Slashdot Mirror
Sony X505/SP Notebook Review
John Gaule writes "Earlier it was mentioned on Slashdot that Sony has introduced the worlds thinnest laptop, the Sony X505 which weighs just under 2lbs. Designtechnica has reviewed this system and compares it to the JVC Interlink 7310, Panasonic W2 and Sony TR1A laptops. Apparently Sony had to have a custom motherboard configured to get the CPU and hard drive in the right position for cooling. There is also no integrated WiFi but it uses an 802.11g WiFi PC Card."
The full review on one page is available here.
:-)
Also, I must say, that is quite the small laptop. And you can see the fingerprints all over it in one of the photos on the main article.
There are other images available here as well.
Looks like Apple will be going back to the drawing board. The iBooks look pretty thick in comparison.
Damon,
http://actionPlant.com
"Almost" broke in half? Usually, smaller and lighter devices don't hit the ground as hard. It would be unusual to have a featherweight laptop to break due to its light weight. Do you have pictures of the damage?
if i sat on any laptop it will fail, having an Apple logo on the front of my taiwanese laptop makes no difference
Apple manufacture nothing, its all outsourced to the same people that make laptops for Del,Sony et al
After 6 years of tech support, Toshiba is the most problem free of the laptops I've dealt with, and IBM/Dell tied for the worst. Apple laptops are also sweet, but I've had more limited dealings with those.
:)
Just got a Toshiba Satellite M35-S359. Something like 1.4" thick, 15.4" screen, ~7lbs. *Very* sweet laptop, and heat is no issue with the Centrino proc in there. Forget IBM's fragile creation, get something with some panache
http://thechubbyferret.net - Ferret pictures and informative links.
I know slashdotters (like myself) love Sony's offerings... they're cool and neat looking, but remember that Sony is supporting the RIAA in all of the lawsuits. Also, the MemoryStick media that they back (and surely put in this laptop) is much more expensive than CF or SD or anything else.
:) Then again, maybe they didn't suck in 1997.
Also, I just plain haven't had good luck with Sony products:
My NX60 stopped working one day for no reason (didn't drop or crush it), my stereo shocks me when i touch the case (so that's gone), my brother's PS2 died for no reason, my coworker's sony laptop's keys [letters on the keyboard] have all rubbed off ("how can I type now!?" "remember where the keys are" "what!!???"), etc, etc, etc.
My Multiscan200sf monitor is holding up quite nicely; that's a well-made piece of machinery
Note that I'm not flaming or trolling, I just think that most people on slashdot would be better-served by choosing a more open vendor than Sony.
My other car is first.
No direct quote as the article is now Slashdotted... However, they ask about inspiration for the carbon fiber. Oh come on, we all know carbon fiber is rad on your tricked out import racer, so why wouldn't it look just as cool on your laptop?
Damn, dude. Be more careful with your stuff. I wouldn't expect any brand of laptop (except for those OLD 286 "mobile computers" that were about 6 inches thick when closed) to survive a 3 foot drop.
My lack of God, it's Trotsky!
Hell, even my iBook has taken many a tumble and survived. One corner is chipped, and the LCD frame is slightly cracked in four places, but the structural integrity has not been compromised. It works as if it's never been dropped.
I've had to use Compaqs, and Toshibas at work, and none have been as well constructed.
home !=
I dont know but IMO a smaller/thinner notebook is a very specialized product for a small market. I personally have a Dell Inspiron 4150 and I think it weighs in around 5-7lbs, but I think it is a perfect weight/size. When you go smaller you start to lose drives (ie, cdrom, etc..), I/O connections, and also the laptop is so light that if you *accidentally* snag your power cord then its to the floor w/ the laptop. I hate the devices that are too small... PDA/phones that try to be laptops (or laptops that try to be palm/small sized) are less user friendly.
The page seems to be dead, Jim, but here's another source of info on the X505.
A fellow I know at college had a W2, and almost the same happened to him. He put his notebook in his backpack, which rolled from one step down to another, barely a one foot drop, and the panasonic dropped out of the side a few inches onto the concrete.
The result? a smashed screen and it wouldn't close properly. I'd ribbed him about how weak the thing looked, but didn't expect it to be so insanely fragile.
These things are notebooks, but I don't think they're meant to be portable, they're more like your grandmother's finest china tea set. So impeccably made, so fine, so well crafted... and not something you'd want to use for their supposed purpose.
(I bought myself a 12" powerbook btw. It's not as elegant as the W2, but stunning in its own right)
My God. $4,000 who is going to buy this? P-Diddy? Martha Stewart?
Sony had to have a custom motherboard configured to get the CPU and hard drive in the right position for cooling
;)
I know Im no expert at language, but isnt that a contradiction?
moo
ok, with the keyboard slammed against the outside edge of the deck, how the heck am I supposed to use this in my *LAP*?
Come on Sony.. move the keyboard back so I can rest my palms on the deck, and hold the laptop on my lap at the same time...
-Mikey
Hmmmm...a new theorum is born:
Don't all laptops pretty much have custom configured motherboards anyway?
Depends why you have a laptop. If you travel, then no, as long as the keyboard is usable, then no,
there is no such thing as too small and light.
Personally, I can live without any drives when
I travel: compact flash makes a reasonable backup choice.
Basic physics tells us all objects, when air resistance is neglected, hit the ground at the same velocity when dropped from the same height, and for a one-meter fall, I don't think air resistance is the issue.
Hmmmm...a new theorum is born:
Slashdotters can't spell theorem.
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
Same velocity, different momentum, though, right?
Lets Give Credit where Credit is do IBM makes some of the best laptop, for stability and performance.
Only caveat is the IBM (corporate level machines T and A Series) tend to more exepnsive than Dell but they also last much longer.
I have a thin v505 that is less than 6 months old, has been treated extremely gently, and is already in need of touchpad replacement/repair (the cursor just skips all over and simply does not accurately track finger movement). This is an annoying and widespread enough problem to warrant those considering purchase of a 505 to perhaps think twice. And if you do, definitely get that extended warranty (but that may just go without saying in laptop purchasing).
It's pretty cool, I'll give it that. But at $3500 or $4000 (depending on which case material you go with) it's just too expensive and too feature limited to be something I would go for.
No trackpad (have to use trackpoint or external mouse).
No built-in floppy or optical drive.
Have to use dongles for LAN and VGA out.
Have to use PC Card for 802.11.
Only a 20GB hard drive.
Max of 512MB RAM.
1 GHz Centrino CPU.
All your paying for is thinness and lightness. That may be enough for some, but not me. Get rid of all the dongles, include a CD drive, beef up the specs a bit and then we can talk. I don't care if you have to make it a little thicker and heavier -- it needs to be useful!
I suspect they're going for the mobile professional market. Marketing guys that will pay out the nose for the smallest, hippest item. Good luck to 'em.
I got one of these. It weighs slightly more than the Sony, but has a Transmeta 933Mhz CPU, integrated 100baseT and 802.11b, 2 USB 2.0 ports, 10.1" TFT, and a touchpad. It runs Linux with no problem, except that the ALi sound chip doesn't support SPDIF, yet the sound driver expects this chip to support SPDIF and tries to initialize those ports with colorful results. :) A few minutes' hacking on the driver source, and that problem was solved.
With the bigger battery, its weight goes up to a whole 2.9 lbs, but it runs for 9 hours.
Edith Keeler Must Die
I dont know but IMO a smaller/thinner notebook is a very specialized product for a small market. I personally have a Dell Inspiron 4150 and I think it weighs in around 5-7lbs, but I think it is a perfect weight/size. When you go smaller you start to lose drives (ie, cdrom, etc..), I/O connections, and also the laptop is so light that if you *accidentally* snag your power cord then its to the floor w/ the laptop. I hate the devices that are too small... PDA/phones that try to be laptops (or laptops that try to be palm/small sized) are less user friendly.
That's true if you want to talk about the speed at which they hit. You neglected inertia which tells us that the heavier object will have much more energy.
Hold a 2x4 in front of you and I'll shoot a 22 pistol and a 45 auto at the board. I bet the board will stop the 22 but do you want to find out if it can stop the 45 at roughly the same velocity?
All these comments saying "What do you expect from a 3+ foot-drop" Valid point but it doesn't change the fact that I will never own another Sony. The one that I had (also an ultra-portable or whatever they call it these days) would drop screws like crazy. The battery went kaput very fast. The hard-drive made that terrible "I'm about to fail noise". Bad, bad product.
So, how about the service. Non-existent. I was promised shipping boxes and RMA tags on no less that four occasions and never received a single one.
There is good news though, someone broken into out house a stole this piece of shit. Our insurance paid replacement cost, which allowed me to get a Dell. Been pretty happy with that.
For another thread of unhappy Sony owners check this out.
You are not a beautiful or unique snowflake -- but you could be if you got off your ass.
Yes...nothing like shattering screens or malfunctioning latches to make you think that Apple has a quality product. The most recent iBooks are abysmal in my opinion, certainly no better than the run-of-the-mill HP's and Compaq's you see in Best Buy or Circuit City.
the force of the impact is equal to the mass of the object (a light notebook) multiplied by the acceleration of gravity.
velocity stays the same, but the force of impact is greater or smaller depending on the mass of the object. the original poster was correct if you take hard==force.
Q: What do you think about American Culture?
A: I think it's a good idea.
(adapted from Gandhi)
What do they mean by custom designed motherboard? Is there some sort of standard for notebook motherboards? I thought they were all custom designed. Last time I checked my crappy Dell notebook had a custom motherboard in it too. I think maybe that was some kind of hype statement?
The thing I've found is that if you type extremely quickly, and especially two of the same letter in a row, the Vaios are likely to miss the second keystroke. I thought it was a problem with my laptop, but the other ones in the store suffered from that problem as well.
Anyone else notice this?
"I think I'll just be sticking with Apple powerbooks from now on as they make the most durable and stable laptops on the market."
You want durability and stability? Try Tadpole. Used by the US military. Runs Solaris and Linux. I've found Thinkpads pretty solid as well. YMMV.
When a mouse falls down a well, it's stunned but survives. When a man falls down the well, it breaks. When a horse falls down a well, it splashes.
-- a crude rememberance of a quote with attribution that has been long forgotten
Are custom motherboards a rare thing in the PC laptop world? That seems pretty unlikely to me.
I've had 3 VAIOs none of which have broken or are in any way flimsy.
I can understand some people want laptops with lots of drives etc, but personally I find once I've got everything I need installed on the machine I rarely need a CD drive for anything since new software gets transferred via the network. Different strokes and all that of course.
A few years ago, I baught a Sony VAIO laptop. It cost about $3000. As was standard with Sony at that time, it came with a one year warranty.
Almost exactly one month out of warranty, I started having problems. The computer would start, stay on for a very short time (usually less than 5 minutes) and then it would shut off.
Thinking some part may be drawing too much power, I tried disconnection every possible part that could be disconnected. However, this did not solve my problem. I finally succumbed to calling the support department, which of course had no clue and recommended I send my laptop in to be serviced.
I sent my laptop in as they said, and got notification that it had been received at the service department. A week passed, and I had not gotten any indication as to the status. I called support, gave them my ticket number, and asked them what was going on. They had no idea, and nothing had been logged. A couple days later I called again, and got the same result.
At this point, I became rather upset, and demanded they call me back by the end of the next day to tell me what was going on. They were kind enough to call me back, but not smart enough to figure out the problem. They said it would cost me $2200 dollars to have the problem "fixed" which I'm sure at that cost meant sending me a refurb unit.
This was 1 month out of a year long warranty, and I was furious and demanded better service. At this point, I could have gotten a computer that was twice as powerful for the same price they were going to charge me for "repairs." Unfortunately I got nowhere in my requests for fair compensation. In fact, I had to pay $60 dollars to cover services rendered and have my unfunctioning laptop shipped back to me.
$3000 dollars got me use of a laptop for one year and one month. This thing had minor wear as it served mainly as a desktop replacement. After dealing with Sony, and being a loyal customer of their other products, I kindly told them to fuck off. I have never spent another dime on Sony products.
-- Fighting mediocrity one bad post at a time.
So 1996... I wonder if those ultraSparcs are really that good performance/clock-wise.
The thing got yanked off a desktop when somebody tripped over the power cord during a reboot. It hit the floor on it's side on battery power after dropping 3 feet and never even hickuped while rebooting. I picked it up, plugged it back in, and went back to work. This was when the laptop was ~1 month old.
The only thing I've ever had to do to it as far as service was have the display hinge replaced when it was roughly 2 and a half years old. It was still under normal warranty. Service went like this:
I've had the same problem with my iBook, which I'm typing this on, which was 8 months old at the time. For starters I was seriously pissed to be having problems with a system less that a year old. Service went like this:
I have to say IBM's service makes Apple's look like a bad joke. IBM picked up and returned my laptop in a period of three days. Apple's service for the same problem involved two car trips and a nine day wait. I was also upset that a problem that's taken around 2 to 2 and a half years to develop on the two Thinkpads I've owned occured on my iBook in less than a year... and seems to be starting again at a year and a half... not to mention the battery which died at 13 months (which is not covered by an Apple Care extended warranty, so I had to replace it out of pocket). Now if only IBM would license OS X and build some Power PC laptops... sigh.
.technomancer
I have an N505VE and it's working great after 3+ years. The battery is dead (though I've never seen a battery last this long) but otherwise it runs like day 1.
I've never dropped it, but I think the build is pretty solid. The powerbooks also seem nice to me, I must admit.
But it is so shiny!
I, too, boycott the **AA, like any good slashdotter.
If I don't get this Sony laptop, how am I going to watch my LOTR & Star Wars boxed set DVDs? How am I going to listen to all of the Matrix soundtrack CDs I bought?
This should have been modded down as a troll. Or maybe even spam. "I dropped it and it broke?" That's interesting. Come on.
Small Laptops ...
I've been wanting a really small laptop for sometime now and finding one that looks sexy and has some punch at a reasonable price is not that easy. But when you realise that you can purchase a G4 12in ibook for just over a grand and an 11in G4 powerbook for just over 1.5 grand. This sony laptop starts to look decidedly expensive all for a couple of millimeters here and there.
Aside from the math, Id rather give Apple some of my hard earned dosh , than redmond. I'd bet Yellow Dog Linux would run a beauty on those *book's too. I just need a job... After a while one needs a gadget buying fix, and I've been yearning for the tiny powerbook for too long now!
Electronic Music Made Using Linux http://soundcloud.com/polyp
Yes, I was about to say that sooner or later laptops will be so light that people will be afraid to use them outdoors lest they be blown away in the wind. Soon we will be needing laptop-weights just to hold them down.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
Perhaps you should consider a Panasonic Toughbook. I have no experience with them personally, however I only hear good things about their durability. They are a bit pricey though.
I can attest to the strength of the PowerBook firsthand. My 17" PBG4 fell off the top of my suitcase (~2.5') inside it's minimal-padding sleeve, and landed head first, right on the corner, onto concrete.
The result is that the case in that corner became slightly flattened. No damage to the screen. No change in functionality.
Yay for quality engineering. My wife just bought a Sony PCG-8N1L, and while not purporting to be thin (it's a fricking thick huge beast) it's all plastic. Having been used to Apple's solid designs, it seems so cheesy and cheap :)
Actually non-integrated WiFi is lame on all notebooks, but especially so on this one.
When it's ultra-light and ultra-thin, the goal is portability, right? This should mean I can close the machine, dump it into its bag, and run.
But you can't do that safely if you have a WiFI card in the slot with the antenna lump sticking out of the side, just waiting to break off or transfer a bump from the outside into the card socket (munging it and in all likelyhood your machine's motherboard).
To a Lisp hacker, XML is S-expressions in drag.
After having my own Sony woes with my Clie and a friend's Vaio, I went on a search for the perfect (for me of course) sub-notebook.
My search ended at the Fujitsu P-5010. It's the size of a book so it fits in my backpack easily. It's not thin, but at 3.4 lbs it's light. It's 1" thickness prevents it from being fragile (with it in my bag, I've fallen on my bag...no damage). Plus the modular bay battery allows me to use it for about 7 hours of compiling Gentoo before I have to plug it in.
Linux support is good (except for wide-angle resolution, gotta go XiG for that).
My only complaints are: XFree can't do 1280x768 on the i855gm chipset (this may be fixed soon). I like a trackpoint more than a touchpad.
Check out the P-series forums at leog.net
IBM's first-line folks were fine. They sent out a box for my laptop immediately. But then the tech folks declared it to be "liquid spillage" and not under warrantee. I was told they would send me the photos proving it later that afternoon. Calling back a few days later, I was told they would send me the photos that afternoon. A week later, they would send me the photos that afternoon. A few days later... Finally I gave in (after many escalations) and had them return the laptop. This all took about a month.
Since it was no longer under warrantee (the "liquid spillage" excuse), I took it apart myself. There was a nice glob of thermal grease in the keyboard connector that was not there when I sent it in. (I sometimes removed the keyboard to dust it. The manual detailing how is available on-line.) I had different memory modules installed. Same capacity, but now they had "certified used" stickers on them. I also found thermal grease on the motherboard in a few places, and some interesting fingerprints etched in the metal around the screw holes.
I tightened some connectors, cleaned the board as best I could, and reassembled. The dead pixels are still there, but it boots reliably now and the screen connector doesn't go dead.
And they'll still be sending me the images showing that it's liquid damage this afternoon. I no longer trust IBM's thinkpad support. If this were a commercial account, I would have gone through the sales rep, and they would have dealt with everything. But the personal support I encountered was definitely not trustworthy.
End-user service is always a crap shoot. You may get great service, you may get lousy service, all from the same company. That's why businesses will pay more to go through sales reps. The sales rep will deal with it. Oh well.
Jason
No, as long as it's useful, a laptop can never be too thin or too small. Or too battery-conservinge.
Obviously you don't have to fly regularly with a computer. There are **THOUSANDS** of us who do. 5 to 7 pounds is a nasty backache waiting to happen, especially when compared to something like the Sony Z1A I have. It's got everything (2 USB ports, firewire, sound in and out, PCMCIA, built-in RJ45 Ethernet and 802.11b), sacrifices no drives (built-in CDRW/DVD, USB floppy), great keyboard, great screen, touchpad, it's speedy as hell, and it only cost like $2200.
Oh yeah, and it ways 4 1/2 pounds and is less than 1 inch thick. And has *awesome* battery life (6 1/2 hour regular battery, 8 hour "long-life" accessory battery).
not that it matters, but i have a sony fxa-36, which has an all plastic casing. it's been dropped multiple times from 2-3 feet, while not in a case, and it still works fine. the plastic on the right hand side of the keyboard cracked the last time, but it's still fully funtional.
Close, but no cigar.
Based on your statement, dropping the laptop from a height of 0.5m or 500m will result in the same impact. Acceleration is constant, 9.8m/s(2) and so is the mass (the laptop does not get heavier or lighter on its way down).
The correct way of defining the impact would be:
energy @ impact = one half the mass of the object multiplied by the square of its velocity.
If VISTA is the answer, you didn't understand the question
It has a trackpoint.
The carbon fibre they use is the 'space age' carbon fibre used on the space shuttle. So it shouldn't break.
However, if you do break it, do not try to re-enter the earth's atmosphere with is as your heatshield - this may cause what NASA calls LOV/C (Loss Of Vehicle or Crew). And NASA said that the Columbia's RCC should not have broken in the circumstances.
Exercise your right not to vote. thinkoutside.org
wow, I think that's just too thin. I love my g3 12" ibook, and I think it's just the right size for everyday use. I know some execs will buy these sony's, but I suspect it'll end up on IT's desk more often than not. we had an issue at an old job of ours, the 'hot-headed' CEO would "drop" his tiny laptop (across the room) and it would break. again, it was sent in for repair more than it was used.
CB
free ipod and free gmail!
Drop a drinking glass from that height and see how well it does.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
You may be an idiot, but I'm the confused one:
Should this be -1 Troll, or +1 Insightful?
-I like my women like I like my tea: green-
christ, you're right. this is at rest.
oh the embarrassment!
Q: What do you think about American Culture?
A: I think it's a good idea.
(adapted from Gandhi)
What better way to benchmark a new box than by clocking an KDE build in 18 hours instead of my usual 24.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
The problem with these pretty notebooks is that executives love them. So while the rest of the company is using ibm notebooks the CEO has to have one of these sexy non-standard puppies and what worked on every other machine in your enterprise might not work on the Sony, despite the same OS, etc.
This is back in 99 my first week on the job, I had been installing the Norton client on 20 or 30, machines with out a hitch and its around 4:30. I ask the CEO if he has time for me to do the install, he says sure if will take less than 10 minutes he needs to leave for a flight. So I install the client, reboot and I get "MSDOS.SYS missing" (win98).
Dear god I was sweating bullets, the first time I meet the CEO and I have killed his laptop! A quick trip to symantec.com revealed the solution and it was a problem specific to Sony. All in all he wasn't delayed more than 5 minutes or so and he was very patient. None the less I have a strong distate for Sony laptops to this day.
... and wired ethernet in a notebook is simply unacceptable now.
Tell me about it. I am carrying half a course load in addition to my regular job with overtime. I bring my laptop, a Tecra 8000 and try to do my assignments, coursework, etc whenever I get a free moment like lunches. Since I'm studying CS, I "need" the laptop because I do a lot of coding for assignments. I would love a lighter laptop and for text books to be on CD rather than paper. I started to get spasms in my back....
I make a reasonable middle-class wage by going to work and not spamming blogs with scams.
OT, but a .22 short caliber bullet can usually go through about 2-4 cm of pine. a single 2x4 might not stop it.
Anyways, I hate it how people say that macs are better. Everybody made fun of me for buying a vaio sr19(10" & 2.9lb) instead of a "portable"(5lb?) ibook. Well, since then at least 2 of my people had to RMA their laptops due to mobo failure and screen issues.
Don't believe me? Check nice ibook stories here.
So to each his own. Sony can make good laptops and apple might too. Know what you are buying instead of just betting your buck on brandnames. But for god's sake, stop this whole "Apple is holy, ppc is better bullshit".
Oh yah recently my laptop experienced a big weight dropped on it from over a meter. As a result there is a crack on both sides of it, but it still functions(except for the bent memory stick slot).
P = M V.
In the case of the laptop, the V would be what it got up to. Using Vf^2 = Vi^2 + 2ad, we find that the V ~= 4.43 m/s.
If I have a 1kg laptop, and have it 1 metre above the ground, the force it will hit the ground with is easily worked out. 1 * 4.43 = 4.43N of force. If you convert it to pounds, that means the laptop struck with a force of about 0.995 pounds. Scientifically we have determined that if it broke from that fall, it was a cheap piece of shit.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
Does the modeline form http://www.vanbuer.net/~darrel/p2040.html help?
But is this a one or three button mouse now?
Oh sorry, wrong thread.
Heh.. heh... heh... You said T and A...
Yes and no. A motherboard is often shared across two brands, though not that often among two models of the same brand. An IBM may have the same mb as a Sager, but a Sager 5800 wouldn't have the same as a 5802. But it's still not that exciting. Even Dells and Compaq desktops will typically have custom motherboards. It just as common int he desktop world.
:(
I might be missing something about why this custom board is special, though, because I can't get the article up
-no broken link
"Same velocity, different momentum, though, right?"
African or European laptop?
So have you gone the next step and bought desktop keyboards with built-in trackpoint?
(grins)
's very nice...
You should have called Apple back on Day 2. They would have sent you a box just like IBM and you would probably had it back on Day 4.
The G3 Dual USB iBooks were no doubt had some huge faults in the logic board design (which usually causes the video failure). However my experiences with Apple's support were exactly like your IBM support, you should have said you wanted it sent in to Apple directly rather than deal with stores. Unless going there isn't out of your way, insist that it be shipped to their debugging center.
I'm surprised that you had to pay for the battery, Apple replaced my power adapter after I tripped on it and yanked the wire out of the plug. I'd think something like that would be pretty obvious when it was sent in (Apple Care Protection Plan). It sometimes has to do with whatever tech person you get on the phone (or how you talk to them), one of the ones I've delt with simply said they were going to have it brought in after I described the problem. Another technician seemed to be amused by what was blatantly my fault but decided to have it exchanged anyway (adapter).
But I really wish Apple would design their more recent products so that these kinds of things don't happen in the first place. My old 1994 Mac still works great, but these past 2 years churned out computers (iBook mainly) that should be recalled to replace the logic boards with a different revision.
from the article: "Using the X505 in a public place such as a coffeehouse or on public transportation, you'll notice a lot of glances."
:-)
and then they will beat the crap out of you and take it. not too hard to run away with a machine this small.
It's too bad the Panasonic W2 isn't technically part of the Toughbook line. Yes it's a little more durable than the average craptop but it's not going to stop bullets like the more rugged machines.
I don't understand why people pay a bunch of money for a delicate little machine, then act surprised when it breaks. You wouldn't buy a wristwatch that wasn't built to take a little abuse, would you? You wouldn't drive a car that couldn't handle rain, would you? So why buy a portable computer that isn't durable enough to leave the house?
I'm more than willing to sacrifice a bit of power for a lot of durability. I don't do anything on my laptop that would need a gigahertz chip anyway. Now if they could just improve the battery life a little, I'd gladly carry a few extra pounds if the thing would run as long between charges as my cell phone. Most laptops are junk.
The force of it falling is dependant on how hard the surface it hits is. As you calculated above, the velocity at impact is 4.43M/s, giving the 1Kg laptop a momentum of 4.43 KgM/s.
F=M*A, where A is the acceleration of the laptop going from 4.43 M/s (V)to 0 M/s (assuming its not bouncing) over the collision time (T) or dv/dt.
dv is constant at -4.43M/s
time is unknown, but assumed to be approaching 0 (harder floor=less collision time).
This causes A to approach infinity.
Since our mass is constant at 1kg (neglecting all the peices flying off), this becomes 1*(infinity) for the force.
Now, the force is obviously not going to be infinite (in this post we WILL follow the laws of thermodynamics!). Assuming the impact takes 1/10 sec (dt=.1), force becomes 44.3N, that would be on a relatively soft floor, and is 10x what you said. Thus the harder the floor, the more damage it takes, as the impact time drops towards 0.
But none of it really matters. What does matter is how the laptop is constructed. It should be constructed to support its own weight, and be able to take minor bumps/drops/etc. Larger laptops have the luxury of more space for cushion and support, basically allowing the laptop to absorb the impact without snapping by spreading the impact time out a bit (dt gets bigger). They pay for that in weight. Smaller laptops have to rely on stong materials without much give. The smaller clearances and parts means stuff cant move around inside without bumping into something else, breaking, or shorting out, and theres not much room for support/cushioning (decreases dt).
tm
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Just reread that a couple times. It speaks for itself.
--Bruce Fields
I think this was the cause of my recent hard drive failure -- I left my T41 laptop powered-up in the case and I think I accidently hit the case on something. Bye bye hard drive. This never happened in 6 years with my various ultralights.
The bigger it is, the harder it falls!
quite the machine. i had bit small for my finger but i like it. and yes, linux runs on it (though not the wireless). any questions... just ask
Except for i-series (I've heard bad things about them).
...and my current machine is a ThinkPad T22.
Over the years I've gone through:
ThinkPad 700
ThinkPad 760cd
ThinkPad 760xd
ThinkPad 770z
All of them ran/run Linux, all of them were desktop replacements, all of them had hundreds if not thousands hours logged logged before they were "retired" and all of them still run (they have been handed down through my family as I have upgraded).
For one brief moment I bought a non-IBM laptop (a Fujitsu), but frankly you can tell just by holding a ThinkPad in one hand and another make in the other that the IBM build quality is far better than the competition and less likely to result in cracked casings, floppy screens, overheating problems, creaky "flexi"ness, and so on... I moved back to ThinkPad within a couple of months and haven't looked back.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
except for the T20 which sucks for some reason.
This is what we call the Sony Timer (TM) in Japan. Engineers at Sony are so skilled that they can design their products to break right after the warranty expires so that people will buy their products again. Everybody in this country knows about this. I am very glad as a Japanese to see that Sony is using its famous technology to give themselves a competitive edge in the international market.
I gave up mod points for this, but jangell stole this from here, just 14 minutes after in_ur_face posted it (12:55PM vs 1:09PM).
I disagree. My iBook has been fantastic except for needing a logic board replacement and a new power brick (both replaced under warranty at no cost). True, they definitely seem to have some issue with the logic board, but otherwise it's a great little machine. Just get the AppleCare warranty on it and expect to send it in 2 or 3 times over it's lifetime before you junk it in 3 years. Well, I guess now that I write that it doesn't sound so great, but they are nice little machines anyway. Much nicer than my Dell Inspiron 4000... even though I guess I've never had any problems with that. Hmm.
Think you just got a bum machine. I've been using a T21 for close to 3 years now and it is the most solid machine I have ever used. The only machine that I restart less is my slack server.
I will agree that the concept and basic execution are great...it's a wonderful idea in the perfect form factor (the 12" is the one I'm talking about...) I'm just dismayed to see Apple falling from its previous pinnacle of quality to a level no better than "the other guys." There was a time when Apple meant buying the absolute best; but it seems that is no longer the case. I have been told many times by Apple salesmen to "buy Applecare!" but it is no substitute for cheap construction.
I've had a rev A. tibook since the day they went on sale, and this sucker just keeps on ticking.
... this thing is a tank.
It has been around the world with me twice, including some rough jaunts into the Aussie desert, and I've replaced the case myself 3 times (ever done that on any other laptop? thank you pbparts.com!) and it just keeps working.
tiBooks are one well-made computer. They have their con's (keys scratching the screen, duh) but their pro's are definitely more substantial, in my opinion
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Wow....what DID we do as a society before laptops? How did we survive? Thousands of people wandering the earth searching for the perfect gizmo to fly AND work. None available? How primitive. I'm surprised that we, as a society, made it into the 21st century without people being able to take their gizmos with them everywhere they go. Sheesh.
[SIG] Remember Mattel handheld games?
If I wanted a laptop (And I do, simply because I go lots of places and want to have a laptop with me for simple things like internet and word processing), I'd want the smallest, most comfortable, stylish, and lightest one available. I have a PC at home to play games on. The laptop, for me, would be for things I need to do while mobile: write (I'm an aspiring author), read slashdot, etc. Maybe plug my tablet in and sketch some.
I don't want to carry around a seven pound monster, if that's all I'm going to be doing. It's the same situation if all I was using a computer at home for, was word processing and the like: I wouldn't put a 3ghz processor in, nor would I put a 300 dollar video card; I'd put it together cheap and from high quality - and older - parts. Tricking out a simple word processing and internet machine is akin to ricing a minivan. You could do it, if you really wanted.. but what's the point?
What I was trying to point out was.. if you build a custom motherboard then have to configure it.. you pretty much shoot yourself in the foot, why not have that configuration built in during the customisation of the board??
moo
Stick to the Panasonic W2 then. Panasonic Toughbooks are known for their ruggedability.
I get what you're saying, I used to say the same thing... but the big thing for me is travel. IE, walking around the city all day. Walking around airports all day. Walking around campus all day. Walking around a conference all day... ...all of a sudden that extra weight really starts adding up on your shoulder. Big time. And smaller starts to look really enticing. First you start throwing anything you can out of your bag... magazines instead of books. You try to find small/light peripherals... and then you pick up a subnotebook and go "wow, this is a lot lighter than my current x" and boom, suddenly you're in the market.
You got the definition of configure wrong. When you design something, come up with the positions of all the components. In doing so you are designing the configuration of the device.
Just look at the first definition of the word configuration for a perfect match for this discussion.
I saw a demonstration by one of Panasonic's sales reps in October of 2002 (Pittsburgh ITEC event). The man dropped their then largest and most expensive Toughbook from a 6 foot height, climbed down the ladder, picked it back up, and it was still in perfect working order. I wish they weren't so featureless and expensive, though.
Where are mod points when ya need em!!!! some one mod parent up...
bah!*@%!