laptop advise

[cobob]

Circuit City sales people are trying to tell me that the Toshiba Portege is much better than the Toshiba Satellite (as a for instance). They tell me Toshiba wont release the Portege to Curcuit City to retail and that they could sell tons of them if they were availabe. Now I notice that the Satellites seem to be considerably cheaper yet have more stuff???

I feel foolish getting locked up over this but I've noticed this phenom for years & I don't get it...what difference does it make? Assuming routine daily use, Is there any compelling reason not to buy the cheapest

[scorrpio]

With laptops, specs are secondary. You pay premium for less weight, and more battery life. L

About same spec Satellite vs Portege: (looked at the 750MHz Centrino model)
Satellite: 6.5lbs, 2 hour battery life, $1300.
Portege: 2.4 lbs, 6.5 hour battery life, $2200.

There's your difference.

[woodyork]

I have the Satellite with 60 gig hard drive and 512 meg Ram. I've had it for about 2 months and am very satisfied with it. The battery life is short but for my use that is not a probem. To get 2 hrs you have to clamp way down on screen brighness and speed. I bought it on sale at Best Buy. Stood in line to buy it and resisted all their efforts to get me to buy insurance and other options. $500- just to good to turn down. Time will tell if it was really a bargain or not.

It depends on how you with the computer. Mine is just used as a second computer hooked up with a wireless router so I can take it around the house and on the occasional trip where it would mostly be used in a motel room. If you had to carry it a lot or needed it to work for a 4 hr plane flight you'll wnt something else.

Good Luck
Woody

[LCHIEN]

there are two kinds of laptops (and stuff in bewteen).
Those meant for use on a desktop as a spac-saving (& ocassional travel) replacement for a multi-piece desktop system and those meant to travel.
As scorrpio mentioned, the lightweight, battery miser systems cost a lot for those attributes, the desk replacements are cheaper.
That's the differences in the satellite and portege.

[crokett]

Or you could just avoid the question all together and get a Thinkpad. Its what I have and having used (and been paid to fix) many other models I won't use anything else. I wish mine had the fingerprint reader though - Easier than entering a password and I won't forget my finger.

[JimD]

I also use a thinkpad at work and on trips. My kids have thinkpads that we bought through Clemson. They all work fine. Mine is a X40 - about 4 lbs but no drives. I use it without an extra monitor or keyboard for all my work computing. The display is not huge but it does not bother me and I am used to the keyboard. I use flash drives when traveling and a docking station with a drive when in the office - but I hardly use anything but the hard-drive and network drives.

You can use a decent portable as your only computer. It is not as handy to add things to but with drives now available in USB configuration, it seems possible to go totally portable. We have a desktop at home and I liked it's easy expandability when I installed a DVD burner a few months ago but I hardly use it. I normally sit in my recliner with a laptop on my lap and communicate throught the wireless router.

Jim

[Russianwolf]

I wish mine had the fingerprint reader though - Easier than entering a password and I won't forget my finger.

You better find some wood to knock on before going back in the shop........

[gsmittle]

Or....

Or you could just avoid the question all together and get a Thinkpad. Its what I have and having used (and been paid to fix) many other models I won't use anything else. I wish mine had the fingerprint reader though - Easier than entering a password and I won't forget my finger.

One of the new MacBook Pros, which come with a vastly superior operating system.

g.

[crokett]

One of the new MacBook Pros, which come with a vastly superior operating system.
g.

As somebody I know said once: "Why would you want to get a Mac? You raising your kid to be a teacher or somethin'?" Thbbpppt! Back at ya.

[parnelli]

Anybody ever dealt with retrobox.com? They've got some fairly nice stuff on there like a Thinkpad T43 for just 350 something. No operating system, and a few didn't have power cords, but it seemed like a decent deal.

[thestinker]

I got an HP a couple of years ago...aminly as a desk top replacment. We do travel a little, but mainly in the RV, so batery life is not a real issue. Whats awesome about this one is 17" monitor eaquals awesome movies when we travel and full size keyboard for use. Also this one has a button to turn off the mouse in the middle of the keyboard, so if you are typing, you don't move the cursor around by accident. This was our 1st laptop...and marked the end of all future desktop systems.

[cgallery]

Circuit City sales people are trying to tell me that the Toshiba Portege is much better than the Toshiba Satellite (as a for instance). They tell me Toshiba wont release the Portege to Curcuit City to retail and that they could sell tons of them if they were availabe. Now I notice that the Satellites seem to be considerably cheaper yet have more stuff???

I feel foolish getting locked up over this but I've noticed this phenom for years & I don't get it...what difference does it make? Assuming routine daily use, Is there any compelling reason not to buy the cheapest

:-)

I wouldn't consider a Circuit City employee a reliable source of information about notebook computers any more than I'd consider a BORG employee a good source of information about table saws. I own nine notebook computers and my work partly involves repairing notebook computers and doing data recovery on notebook hard drives. I've been under the skin on lots of machines. And let me tell you this: Once you strip the plastics, they're all look alike. The difference in reliability between a Dell Inspiron (lower-end) and Dell Latitude ("commercial") isn't there. ****, they often use the exact same motherboard.

My advice is to pick a major-label machine that fits your needs at a price you can afford. Run a good stress test on it overnight to make sure it doesn't tend to overheat and crash. When it is really working hard check it for hot spots and if there are any spots you find to be too warm for comfort, return it and switch to another model.

Never "jolt" a notebook that is on. Avoid jolting notebooks that are off, too. Don't touch the screens with your fingers or anything else (leads to pressure marks). Use a can of compressed air to keep your fans and heat-sinks dust-free (and don't be a wild man w/ the compressed air and hyper-spin the fans, either).

Be careful with extended warranties. The ones sold by the stores can be a PITA to get honored. When you take the machine in they turn it on and if they see anything on the screen they tell you your problem is software and that it isn't covered. I'm not saying to not buy the warranty, but make sure it includes accidental damage.

My former favorite was IBM. But I was a T-series fan and they kept getting larger, so I'm now primarily using a Fujitsu S6240.

Good luck!
Phil

[JoeyGee]

I agree on ThinkPads

IBM ThinkPads were the best LT's made, hands down. I don't know if they are any different with Lemello (SP?) but I would definitely check them out.

I also agree about getting advice from a Circuit City (or Best Buy or Staples...) I loved the TS analogy. If those guys knew what they were talking about they would be working real jobs making better money. I have often overheard them giving bad advice, or just plain wrong advice--but they act sooo cool doing it.

Go online, look up reviews. Check out the Dell Outlet online (www.dell4me.com and click on Dell Outlet). I often spec a new machine and then search the outlet for something similar to compare price. Compare that model to what you find in stores and online.

The bottom line is, be honest with yourself on what you will do with it and don't overbuy--that goes for laptops and desktops. All I use my home PC for is Internet, MS Office and e-mail. I bought a bottom of the line Dell DT from the outlet for $250 and it works great.

[zootroy]

As with any tool, the question is, what are you going to use it for?

If the answer is checking email and online shopping, then you can get a laptop that suites your needs for ~$600.00. I've recently found a few for friends and they have been very happy.

IMO this is all you need for basic daily use.

1.4 ghz cpu min.
40 - 80 gig hard drive (saving a lot of mp3s or images, go larger)
512k ram

DO NOT get a machine with an expensive video card unless you specifically need it for gaming or other 3D intensive app.

A wireless card is nice to have.
Most come with CD burner DVD player combos.

I have seen way too many people buy machines with >= 3ghz cpus when their main purpose is to shop on ebay via dial-up????????

I have a laptop with similar specs that I got over christmas from Best Buy for $400.00 after mail in rebate (Compaq Presario). I run photoshop, autocad, etc. No problems.

Whatever you do, don't waste your money on an extended warrenty. Usually they run $300.00 for a $1,000.00 machine. Almost %30 of the price of a laptop for insurance. If they are going to go down, it will probably be within the first year.

I know a lot of people love their macs, but IMO they are way too expensive for pedestrian use.

Hope this helps.

[kmk]

It shouldnt be confusing. There are only two choices in laptops. (1) ThinkPads (any series) (2) MacBook

Close your eyes and pick one with wireless and bluetooth. Deal with the credit card company later.

I'd pick MacBook