Some purchasing advice on laptops.

[Flood]

Guys and ghouls,

My lady is wanting to buy a laptop.  She needs it mainly for her school (adult night college type) and maybe a bit for her work.  I have to admit that I am literally clueless about laptops until I do some reading online.  In the meantime can some of you folks in the know make some recommendations please?

Some things to consider:

- Price range I don't have a "budget" but I can't see her buying something that she won't fully utilize but get stuck on price.
- She already has a Dell desktop PC (hey, it was before we were together) so she does get some price cuts or bennies I think if she goes through Dell.
- She wants to hook up her printer and possible future digital camera to it without much hassle.
- She will be using it for her college courses and maybe some overlap projects for work.

Edit: she wants to be able to access the internet wirelessly.


So, any input would be appreciated.  Thanks.


 

[RipSnort]

Typically I build my own computers,  but like you, when it comes to laptops I'm clueless. I went for a Delll XPS model with the 17" screen. The biggest factor iin choosing the Dell was the preferred account with 18 months interest fee financing. I went for the cheapest model in the xps series and upped the ram and hd size. I'm really pleased with it. It took less than a week to arrive.  Visually it's not a bad looking unit in my opinion.
I have my own businees and needed a laptop to bring along to client meetings. My clients are architects and interior designers. I create digital models of their designs for review and presentation prior to the construction document phase. My desktop (aging)  is very similar in specs to the laptop. I had a very detailed residential model . It could be better described as a mansion than a home. There were tons of details- complicated soffit, belt courses, balconies and a massive pool. Also a ton of landscaping involved.
When I tried to build a final quality rendering on my desktop it choked and aborted the operation with" out of memory " messages. Just for the hell of it I threw it on the laptop and gave it a shot . It rendered in less time and completed without errors.
I run both a cadd program and a modeling and animation ssoftware. Both are prcoessor intensive. I also do a lot of real time operations moving 3d geometry around with opengl , multi-pass rendering and radiosity calculations.  In all cases it performed like a champ. I'm using it more now for work than my desktop.  It hought it was pretty cool  to work at home and spend all day in my jammies. With the laptop I don't even have to get out of bed now,,heh.
It's the only laptop I've ever owned  so I don't really know how it compares to similar models.. Out of all my big electronic purchases over the last few years, this one left me feeling most satisfied.

[Samwise]

Dell laptops are cheap, they don't seem to break too often, and they have wireless networking built in.  They probably aren't great gaming machines, but you didn't mention games so that's a non-issue.

The printer and camera stuff is also a non-issue because every computer made within the last 5 years is gonna have a USB port, and almost every camera or printer made within the last 5 years is gonna connect via USB.

[raydeen]

I can reccomend HP/Compaq laptops. I've had two so far and both are still working. The only problems I've had is that the older one (bought in '99) lost it's PCMCIA capability. The newer one (bought in '03) had a memory incompatibility with XP. If it hibernated, the next time it was fully shut down and restarted the registry or LSASS would become corrupt and I couldn't log in. I resolved the problem  by loading 2000 on it and haven't had a problem since. Dells are also good. We have a number of them at the school where I work that are about 2-3 years old and still in good working condidtion. They don't get heavy constant use, but they do get a bit of road work between Dec. and Feb. every year as we use them to test applicants coming into the school for the following year. The only problem I've ever seen with a Dell was one my brother-in-law got 2 or 3 years ago. The bluetooth adapter kept going bad. It keep activating and de-activating when the computer was on. After about 4 replacements, the tech guy just removed it completely as it was never used.

[schild]

Dude, you're getting a Dell.

Seriously. Ignore the rest of the market.

I'd say the same about gaming PCs unless you're building your own as well. I don't love Dell, but their product is top notch. Everything they make however, is ugly as balls.

[Hanzii]

Dells are good and since you're saying she'll get some rebates as an existing customer, there's really no point in looking elsewhere (unless design is really important, then Sony, Apple or Asus is the way to go).
Remember there's the plain old workhorse laptops, the really petite, lightweight (but somewhat underperforming) and expensive models and then there's the desktop replacements like the XPS. She's not getting a desktop replacement!
Since gaming isn't a factor and she's going to carry this with her everyday, you don't want one weighing 4-5+ kilo with a 2-3 hour battery life (and just as expensive as the slimmest model). There's some new models out with no internal cd-drive which instead has an extra battery giving it up to 12 hours battery life. Toshiba oes one, I don't know if Dell does.

She needs it mainly for her school (adult night college type)

Stripper school?

[schild]

Isn't 4-5 kilos like 87 pounds? You silly Europeans and your gargantuan Laptops. Here we have ones that weigh less than a pound. LESS THAN A POUND. That's got to be like 1/100th of 1/10th of a kilo.

[Hanzii]

I was talking desktop replacements vs. those machines, stupid.
You just made my point for me, which was uneccessary, since I made it myself.

The new XPS is 3,9 kilos with battery - she doesn't want that for school.

[schild]

I know exactly what you were saying. You must be tired.

[Flood]

Cool thanks for the input.  I build my home PC's myself, so I don't know which brands have a better reputation etc.  Soooo thanks.


I think shes going to go with a Dell Inspiron 6000, with a few upgrades I suggested.  She is trying to save money if possible.

And although I think she has some of the... prerequisites... to be a good uhh night time worker heh, she actually goes to an accelerated night course type college for adults or returning students (University of Phoenix, University of LaVerne, National University yadda yadda).  She's going to be using it in study groups, write papers on the fly, maybe a few Excel/Powerpoint projects and the odd work project. 


Thanks again.

[Trippy]

Make sure the laptop has a built-in flash memory slot that fits the memory type her camera uses. That'll save the hassle of carrying around and fiddling around with dongles or adapters. If she's going to be carrying this thing around try to get something as light as she can stand relative to screen and keyboard size.

[Furiously]

I've found that even with a decent size discount with Dell, you cannot beat the specials out there....


http://www.edealinfo.com/dell/ Check them out for specials.

[Jain Zar]

I second Hewlett Packard.  Decent price (950 for a 512 meg ram Athlon 64 3200 with 15" widescreen in September), and completely kickass customer support. 
There was an issue with my system.  They picked it up the next day, and 3 working days later it was back and working perfectly.
(Was probably a bad OS imaging to start with, causing power supply issues.  They couldn't replicate it, but they replaced some wiring and redid the OS install
and it was smooth sailing from then on.  Last I knew anyhow, since I became a Mac whore.  Its good to know I can play Dawn of War whenever I want though.)

[schild]

I'd recommend HP if you hate Dell. But HP machines are second rate comparatively.

[MisterNoisy]

NewEgg is selling this for $1200.  S'a fairly nice machine by the specs alone (Pentium M 2.0GHz on 915GM chipset, 1GB RAM, 100GB HDD and DVD burner), good battery life, and 6.2 pounds isn't too much to have to lug around.  Only real drawbacks for the type of work you'd be asking of the machine would be the somewhat low (XGA) resolution and the lack of a productivity software bundle, though you can address the latter here.

That said, you can equip a Dell Inspiron 600m to similar (if lower all-around) specs (1.7 GHz, 1 GB RAM, 80GB HDD, XGA, 5 lbs) for about the same coin, so if you have a line on some sort of kick-ass rebate through them, go for it.

If you're looking for a less expensive machine, this isn't bad for <$1000.

[Flood]

Yea Dell looks like the inevitable choice due to rebates/bonuses from her owning a Dell PC.  And as a matter of fact we even looked at the 600m that was mentioned.

But cool thanks again for zee input gentlemen.


 

[MrHat]

Get something light.  3-4lbs.  makes all the difference.

[Hoax]

And although I think she has some of the... prerequisites... to be a good uhh night time worker heh,

Ok since this IS the internet I'm going to have to say it.

Pics?   

[TheTijuanaBrass]

And although I think she has some of the... prerequisites... to be a good uhh night time worker heh,

Ok since this IS the internet I'm going to have to say it.

Pics?   

[Morfiend]

Very nice. If your not worried about price. I have the 17 inch. Its my work computer.

[schild]

That is way too goddamn expensive for a laptop and it still has that shite PowerPC processor in it.

[Flood]

I don't have any pics of my lady that are transferable to my computer, sorry.  I have some hard copy pictures but we don't own a digital camera (yet).  My point was more that I think my lady is very pretty.  She's definitely above my pay grade, so to speak.


P.S. - vicarious overtures creep me out.   

[Righ]

Very nice. If your not worried about price. I have the 17 inch. Its my work computer.

That's your own expired WebObjects session. Were you hoping we accidentally bought it for you?

[Morfiend]

Very nice. If your not worried about price. I have the 17 inch. Its my work computer.

That's your own expired WebObjects session. Were you hoping we accidentally bought it for you?

Not that I know off. But it wouldnt have hurt. That was the link it gave me for the PowerBooks.