Laptop

[Harut]

i'm thinking about buying a laptop.

any particular suggestions? brand names? systems?

 

i know nothing about them.

[vava]

Barev Harut,

 

How 'bout a PowerBook?

 

This one is pretty nifty. It's even got a 17" screen!

[Sip]

Go with Dell. I have had several laptops in the past few years ... I used to love Sonys but all I can tell you right now, is stay away from the new ones. They seem to use substandard parts... we have had several different ones at UCLA whose hard disks have died ... one had the LCD display go out.

 

Right now, I have a DELL Lattitude (big one!) with a 14" screen and CD recorder DVD player etc and I just love it. Good thing was, I got it for "free" from intel (part of a fellowship) but this thing kicks arse. Battery lasts more than 6 hours!!! Maybe even 8 hours if I am careful!!!!

 

Anyway, dell is good right now. You can't really go wrong with them ... I know quite a few people that have different ones at UCLA. It is going to depend entirely on how much you can spend and what features you are looking for.

 

Also, you can't really beat their warrantee either ... I've never had to use it but I have heard very good things about them.

[Sip]

Big difference between my Dell (1.2 Ghz) and Sony R505TSK 850Mhz is the NOISE level. When the fan kicks in on the Sony (pretty much all the time) it is sooooo fricking loud. I can't take it to class or a meeting because of all the noise. The dell, you can't even tell there is a fan there ... but actually I think it has 2!!!

 

Things you should look for:

 

1) Built-in modem

2) Built-in ethernet network

3) VGA-out port (for doing presentations)

4) TV-out is nice but not necessary (mine has it)

5) Battery life... it will make a big difference ... buy them with extra-capacity batteries as opposed to just standard.

6) CD Recorder/DVD player is not that big a deal on a laptop. I have never used the DVD player and I usually burn CDs on my home machine. Assuming the laptop is not going to be your main PC.

7) 256MB RAM should be enough. 512 is good.

8) CPU speed doesn't matter. Save your money on this if you can get more RAM or bigger disk/battery.

9) Anything over 20Gigs is good enough for a laptop. Of course bigger is better

10) It's nice to have both a touch-pad and the small joystick type mouse.

11) USB connections are VERY good to have.

12) Firewire may come in handy. Sony's have them (they call it iLink). Dell's usually dont.

13) If you can get one with built-in wireless ethernet, that's a BIG plus!!!! It's nice to have wireless connectivity ... I just use an add-on card with mine.

14) Don't waste money for a docking station.

 

I'll post more if I think of anything else.

[vava]

We bought 2 Dell P4 laptops at the office a few months ago. They are very fine indeed: mega machines with loads of RAM, CD Burner, HUGE video card for a mobile PC (and of course the weight to go with all the features). The video card fritzed out on one of them a few days after we received it, and Dell replaced it within 3 days. Not too bad at all.

[hyebruin]

Wow, Seaphan! I feel so good having read your post! I, too have a DELL, part of the program here but guess what? in the end it's going to cost us about $2,600!! because it counts as tuition each semester!

Here's a question? the fan! is it for cooling down the system? and what in the world is ethernet? (at first I thought it was a joke/typo---like ether from chem!?)

[vava]

A few things I wanted to add, 'cause it really depends on what you need it for...

 

Figured I'd add my 2 cents It's important though, that you buy the machine that fits your computing/life needs. These things are improving so fast, that getting all the latest and greatest, can sometimes make you feel that you got ripped off when you see your machine selling for half the price you bought it for....

 

edit - took out the bold, sorry....

 

[ March 27, 2003, 08:27 PM: Message edited by: vava ]

[Sip]

Hehehe ... I thought I was the only one who referred to his laptop as his girlfriend

 

Did someone say tax deduction (or credit)?

 

Yup. The fan is for cooling. You will notice it will turn on when you use the system a lot and should go off if the system is left "idle". You can save battery power by slowing down most laptops ... not only will it use less power since it's slower, it will also use less power since it won't need the fans to cool itself off (chips gets significantly hotter if they are made to run fast and do a lot of computation).

 

Ethernet: yes, it is basically a very common form of networking ... i.e. connecting a bunch of PCs together with wires. In most buildings (like schools), there will be an ethernet backbone to which you can connect a laptop PC using a network wire (looks like a bigger telephone wire).

 

Now, there are a lot of new technologies for doing wireless networking. So instead of using wires like traditional ethernet, they use a small radio antenna and transmit like that. A lot of schools and offices are now equipped with this type of wireless networking so it's good to have it on a laptop.

 

For example at UCLA, now you can take your laptop and pretty much go anywhere in Boelter hall and you'll be connected to the network. They are also working on making this available in the entire campus! So you can sit in Kerchoff for example and surf the web on your laptop with no wires

[Azat]

What's the difference between a blonde and Windows XP?

 

The blonde operates on more laptops!

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Harut jan, I have a 1 year old Dell and a 3 year old HP and I love them both. I also have used a Toshiba and a Sony and I had no problem with any of them. However one can never go wrong with a Dell. They are great. The new 5100 series is cheap and powerful.

[Azat]

All this for sub $1200.

 

http://configure.us.dell.com/dellstore/con...6V937&oc=5100RL

[Harut]

thank you all.

you guys are so helpful, why don't you buy one for my birthday. it's in a couple of weeks. (j/k)

========

 

i was thinking about dell. but it's always nice to hear it from pros.

the thing is that it might become my primary pc, since my home machine is antique already, 3 years.

i don't think i'm going to use it very intansely, at least for now.

but i'll have a few huge things constantly running on it (oracle, VS, hyeforum, ...).

as far as specifications go, Sip's suggestions are what i was thinking. just no wireless stuff. we don't have that stuff in school. i don't have high speed access either.

 

but the thing is that i don't like to buys stuff over the net or phone.

i like to hold it in my hands before i get it.

is it possible with dell?

[hyebruin]

Thanks, Azat! that's a good one...even a noncomputer person like me can appreciate!

that other comment was funny...sounded like your kids' names! little 'Dell' and big bro 'HP'! what's the name of the misses? Is it "Della"? wow! this is good stuff! (ignore me! just typing outloud!)--there I go again!--

[THOTH]

Dell is certainly nice (just recieved and set up a Del desktop for the kids last night! - blows my 4 yr old Micron away...though not by as much as one would think...)- I think the Toshibas might be worth looking into as well for laptops...and again the most important thing is to consider your needs - what will you use it for. As I do a lot of video work and have been frustrated by the clugeyness of PC based applications (some of them have never worked righ/lots of crashes/interupt issues etc) I am very seriosly considering a moblie MAc G4 Powerbook. An awsome machine - that will also to near full PC emulation (except for 3D graphics/games). Its pricy - but may be worth it depending on your needs...

[MosJan]

Harout jan costco/n shutov Dell a unenalu - so tsankatsats jamanak karror es tesnel iyn shutov.

 

isk partadira nor linel@ / yete voch spasi bavakanin hajax unenum em bavakanin tarm unitner

[lady of grace]

hi experts, specially Azat.. I'm planning to buy a comp and don't know where to start and how to choose.. I want to do work from home and have to have a medical billing software and accounting. So, I'm sure it needs to have certain capacity. I wouldn't want a laptop, I think it will be harder to work with it. I always have a hard time using my fingers for mouse. Please advise?

[Azat]

Wow. I am honored that you especially needed my advice, but in really I am far from a hardware expert. Sip is the man you need.

 

I can however give you some advice.

 

I would stick to Dell or Sony Vaio for a desktop PC.

 

I personally have a Sony right now. They come standard with fireware and USB 2 ports. Had a large hard drive(60 in my case but 80-120 on the new PC) and lots of memory(384 in my case but all the new desktops come with 512). They also come standard with 32meg video card.

 

the Dell systems are outstanding as well and are a bit cheaper and have a much better warranty.

 

They both come standard with nic cards and modems and all that other junk.

 

Maybe Sip can give you better advice.

[THOTH]

You wouldnt believe the system I got from Dell just the other day for around $1K. Just awesome...

 

Pentium® 4 Processor at 2.53GHz w/533MHz front side bus/ 512K L2 Cache Qty: 1 Unit Price: 1,208.00 (+$150 rebate!)

 

Floppy Drive and Additional Storage Devices 64MB Dell USB Memory Key and Floppy Drive

 

Mouse Dell® 2-button scroll mouse

 

CD or DVD Burner for 2nd bay - New 48x/24x/48x Max CD-RW Drive

 

Sound Card Integrated Audio

 

Limited Warranty, Services and Support Options 1Yr Ltd Warr plus 1Yr At-Home Service + 90Days Dell SecurityCenter (McAfee)

 

Software Bundles WordPerfect® Productivity Pack with Quicken New User Edition

 

Operating System Microsoft® Windows® XP Professional

 

Memory 256MB DDR SDRAM at 333MHz

 

Monitors 17in (16.0 viewable,.25dp)M782 Monitor

 

Keyboard Dell® Enhanced Multimedia Keyboard

 

Digital Music Dell Jukebox powered by MUSICMATCH

 

Speakers Harman Kardon HK-395 Speakers with Subwoofer

 

Multi-Function Lexmark X75 Multi-Function Printer (Print, Scan, Copy, Fax)

 

Hard Drive - 60GB Ultra ATA/100 7200RPM Hard Drive

 

Network Interface Integrated Intel® PRO 10/100 Ethernet

 

16x Max DVD-ROM Drive

 

Digital Photography Dell Picture Studio, Image Expert Standard

 

Modem 56K PCI Telephony Modem

 

Mail-In Rebate Offer Save $150 with mail-in rebate. Price shown before rebate.

 

Video Cards 64MB DDR NVIDIA­ GeForce4 MX™ Graphics Card with TV-Out

 

Internet Access Service 6 Months of America Online Membership Included

 

[ March 28, 2003, 03:28 PM: Message edited by: THOTH ]

[Guest Fadi]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Azat:

Wow. I am honored that you especially needed my advice, but in really I am far from a hardware expert. Sip is the man you need.

 

I can however give you some advice.

 

I would stick to Dell or Sony Vaio for a desktop PC.

 

I personally have a Sony right now. They come standard with fireware and USB 2 ports. Had a large hard drive(60 in my case but 80-120 on the new PC) and lots of memory(384 in my case but all the new desktops come with 512). They also come standard with 32meg video card.

 

the Dell systems are outstanding as well and are a bit cheaper and have a much better warranty.

 

They both come standard with nic cards and modems and all that other junk.

 

Maybe Sip can give you better advice.

---

Why anyone would buy a desktop with a compagny trademark and be limited with what they offer as a compleat product, and pay 20 % more because it has "Dell etc..." printed on it ?

 

[ March 28, 2003, 03:31 PM: Message edited by: Domino ]

[THOTH]

Domino - not everyone has the time, inclination or knowledge to assemble a machine themselves. And I got to hand it to Dell - they have been doing this a while and it shows. Of course there are other manufacturers that are makin gsome good products as well and one should attempt to check them all out to see what meets their needs (I did). Emachines makes a pretty nice real cheepo machine BTW that may do what you want just fine. And of course one can always replace ort add components and such as needed and for some it really doesent matter to have some specialty components when the generic set 9made by whomever) will do...

[Sip]

That use d to be true but I don't think it's true anymore. The profit margins on PCs are very very very very small. This means if you are not buying their high-end stuff, you are getting an extremely good deal.

 

Lady-o-Grace: Dell, Gateway, HP (same as Compaq) are ALL good. You basically get what you pay for with these companies. You should ofcourse shop around and compare prices at different stores but you will notice that most prices are fairly standard on PCs. You should look around for rebates because that is the only way to get a "better" deal.

 

For the type of stuff that you are going to be doing, basically ANY PC would do. I would recommend getting one which comes with a cd-recorder since that's always nice to have.

 

Stay away from the really really cheap stuff. Stay away from eMachines (company).

 

I recently bought THIS for my parents for $589 with $50 rebate. It's an excellent machine and is probably exactly what you want. Note that you will need to buy a monitor and speakers separately for this but that is an excellent price.

 

Dell has comparable PCs but if you want something against which to compare features, that is a good start. If you have any questions about what exactly all those things mean, feel free to ask

[Guest Fadi]

quote:

---

Originally posted by THOTH:

Domino - not everyone has the time, inclination or knowledge to assemble a machine themselves. And I got to hand it to Dell - they have been doing this a while and it shows. Of course there are other manufacturers that are makin gsome good products as well and one should attempt to check them all out to see what meets their needs (I did). Emachines makes a pretty nice real cheepo machine BTW that may do what you want just fine. And of course one can always replace ort add components and such as needed and for some it really doesent matter to have some specialty components when the generic set 9made by whomever) will do...

---

Thoth, you don't have to build it yourself, the place where you purchase it usually does it for you. I hate to pay for a computer when I can't chose each one of the pieces in.

 

Seaphan, what if you don't want one or two pieces in that comp. what do you do ?

[Sip]

Well, I personally have always put together my own stuff ... but it's definitely not something I recommend to anyone. The other thing is, when you buy a PC you end up paying for software licenses too since they come "prepackaged" with some OS. It doesn't matter that you want to put linux on it or that you get the OS for free from school. You still have to pay for it.

 

But it's not like they add 20% to the cost of the PC for their profits ... they really don't have much profit especially on the low-end and sub-$1000 machines.

 

One thing I don't like about buying "retail" is that sometimes they have integradted audio/video etc on the motherboard. I always like to have separate components to upgrade myself but again, to someone who is only going to post on hyeforum, check email, and do taxes once a year, I don't think that makes a difference

[Sip]

And how exactly do you do the choosing? Do you ever ask what the cache architecture is on the processor? Do you look at TLB buffer sizes? Do you ask whether there is pre-fetching circuitry or if there is any pre-decode instruction cache to speed things up? Would you choose a 2-way set associative 2-bank 64K L1 cache or a fully associative 1-bank 32K L1 setup if both have similar L2 caches? Do you look at the specifics of the north or southbridge chipset used on the motherboard? How about the DRAM ... do you check anything other than the latency? Do you at least count the number of "modules" on the board as some people do? How about ECC or parity? Would you go with DDR SDRAM, ESDRAM, RDRAM, SLDRAM? What exactly is the difference anyway?

 

Basically, what I am trying to get at, is the way some of these questions sounded to you, is probably how "video card", "sound card", "IDE", "SCSI" sound to a person who wants to buy a "computer"

 

[ March 28, 2003, 05:04 PM: Message edited by: Sip ]

[Guest Fadi]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Sip:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Domino:

Thoth, you don't have to build it yourself, the place where you purchase it usually does it for you. I hate to pay for a computer when I can't chose each one of the pieces in.

---

And how exactly do you do the choosing? Do you ever ask what the cache architecture is on the processor? Do you look at TLB buffer sizes? Do you ask whether there is pre-fetching circuitry or if there is any pre-decode instruction cache to speed things up? Would you choose a 2-way set associative 2-bank 64K L1 cache or a fully associative 1-bank 32K L1 setup if both have similar L2 caches? Do you look at the specifics of the north or southbridge chipset used on the motherboard? How about the DRAM ... do you check anything other than the latency? Do you at least count the number of "modules" on the board as some people do? How about ECC or parity? Would you go with DDR SDRAM, ESDRAM, RDRAM, SLDRAM? What exactly is the difference anyway?

 

Basically, what I am trying to get at, is the way some of these questions sounded to you, is probably how "video card", "sound card", "IDE", "SCSI" sound to a person who wants to buy a "computer"

---

LOL seaphan... Do you have the choice for the TLB ? I can't build my own CPU, can I, or have a choice on the cache architecture ? I can just take the pack called Athlon XP or Pentium IV. Ah BTW, whats a pre-fetching circuitry ?

 

Ah and I do take into account the north or southbridge chipset used on the motherboard. :-) As for the modules, are you talking about memory modules ? If yes, then yes... but do I have the choice again ? It takes few weeks before watching for every pieces and make my choice, the problem being that after I make my choice a newer version of the pieces come out, and I passes more weeks deciding if it worth that I buy that new version, that goes on and on... and it end up that it will take mounths if not more then a year before I do the chance. So with computer what I do best, is just getting updated days per days basis, in order that when I decide to change something I would know which one to chose right away.

 

And lastly, I go with DDR, I do not have much choice with an Athlon Platform.

[Harut]

Mos, knakh@ntrei nor@, bayts vor etents ban lini anpayman dzen hani.