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Apple-Quality Intel Laptops?
arashiakari asks: "I have to buy a new laptop soon and I am having trouble settling on a brand or model except one that I cannot use. Apple's iBook laptop is beautiful, functional, lightweight, and made of high quality materials. I would buy one today except that I am a professional programmer and MUST use the same platform my compiler targets: Intel. So far each Intel-based laptop I have looked at is both grossly over-decorated (Compaq, Toshiba) and made of cheap flimsy materials (Dell), or has the combined problem of being overpriced and under-powered - with external bays for everything (Sony). IBM is expensive, but they are as close as I've found to "right" ... with Toshiba in second place. It seems like Intel-based laptops are either hot ugly tanks or oversized PDAs, there seems to be a scarcity of balanced well-thought-out and produced machines. Does the Slashdot have any suggestions?"
Will an intel emulator work? Something such as virtual pc? I know you can use the commercial product for Mac's called codewarrior that is able to compile for intel. You'd still need some kind of emulator to test it though. Has anyone else done this?
/* oops I accidentally made a comment, sorry */
Get a job developing for macs.
Problem solved.
I do all of my development on my IBM Thinkpad T23, with built-in wireless and Ethernet. It is a workhorse and has not let me down. IBM is a great company with excellent support for their products.
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There's a rule to follow: "Thou shalt lust after no other laptop than an IBM Thinkpad."
I've owned three of them, and all have been really great computers. I've owned other laptops, and they failed to measure up to the standard set by the Thinkpad.
My current machine is an A21m with 800mhz Pentium III, running Linux. All the hardware on the machine works with Linux. I have use it every day for work for the past 2.5 years, and it's just plain reliable. It's worth the money I paid for it, and I've noticed that the prices have dropped a lot. You can get a Thinkpad for much much less than what I paid for mine.
My next laptop will be an IBM Thinkpad.
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
IBM laptops win my vote for having the best ballance of quality, features, performance, portability, sturdiness, and design. Yes, this all comes at a higher price but if you look, it's about the same or less than the equivalent Apple gear. Moreover, amazingly the prices did go down compared to say 2 years ago. I remember there was no way to get a T-series Thinkpad for under $2000 and it still would be stripped down unless you get a $3000. These days you can buy a well configured T-series Thinkpad for under $2000 or you could opt for an cheaper R-series and pay the prices pretty much in Apple's 12inch iBook range for it (excapt that you'd get a better screen and much faster CPU)
Which Compaqs have you looked at? I agree that their consumer/home versions are pretty cheesy looking.
We use the Evo N800c model at work. They look professional, are very reliable, and work with everything we've tried. We've been all Compaq except laptops up until the past year (IBM Thinkpads). Once I saw the newer Evo notebooks, we switched over to the Compaq laptops as well. The IBM's were great too, just pricey as you said. I don't even normally put my Compaq in a case unless I need extra peripherals or are traveling very far with it. It's pretty sturdy.
Before Thinkpads, we used all Toshibas. They were great a few years ago. I think their build-quality and reliability has gone down though, at least based on the ones we've bought.
Jason
"FORMAT C:" - Kills bugs dead!
What I've always liked about Apple's notebooks is their ability to make the right compromises between size, weight, cost, speed, expandability, etc. I'm not saying they're perfect, but I agree with you that they're usually a lot better thought out than most of the wintel notebooks out there. You're better off asking yourself what your priorities are in a portable machine, and then picking a box that was built with the same priorities as you. As you said, the VAIO line is well designed, but often lacks features and speed. Do you need that extra speed? If you're looking for a devel machine then maybe you should just bite the bullet and buy a chunkier box.
Another poster suggested testing your apps in VPC on the Mac, but I think a virtual machine is the last place you want to be debugging test code. Any chance you could move to high level development? That way the test platform wouldn't really matter, just use your OO language of choice.
Don't knock HTML email. It makes my life easier, since I
Another vote for IBM. I'm currently on a T30 and had a T23 before this. I use my TP 24/7 and it never gets turned off. It gets a ton of use, not just sitting idle. It never crashes or dies. Should you have a hardware issue you'll have it back to you in 48 hours. They aren't the cheapest, but you get what you pay for.
:)
I couldn't work without my notebook...and I'm not giving up this T30 for anything...but maybe a T40.
I was roughly on the same quest as you a year ago. I spent too much time searching for online product reviews that it eventually crush my head. I decided to go to a local computer mall, and browse around the products that I've reviewed online. The product that I actually picked was none of that I thought was good (based on the reviews), it was a Fujitsu Lifebook S Series (6010); as I expected it's the closest thing that can come to iBook's quality, screen is definetly the best of all other notebooks I've used (Dell, Compaq, Toshiba, Vaio, Acer, Gateway, etc), the magnesium alloy screen cover is very solid. And oh, it has a superdrive--the same one used in ibooks!
All in all, it's the tiny bits of design detail that catch my attention on this well built pc, fujitsu actually manufacture it themselve in Japan, unlike others that usually outsource their production line to taiwan.
I would suggest you to go and check out the physical product yourself, ask for a live demo, try launching programs, use the disk, connect to an external mouse just like how you'd use the computer; a 20 minute of physical test is much better then a 2 weeks of reading online reviews.
Sharp Mebius Muramasa It is smaller and lighter than Apple's brick. It runs on Transmeta so you can get geek points too.
Panasonic Let's Note Again, smaller and lighter than Apple's iBrick.
It continues to amaze me that people look at the iBook as some kind of zenith of hardware design when it is bigger, heavier, and has only one mouse button compared to the Windows-based alternatives. I guess if you are comparing the Apple to an IBM or Dell laptop you'd have a point but with all sorts of more stylishly designed laptops than those available you'd be hard pressed to claim that Apple is leading in the field.
I have been pwned because my
I've had on the whole positive experiences with both Fujitsu and Sharp. (I've linked to the latest models, not the ones I've used.) They may not be titanium, but they're solid and not overly bloated.
With all the big names flying around, have you considered an Alienware machine? They're not the lightest in the world but they look to be fairly high quality.
They bill for games, but performance is performance.
They have some nice-looking laptops - especially their new Centrino-based model.
I think you can even make binaries for windows with a mingw crosscompiler... Thank god for GCC!
I was in the same boat you are in now and I chose the ibook, it's sweet, but I also needed to program for the intel platform. I bought a second machine ( a beefy workstation ) and I rdesktop into that fullscreen to do my programming. It works very great even over a wan if the bandwitdh is there. Get the ibook you won't regret it.
"Talent does what it can; genius does what it must."
I researched what was available pretty extensively, and chose an IBM Thinkpad G40.
I wanted something powerful, but this was for home, so price was very much a consideration. I looked hard at a couple of Toshiba's, and at the Dell range, but the IBM came in at a slightly lower price for the features I wanted, and I know from experience that Thinkpads are high quality. I did also look at the iBooks, but the prices were way too high for the feature set.
For what it's worth, I wanted 40 Gb / 512 Mb/ DVD/CR-RW combo / 15" screen / XP Pro / 2 GHz or better processor. Size / Weight / battery life weren't an issue. The G40 I bought has a 2.4 GHz processor. Unlike most Thinkpads, it doesn't have removable drives. I was willing to cut the iBook some slack on processor speed (although the ones I tried in store were very slow; they were short on RAM as displayed).
Relative price probably varies from country to country, and month to month, so if you live in a different country from me (probable), and since my purchase was a month ago, you might find something else works better for you.
Sager laptop owner forums
Sager reseller
It may be a somewhat unknown brand, but I have been totally blown away with it. Check out the specs and the forums.
http://www.vprmatrix.com/products_notebook_200A5.a sp
--
"we live in a post-ideological world..." - Billy Bragg.
The thing you have to do is understand why IBM and Apple are at the top of their markets.
One reason...they build their own Notebooks...take a look at this page and then you'll understand why...
The short answer is Alienware, Toshiba, Dell, Compaq, etc are all made by the same companies...chances are they are all the same laptop.
Sony, IBM, and Apple all used to design their own notebooks...Apple kind of has to (yet they still use ODMs to assemble their boxen), and Sony and IBM have started to slip recently (using some of Quanta's ODM systems).
But if you want to find out how good the notebook is, find out who really made it.
Of course, you can always buy from the site that I linked to. They will sell notebooks without an OS and even have a Linux Forum. Not to mention they have unmatched customer service.
Let's be serious here, Apple laptops aren't all that durable. Two of my friends have had the screens break, one in a bookbag and one in a laptop bag. With a few exceptions, I'd say the average laptop now is a lot less durable than 10 years ago.
I've picked up two used Panasonic Toughbooks on eBay and they've been attention-getters ever since. How many laptops can you stand on, throw across the room, use as hammers, and use in the rain, all while your favorite mp3s are playing?
I'm a big form-follows-function guy. The Toughbooks are all black, magnesium alloy with rubber covers over the ports. They're elegant in the same way a Beretta pistol is a work of art.
I've taken to keeping my Tougbook in a bag lately, not to protect it from the outside world, but to protect the outside world from it. The rubber feet came off the bottom some time ago, and the metal case has a tendency to mar floors if I drop it. I do that sometimes just for effect.
I presently own two Toughbooks: a CF-25, which is a full-size machine (comparable to any other laptop). It's a Pentium 150 with a nice comfy keyboard, 1024x768 screen behind a polycarbonate sheet, three(!) PCMCIA slots, and a gel pad surrounding the hard drive, which I upgraded from 4 gig to 10. The lack of CardBus and USB finally forced me to upgrade to my present machine, which is a...
CF-17, a Celeron 300 subnotebook. It's petite, the (touch)screen is only 800x600, and the keyboard takes some getting used to. With 128 meg and the 20 gig drive I dropped in it, it's more power than I need. (My desktop is only a 300MHz machine, for comparison.) It's got a single USB1.1 port, and I occasionally stick a 480Mb/s "hi speed" USB card in the slot when I need to use an external burner.
There are of course more recent Toughbook models, up to Pentium III and probably faster, but my budget and needs are more modest. Lately Panasonic's come out with a few "semi"-rugged models, which translates to "beats the crap out of your Dell, but won't survive a 10' drop onto concrete like the others". They're worth looking into if you're not the type to occasionally toss a load of 2x4's into your truck without noticing the laptop sitting there.
P.S. I'm not affiliated with Panasonic in any way, just a loyal customer. I could've probably sold a dozen of these machines to people who've been impressed by mine, I should see about becoming a dealer.
We got rid of the guy where I work who insisted on using a Mac on his desktop. Because, while that alone really wasn't an issue, it was a symptom of a contrarian crank, who was never going to be easy for anybody to work with.
Think Different indeed.
I work in a shop that sees a ton of desktop's and laptops alike, and the only ones I never see for hardware problems are the Thinkpads. I personally use a beefed up T20 w/a 900MHz PIII and a DVD/CDRW drive, and I couldn't imagine using another laptop (besides the 15" TiBook I lust over). They're built like tanks. I dropped my TP 600 prior to this one about 5 times from 4 feet up before I gave it to my mom. She still uses it for school. Just avoid the i series. They're built like compaqs.
... was in the same situation. On pricewatch, he found a notebook from MicroPro, with a 2500+ (socketed no less), a 333Mhz fsb, Mobile Radeon 9000 64DDR, 60gig HD, and a really nice 15 inch screen. And if you go to pricewatch, and search for "MicroNote Professional 530", you can get it for under $1,200 dollars. It doesn't get the best battery life (around 2 hours and 10 minutes under normal use), and it's feels almost twice as heavy as my ibook, but it's a very cool machine.
There are some things I don't like about it though. Of course this machine has some very hot components. At the bottom, there is a large intake just under the CPU, with a solid copper heat sink and heat pipes that bring it to the left side of the notebook, with a turbine to help it along. For this reason, you can't keep it on your lap (both legs) without blocking the airflow. This doesn't seem like a big deal, but if you put your hand next to the vent on the left, you can feel that the air is really hot.
I wouldn't recommend it if you are looking for an extremely mobile notebook, but if you want one of the most powerful notebooks in production for under $1,200, click here for details. Remember, you get a special deal if you buy it through pricewatch (about $222 I think). If you want any more details, ask me, or him.
If you are just targetting Intel processors with open source tools, you shouldn't have any problems. If you need to target a non-gnu platform, however, well then you need a really good laptop to compensate for the hassles.
I was fairly satisfied with a Sony VAIO that a previous employer insisted on paying too much for. (I submitted the specs for an iBook, but they insisted on spending more money) Of course it not only cost more, but ended up needing repairs more often.
I bought an iBook on my own, but really haven't seen a PC laptop that I would buy on my own yet.
My advise is to concentrate on the features you most like in a PowerBook/iBook. Is it the display? The ports? General durability? Running a GUI desktop and a Unix shell at the same time?
If the latter is a factor, as in you might want to do some network analysis in the field, then you want to pre-validate that the laptop you're looking at can be partitioned and dual-booted with either Linux or BSD.
I bought a P2110 a year or so ago, and it was the best laptop I have ever owned (albeit a little slow.) Their laptops tend to use magnesium over cheap, flimsy plastic (dell, the 8100 -- piece of junk) and are well put together, all at a reasonable price. I recently purchased a P5010D, which is almost as good quality as the P2110.
If you want to spend money, and not on two fujitsu laptops, go with IBM. They use decent plastic and good designs. They are some of the more intelligently designed laptops out there, and have been hardy tools for me in the past.
However, you should be able to find a comparable and cheaper machine in its lower-end brother, the D500.
The man said he was going to develop on Intel, he didn't say windows.
Can I get an eye poke?
Dog House Forum
After all, just like the Slashdot ad says, Oracle makes laptops unbreakable.
I recommend the IBM Thinkpad as well. I hated laptops but I have just spent two years using a 600X and it has made a convert out of me. I just bought a certified pre-owned T30 of my own from the IBM web site.
My only real complaint is that I didn't get the !@#$% CDROMs for the Windows XP that is installed on it. You are supposed to be satisfied with the recovery partition. The story is if you have a problem with the recovery partition, and the system is under warranty, IBM will fix it ASAP. What I want to know is what am I supposed to do if it's 2:00 in the morning or if the unit is no longer under warranty?
Also, it is possible for the system to get to the point where you can't boot to access the recovery partition. In that case you are supposed to use a recovery floppy - except there is no floppy drive on the system and there's no documentation on what to put on a bootable CDROM (the floppy is built by some utility)!
Even if I wanted to pay for it twice and I bought a retail copy of XP I still lose because now I don't have the IBM-specific drivers and utilities.
Of course, IBM is not the company sticking it to people here, that "honor" belongs to Microsoft and their utterly delusional paranoia that someone might steal a copy of Windows. You can hardly get a PC that doesn't come with Windows and by the time a new version of Windows comes out your hardware that is running the previous version is obsolete so there is very little reason to actually steal Windows.
I am also a professional programmer, so I can relate to your worries about development restrictions on a non-PC platform. I've been running VirtualPC on my second-hand TiBook for awhile now, and I can testify that it works quite well for PC development purposes.
...I find I write better code on trailing-edge hardware, because any speed issues become extremely obvious where the same code would SEEM fine on my Athlon box.
;-)
:-). Check out the Connectix web site if you're interested in more info.
On a 667 Mhz laptop, i can use visual studio without complaints. Yes, it's slower than it would be on a P4 notebook. Let me tell you why I don't care: optimization!
But then again, maybe I'm a maniac.
Anyway, based on my experience, I'd suggest that you not rule Apple out yet... Unless you're doing hardware drivers or video games, the emulation won't be a huge issue... And the reliability and design on these laptops are almost everything the zealots say they are
There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root.
Virtual PC emulates an Intel based PC. Unless you actually install Windows, it has nothing to do with it, and you can install almost any other OS instead.
There are exceptions, but that simply has to do with the OS not having drivers for the specific "hardware" Virtual PC emulates.
You said you like their laptops, but they are expensive, so you might want to check it out. They sell both new and factory refurbished stuff there.
Nothing to see here; Move along.
I just bought an IBM Thinkpad R40 a couple months ago, and all I can say is it's great. Works wonderfully out of the box with Linux and FreeBSD, is very fast (Pentium M), great battery life (around 4-5 hours), very nice screen, and great construction. I've been impressed. It's a big step up from my previous Compaq Presario, and not significantly more expensive.
-- "Big Brother is Watching..."
Next question . . .
I have a friend with a titanium...the case surrounding the LCD is flimsy and isn't stiff enough to support the screen. It's fairly easy to break the screen (which is quite expensive to replace).
May we never see th
You're an Apple zealot recommending a Microsoft product? :-)
Seriously, I agree with the "give programmers slow computers" bit. To get the best code, give 'em slower computers with lots of fancy add-ons (multiple monitors, etc) so that you get efficient code that properly supports everything.
May we never see th
2. Become a stockholder. Stockholders also get access to discounts.
3. eBay. The IBM store on eBay has some sweet deals.
If you save enough money you can go out and buy a cheap iBook as well. Have the best of both worlds.
Lasers Controlled Games!
Yes, it's big and heavy.
But it's got EVERYTHING internal (no need for external bays) and a beautiful 15" screen with resolution that is far higher than Apple's 15" laptop LCDs. Runs every game I have quite well.
It's an Inspiron 8200. Yes, it's not the most portable, but Dell's primary market is businesses. It doesn't matter if the unit is a little heavy if a bulk of your "traveling" is from your cube to the conference room. (Or in the case of where I work, half of the engineers have Dells that move between the docking station on their desk and the benchtop in the lab multiple times per day.)
That said - If you have the money, Thinkpads are the way to go. They are the most durable laptops on the market by far. (Unless you go into the "ruggedized" market, where units like the Panasonic Toughbook reign supreme.) If cost is an issue, Dell makes excellent laptops, especially the Inspiron 8000 series.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
I used to work in a computer sales center.
Compaq consistently has the worst quality rep of any PC manufacturer. (Except Packard Smell... Thank God they're gone. Even eMachines is better than Compaq.) We routinely had Compaq laptops come in for service with displays that had simply stopped working.
Toshiba used to be excellent, but like you, I've heard that they've gone downhill over the past few years.
Dell's quality seems to oscillate every few years. Back when I was in school, all of their laptops and desktops were utter shite. The desktops we've been getting at work lately have had AMAZING build quality and impressive design. (The latest ones, at least the latest Precisions, have completely screwless designs and quite well designed ducted cooling.) I have an Inspiron 8200 and it's one of the best laptops I've ever used. The only complaint I have about it is the lack of a display blanking key, a feature I miss from my old TI Travelmate 7100.
Sony Vaios seem to always be overpriced and have all of their accessories external.
IBM Thinkpads are also pricey, but well worth the money if you can afford them. Thinkpads are built like tanks. We NEVER had a Thinkpad less than 4-5 years old come in for service at my campus store when I worked there, and those that did come in after 4-5 years of life were mostly in because of software problems.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
http://www.eurocom.ca
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'Nuf said