Military Grade Laptops

bllb writes "Slate has an article about the "waterproof, vaporproof, shockproof" laptops the military is using. It's not at the cutting edge of performance, but it's nice to see some bombproof hardware." Most of the laptops I've owned over the years died through dropping or drowning, so maybe I should look into something a little more sturdy ;)

Comments

Makes sense

[SlimFastForYou]

My laptop just took a lil fall and the screen went cracky cracky. I can still read what the screen says, but its too bad that this laptop wasn't the one I dropped.

I wonder how they have the hard drive set up, or if they use flash. Normally, any hard drive experiencing even a small shock can be easily destroyed if the head is reading.

700 MhZ isn't too great but you could always take it in the shower for some good 'ol pr0n. ;)

toughbooks

[hawwy]

wired ran an article a few weeks ago about how the army was using rugged panasonic laptops for operations. one of their gis guys was having trouble manipulating huge images with them and had the government ship over a titanium powerbook which is apparently holding up fine.

iBooks...

[Squidgee]

FYI, iBooks are also very, very sturdy. Mine took a leap from a table (~3ft up) due to dog, and survived. And it was on, with the screen open, and CD-ROM drive out (It shootso ut form the side). And it landed on its side.

My friend also sent his for a trip down the stairs (Screen open, iBook on), and it still works A.O.K.

So, you could also buy an iBook, and it will survive the same falls.

Re:Yes, but...

[dooby]

I was thinking more of the baked Powerbook G4, but anyway, the article implies the 'GoBook MAX' will survive an oven...

Hardened hard drives

[87C751]

Hard drives can be made to withstand a lot of punishment. 10 years ago, I saw a demo at a trade show where a 2.5" HP hard drive was attached to the end of a 30" bar. A motor and crank lifted the end of the bar 18" above a steel plate and then dropped it. There was an O-scope hooked up to the read channel, and it barely fluctuated at impact.

Granted, I don't expect consumer-channel equipment to be that strong.

I spent 2 yrs playing IT guy for a tank battalion

[disputin]

The laptop isn't the problem. Most people are smart
enough to keep it out of the rain and dust. Most of the components are sealed. The real problem was copiers and printers. If someone made a copier or printer that could be bounced around working in heat, cold and dust, they'd make a killing with the US Army.

I don't need a sig - I gave up smoking

Must be good news for the insurance companies

[sabri]

With the amount of money office workers spend on their cars alone, a couple thousand dollars more for a droppable, dishwasher-safe laptop is a no- brainer bargain in total cost of ownership. The GoBook MAX gives new meaning to the phrase "homeland security."

I don't think the TCO is an issue here; I'm sure that most insurance companies (who nowadays pay for broken laptops) will be seeing these robust laptops as a positive development.

Additionally, I really wonder if these laptops are protected against those EMP bombs..

i build similar machines

[snyrt]

i'm a pre-production engineer from technology advancement group, a company in dulles, va. we build systems very similar, though we've moved away from the laptops and build mostly rack mounted systems. our systems are build to be ruggedized from the component level in order to survive more shock than any other system around. all the chassis are custom designed and all components are tested thoroughly. our most impressive test is the barge test. we take our machine, put it inside it's fiberglass case, turn it on and link up to it with a wireless connection. we put it on a small barge in a lake and detonate depth charges beneath the barge. most of the time the barge will fall apart, the machine will go flying in the air and land floating in the water. while all this is happening it is linked to a system on land which is monitoring its work. we don't sell a system unless it can go through this test without missing a step. this is the beauty of ruggedized computers. there's a video of a barge test on our website

Re:Offical Specs

[dsmey]

Odd. My Sony Vaio came with that IBM DJSA-series hard drive, and it croaked after the first 1-foot drop it took while the PC was running. Sony replaced it with a Toshiba.

I'd have to see the hard drive compartment to believe it.

No shit...

[kikta]

I spent two years stationed at Quantico as a Tech and the printers that would come into our shop from TBS (The Basic School) were the worst. I swear those motherfuckers were using their HP Laserjet 4's as wheel chocks for their Humvee's. They were always filled with sand & one time I found a huge-ass spider nest above the fuser! "Shit, Devildog, I don't know what's wrong with it." :-D

ooo, I owned one and broke it!

[mrbrown1602]

I owned an older Itronix military grade model at one time. It was pretty cool, I threw it in the oven a few times and into a lake once, and it kept on working. But, we I finally threw it across the room and it landed on its corner... the hard drive ceased to function. ;-)

Re:Be more careful!

[Dun Malg]

As opposed to the ones the US and British seem to be using in Iraq over the last couple of days?

Pffff! Helicopters are inherently dangerous and malfunction-prone. ALL the armed services crash helicopters with unnerving regularity. When I was with the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault), we rode in helicopters a LOT, and I have personally been in THREE crashes/hard-landings. The problem with helicopters is that they're pretty much doomed if they lose power or if any of the control systems crap out. Compounding this is the fact that they vibrate like you wouldn't believe, which has a tendency to make things "come loose". In wartime, the helos are logging a LOT more hours than in garrison, so the number of failures resulting in crashes will go up. As awful as it sounds, a couple helicopters going down from mechanical failure is statistically inevitable on an operation of this scale.