think it's a very serious question considering the J4 is at 2.0 and 2.2 GHz. I'd like to get one of these, but I intend on running solely Linux. I've checked out the Linux laptop sites but not too many winbook articles... not too surprised though.
So if anyone can let me know if they've had any luck finding/writing drivers for their Winbook. Also, the performance of Linux on this thing. Thanks in advance.
-Mauricio
You could purchase "Laptop Buyers Guide" (usually available in any place that sells large qty's of magazines. However as you said, that still leaves much room for questions owing to the sheer number of models available.
So here's my story;
In 1995 I bought a Toshiba Satellite Pro, a Pentium 90 machine which is *still* working today! although with a tiny crack in the lid, and owing to a fall (while in it's padded case) a wonky on-again/off-again CRROM. I upgraded the drive to 2GB in 1998 and increased the RAM to the machine max of 40MB. My fiancee now has it at school and uses it every day.
In April last year I bought a Tecra 8100 (this reply is being typed on it!). Someone commented on the keyboard layout and yes, there are one or two miniscule issues there, but thos "issues" pale in comparison to the qualities of this awesome machine.
It *is* my desktop replacement, I have two docks one at the office and one at home with identical monitors, keyboards, mice speakers etc to avoid driver issues.
The thing has a 900MHZ CPU (with a full 512 L2 cache)30GB drive, 512MB of RAM, an awesome graphics card...it's awesome, but simply what I would have expected from Toshiba after the experience of my first one.
I've setup IBM machines (for others) and just didn't like em, ditto HP's...I love my Toshiba. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend the brand to *anyone*
I bought this when it was just a micron away from bleeding edge and benefitted immensely from the better price.
I say "Toshiba all the way, no matter what"
Hope this along with the other posts helps you some. It *does* seem that there's quite a few folks out here who feel the same way about Toshiba's that I do....it may perhaps guide you.
Ah, fuck it
Sony's pretty good with hardware. It's the software support that they get you on. They have a 1 year hardware warranty (standard) and a 90 day software warranty. As long as you know what you are doing, and are not relying on the pre-bundled software you should be ok with Sony.