Laptop Recommendations
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I'm looking for a good laptop for college and wanted to know if anyone here has any recommendations. I don't want to (and can't) get a top-of-the-line laptop - but a decent graphics card would be nice (Longhorn-ready is not needed). Right now I'm looking at what Dell has to offer. All their home/home office laptops appear to use Media Center X| and I want XP Pro, so I'm looking at their "small business" laptops. Specifically: Some of the laptops have a higher-resolution display (more than the standard 72 dpi). Does anyone here have one of those, and if so, how is it? I'm worried it would be too small to read. Thanks in advance for any replies. Mike
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I'm looking for a good laptop for college and wanted to know if anyone here has any recommendations. I don't want to (and can't) get a top-of-the-line laptop - but a decent graphics card would be nice (Longhorn-ready is not needed). Right now I'm looking at what Dell has to offer. All their home/home office laptops appear to use Media Center X| and I want XP Pro, so I'm looking at their "small business" laptops. Specifically: Some of the laptops have a higher-resolution display (more than the standard 72 dpi). Does anyone here have one of those, and if so, how is it? I'm worried it would be too small to read. Thanks in advance for any replies. Mike
Media Center is Pro, with the mediacenter application and stupid dancing people on your taskbar. You can just not use it. Ryan
"Michael Moore and Mel Gibson are the same person, except for a few sit-ups. Moore thought his cheesy political blooper reel was going to tell people how to vote. Mel thought that his little gay SM movie about his imaginary friend was going to help him get to heaven." - Penn Jillette
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I'm looking for a good laptop for college and wanted to know if anyone here has any recommendations. I don't want to (and can't) get a top-of-the-line laptop - but a decent graphics card would be nice (Longhorn-ready is not needed). Right now I'm looking at what Dell has to offer. All their home/home office laptops appear to use Media Center X| and I want XP Pro, so I'm looking at their "small business" laptops. Specifically: Some of the laptops have a higher-resolution display (more than the standard 72 dpi). Does anyone here have one of those, and if so, how is it? I'm worried it would be too small to read. Thanks in advance for any replies. Mike
Previouly, most got a 14" display with a 1024 x 768 resolution in the cheap-ish laptops. Don't do that. You spend a lot of money - and you need a decent display, so give the extra money to get the monitor upgrade. Nowadays, widescreen format displays seem to be the only good in this world, so many are sold with something like 15" @ 1280 x 800 (or so). These are marginally better than the 1024 x 768, but impressive at all. Currently I have - and recommend to all who cares to ask or even listen - 14.1" @ 1400 x 1050 (IBM T41P), which I find VERY nice and absolutely not too small. Yes, it is smaller than the same display with 1024 x 768, but very clear and... well, I like it. You can also go for a larger display 15"+ with 1600 x 1200, but that tend to be too small. At least that is my opinion. Plus the computer is larger due to the larger display panel. So, in short: Avoid 1024 x 768 like the plague Try to stay away from anything with a vertical pixelcount less than 1050 Go for a 14.1" @ 1400 x 1050 if possible Anything larger (inch-wise) may be ok, but be carefull that it doesn't get too small. /Jan Do you know why it's important to make fast decisions? Because you give yourself more time to correct your mistakes, when you find out that you made the wrong one. Chris Meech on deciding whether to go to his daughters graduation or a Neil Young concert
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Previouly, most got a 14" display with a 1024 x 768 resolution in the cheap-ish laptops. Don't do that. You spend a lot of money - and you need a decent display, so give the extra money to get the monitor upgrade. Nowadays, widescreen format displays seem to be the only good in this world, so many are sold with something like 15" @ 1280 x 800 (or so). These are marginally better than the 1024 x 768, but impressive at all. Currently I have - and recommend to all who cares to ask or even listen - 14.1" @ 1400 x 1050 (IBM T41P), which I find VERY nice and absolutely not too small. Yes, it is smaller than the same display with 1024 x 768, but very clear and... well, I like it. You can also go for a larger display 15"+ with 1600 x 1200, but that tend to be too small. At least that is my opinion. Plus the computer is larger due to the larger display panel. So, in short: Avoid 1024 x 768 like the plague Try to stay away from anything with a vertical pixelcount less than 1050 Go for a 14.1" @ 1400 x 1050 if possible Anything larger (inch-wise) may be ok, but be carefull that it doesn't get too small. /Jan Do you know why it's important to make fast decisions? Because you give yourself more time to correct your mistakes, when you find out that you made the wrong one. Chris Meech on deciding whether to go to his daughters graduation or a Neil Young concert
Though, techincally now a dell, offers a pretty laptop. Although they have lousy power consumptions they do have great power delivery. Get XP Pro. (Actually I would recommned 2k pro or linux) "Until the day of his death, no man can be sure of his courage" -- Jean Anouilh
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Previouly, most got a 14" display with a 1024 x 768 resolution in the cheap-ish laptops. Don't do that. You spend a lot of money - and you need a decent display, so give the extra money to get the monitor upgrade. Nowadays, widescreen format displays seem to be the only good in this world, so many are sold with something like 15" @ 1280 x 800 (or so). These are marginally better than the 1024 x 768, but impressive at all. Currently I have - and recommend to all who cares to ask or even listen - 14.1" @ 1400 x 1050 (IBM T41P), which I find VERY nice and absolutely not too small. Yes, it is smaller than the same display with 1024 x 768, but very clear and... well, I like it. You can also go for a larger display 15"+ with 1600 x 1200, but that tend to be too small. At least that is my opinion. Plus the computer is larger due to the larger display panel. So, in short: Avoid 1024 x 768 like the plague Try to stay away from anything with a vertical pixelcount less than 1050 Go for a 14.1" @ 1400 x 1050 if possible Anything larger (inch-wise) may be ok, but be carefull that it doesn't get too small. /Jan Do you know why it's important to make fast decisions? Because you give yourself more time to correct your mistakes, when you find out that you made the wrong one. Chris Meech on deciding whether to go to his daughters graduation or a Neil Young concert
Jan R Hansen wrote:
Currently I have - and recommend to all who cares to ask or even listen - 14.1" @ 1400 x 1050 (IBM T41P), which I find VERY nice and absolutely not too small. Yes, it is smaller than the same display with 1024 x 768, but very clear and... well, I like it.
This is subjective, but that's what my work laptop (dell) has and I find it borderline too small. Which is odd, since my home monitor is a 17(16)" CRT at 1600x1200 with about the same DPI and I don't have any problems with it. The onlything I can think of is that the LCD is more sensitive to head positioning than the CRT. If your budget allows, I'd strongly suggest a 19"+ external monitor for when you're at your desk. You don't want a bad laptop display when you're using it in class, but I'd prefer good enough mobile combined with a great display back at my desk to a single intermediate display for both.
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Though, techincally now a dell, offers a pretty laptop. Although they have lousy power consumptions they do have great power delivery. Get XP Pro. (Actually I would recommned 2k pro or linux) "Until the day of his death, no man can be sure of his courage" -- Jean Anouilh
Ennis Ray Lynch, Jr. wrote:
Although they have lousy power consumptions they do have great power delivery.
Alienware actually has two models (three plus if you look at processor differences), the work-horse desktop replacement which uses a desktop chip and massive power consumption, and the lighter and less power-hungry Sentia models. The Sentia are more like your standard notebooks 12" or 14" displays and full Centrino design for more than 3 hours of battery life. _________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
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Media Center is Pro, with the mediacenter application and stupid dancing people on your taskbar. You can just not use it. Ryan
"Michael Moore and Mel Gibson are the same person, except for a few sit-ups. Moore thought his cheesy political blooper reel was going to tell people how to vote. Mel thought that his little gay SM movie about his imaginary friend was going to help him get to heaven." - Penn Jillette
Ryan Roberts wrote:
Media Center is Pro
Are you sure? Last time I looked at it, it didn't have domain connectivity which would imply that it's based on XP Home... http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/mediacenter/evaluation/faq.mspx[^] While you can access network resources on a work network or a domain, you cannot join a Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 PC to the domain. PCs running Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 are designed specifically for home use. Windows XP Professional features, specifically Domain Join and Cached Credentials (Credentials Manager for logons) are not included. As a result, you will be prompted for your logon user name and password to access network resources after you reboot or log back on to the PC. In addition, file shares or network resources that are set to require a domain-joined PC for access will not be available. Remote Desktop and Encrypting File System support are still included.
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I'm looking for a good laptop for college and wanted to know if anyone here has any recommendations. I don't want to (and can't) get a top-of-the-line laptop - but a decent graphics card would be nice (Longhorn-ready is not needed). Right now I'm looking at what Dell has to offer. All their home/home office laptops appear to use Media Center X| and I want XP Pro, so I'm looking at their "small business" laptops. Specifically: Some of the laptops have a higher-resolution display (more than the standard 72 dpi). Does anyone here have one of those, and if so, how is it? I'm worried it would be too small to read. Thanks in advance for any replies. Mike
Mike_V wrote:
I'm looking for a good laptop for college and wanted to know if anyone here has any recommendations.
Buy the most with what you can afford.
"The largest fire starts but with the smallest spark." - David Crow
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I'm looking for a good laptop for college and wanted to know if anyone here has any recommendations. I don't want to (and can't) get a top-of-the-line laptop - but a decent graphics card would be nice (Longhorn-ready is not needed). Right now I'm looking at what Dell has to offer. All their home/home office laptops appear to use Media Center X| and I want XP Pro, so I'm looking at their "small business" laptops. Specifically: Some of the laptops have a higher-resolution display (more than the standard 72 dpi). Does anyone here have one of those, and if so, how is it? I'm worried it would be too small to read. Thanks in advance for any replies. Mike
Mike_V wrote:
I'm looking for a good laptop for college and wanted to know if anyone here has any recommendations.
What is your budget? what is your flexibility on that? you said you can't get a top-of-the-line laptop, which is understandable, few can, and then you get into the heated debate over what is top-of-the-line and what is just a portable space-heater. ;) Start with needs. For college... so report writing only or code-development or other class materials? any graphics related career choices involved? Comp-Sci? EE? Comp-E? Business & Comp-Sci? BS or BA degree plan? Any possible co-op opportunities that would require the laptop to be used for future earnings capability? Start with what you need it to be used for. Then start a list on what you would "like" it to be used for. Don't drop a need for a "want". _________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
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Mike_V wrote:
I'm looking for a good laptop for college and wanted to know if anyone here has any recommendations.
What is your budget? what is your flexibility on that? you said you can't get a top-of-the-line laptop, which is understandable, few can, and then you get into the heated debate over what is top-of-the-line and what is just a portable space-heater. ;) Start with needs. For college... so report writing only or code-development or other class materials? any graphics related career choices involved? Comp-Sci? EE? Comp-E? Business & Comp-Sci? BS or BA degree plan? Any possible co-op opportunities that would require the laptop to be used for future earnings capability? Start with what you need it to be used for. Then start a list on what you would "like" it to be used for. Don't drop a need for a "want". _________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
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I'm looking for a good laptop for college and wanted to know if anyone here has any recommendations. I don't want to (and can't) get a top-of-the-line laptop - but a decent graphics card would be nice (Longhorn-ready is not needed). Right now I'm looking at what Dell has to offer. All their home/home office laptops appear to use Media Center X| and I want XP Pro, so I'm looking at their "small business" laptops. Specifically: Some of the laptops have a higher-resolution display (more than the standard 72 dpi). Does anyone here have one of those, and if so, how is it? I'm worried it would be too small to read. Thanks in advance for any replies. Mike
About 2 months ago I purchased the Toshiba Satellite A105-S1712 for 650US and I'm real happy with it. I'm using it to work with sql2005 and visual studio2005 and have had no problems.
“Profanity is the attempt of a lazy and feeble mind to express itself forcefully”
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Ryan Roberts wrote:
Media Center is Pro
Are you sure? Last time I looked at it, it didn't have domain connectivity which would imply that it's based on XP Home... http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/mediacenter/evaluation/faq.mspx[^] While you can access network resources on a work network or a domain, you cannot join a Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 PC to the domain. PCs running Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 are designed specifically for home use. Windows XP Professional features, specifically Domain Join and Cached Credentials (Credentials Manager for logons) are not included. As a result, you will be prompted for your logon user name and password to access network resources after you reboot or log back on to the PC. In addition, file shares or network resources that are set to require a domain-joined PC for access will not be available. Remote Desktop and Encrypting File System support are still included.
Crap, never used it on a domain. The boot screen lies to me :) Has IIS though. Must be some sort of nasty hybrid. Ryan
"Michael Moore and Mel Gibson are the same person, except for a few sit-ups. Moore thought his cheesy political blooper reel was going to tell people how to vote. Mel thought that his little gay SM movie about his imaginary friend was going to help him get to heaven." - Penn Jillette
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One mroe thing on this list, are you planning on using it for all 4 years, or replacing it midway through your degree. This is more of an issue with a laptop since you're much more restricted in what you can upgrade.
dan neely wrote:
One mroe thing on this list, are you planning on using it for all 4 years, or replacing it midway through your degree. This is more of an issue with a laptop since you're much more restricted in what you can upgrade.
Thanks, and I guess both of us should add, is this going to work with an existing desktop computer, or will this be the sole computing device for the whole college experience? hmmm I like that... college experience... ;) _________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
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Previouly, most got a 14" display with a 1024 x 768 resolution in the cheap-ish laptops. Don't do that. You spend a lot of money - and you need a decent display, so give the extra money to get the monitor upgrade. Nowadays, widescreen format displays seem to be the only good in this world, so many are sold with something like 15" @ 1280 x 800 (or so). These are marginally better than the 1024 x 768, but impressive at all. Currently I have - and recommend to all who cares to ask or even listen - 14.1" @ 1400 x 1050 (IBM T41P), which I find VERY nice and absolutely not too small. Yes, it is smaller than the same display with 1024 x 768, but very clear and... well, I like it. You can also go for a larger display 15"+ with 1600 x 1200, but that tend to be too small. At least that is my opinion. Plus the computer is larger due to the larger display panel. So, in short: Avoid 1024 x 768 like the plague Try to stay away from anything with a vertical pixelcount less than 1050 Go for a 14.1" @ 1400 x 1050 if possible Anything larger (inch-wise) may be ok, but be carefull that it doesn't get too small. /Jan Do you know why it's important to make fast decisions? Because you give yourself more time to correct your mistakes, when you find out that you made the wrong one. Chris Meech on deciding whether to go to his daughters graduation or a Neil Young concert
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I'm looking for a good laptop for college and wanted to know if anyone here has any recommendations. I don't want to (and can't) get a top-of-the-line laptop - but a decent graphics card would be nice (Longhorn-ready is not needed). Right now I'm looking at what Dell has to offer. All their home/home office laptops appear to use Media Center X| and I want XP Pro, so I'm looking at their "small business" laptops. Specifically: Some of the laptops have a higher-resolution display (more than the standard 72 dpi). Does anyone here have one of those, and if so, how is it? I'm worried it would be too small to read. Thanks in advance for any replies. Mike
I purchased a Dell Latitude around 6 months ago and am very pleased with it. No problems what so ever. The one recommendation I can make is to check out Dell's refurbished listings on their site. I saved around $400 buying a refurbished model and it came with a better warranty than the "new" models did.
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I'm looking for a good laptop for college and wanted to know if anyone here has any recommendations. I don't want to (and can't) get a top-of-the-line laptop - but a decent graphics card would be nice (Longhorn-ready is not needed). Right now I'm looking at what Dell has to offer. All their home/home office laptops appear to use Media Center X| and I want XP Pro, so I'm looking at their "small business" laptops. Specifically: Some of the laptops have a higher-resolution display (more than the standard 72 dpi). Does anyone here have one of those, and if so, how is it? I'm worried it would be too small to read. Thanks in advance for any replies. Mike
I thought there was an upgrade option to get XP pro on home systems? You can always get an OEM version pretty cheap(< 100). Also - don't overlook the benefits of Media Center if you're going to be using this in a dorm - you can replace an entire Audio System if you just get some speakers. Add a decent monitor (cheaper than a TV) and you've got your entire entertainment system. The only real downside is not joining a domain - but is that necessary? Anyway, this is kind of a tough one, since the home editions seem to have the better options for screens, but are less durable than the others. An inspiron, for instance, seems like a good buy, and it's what I've got at home, but I wouldn't feel too comfortable lugging it around the way I did with my Latitude from a previous job - it was MUCH more solid, and could handle a docking station which might be something else you consider. So...First decide if you want widescreen - if so, make sure you get at least 1024 vertical, or it's not worth it. Then decide how mobile you're going to be. If you're going to sling this around in a backpack, then DO NOT get a home-style Inspiron or an equivalant - get a business class machine for the enhanced ruggedness. Lastly - do you want it to dock? The inspirons use a crappy USB system - stay away from that. But if you get a Latitude it's got a real dock, which ends up being quite nice since you can plug into a nice monitor when you're at your desk. That way, you can have a widescreen when working at home, but a small form factor when on the road. Good Luck, J
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I thought there was an upgrade option to get XP pro on home systems? You can always get an OEM version pretty cheap(< 100). Also - don't overlook the benefits of Media Center if you're going to be using this in a dorm - you can replace an entire Audio System if you just get some speakers. Add a decent monitor (cheaper than a TV) and you've got your entire entertainment system. The only real downside is not joining a domain - but is that necessary? Anyway, this is kind of a tough one, since the home editions seem to have the better options for screens, but are less durable than the others. An inspiron, for instance, seems like a good buy, and it's what I've got at home, but I wouldn't feel too comfortable lugging it around the way I did with my Latitude from a previous job - it was MUCH more solid, and could handle a docking station which might be something else you consider. So...First decide if you want widescreen - if so, make sure you get at least 1024 vertical, or it's not worth it. Then decide how mobile you're going to be. If you're going to sling this around in a backpack, then DO NOT get a home-style Inspiron or an equivalant - get a business class machine for the enhanced ruggedness. Lastly - do you want it to dock? The inspirons use a crappy USB system - stay away from that. But if you get a Latitude it's got a real dock, which ends up being quite nice since you can plug into a nice monitor when you're at your desk. That way, you can have a widescreen when working at home, but a small form factor when on the road. Good Luck, J
JBurkey wrote:
I thought there was an upgrade option to get XP pro on home systems? You can always get an OEM version pretty cheap(< 100). Also - don't overlook the benefits of Media Center if you're going to be using this in a dorm - you can replace an entire Audio System if you just get some speakers. Add a decent monitor (cheaper than a TV) and you've got your entire entertainment system. Lastly - do you want it to dock?
If you're using it as a dorm theater setup, the answer here is yes, unplugging a ratsnest of wiring every time will get old really fast.
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Previouly, most got a 14" display with a 1024 x 768 resolution in the cheap-ish laptops. Don't do that. You spend a lot of money - and you need a decent display, so give the extra money to get the monitor upgrade. Nowadays, widescreen format displays seem to be the only good in this world, so many are sold with something like 15" @ 1280 x 800 (or so). These are marginally better than the 1024 x 768, but impressive at all. Currently I have - and recommend to all who cares to ask or even listen - 14.1" @ 1400 x 1050 (IBM T41P), which I find VERY nice and absolutely not too small. Yes, it is smaller than the same display with 1024 x 768, but very clear and... well, I like it. You can also go for a larger display 15"+ with 1600 x 1200, but that tend to be too small. At least that is my opinion. Plus the computer is larger due to the larger display panel. So, in short: Avoid 1024 x 768 like the plague Try to stay away from anything with a vertical pixelcount less than 1050 Go for a 14.1" @ 1400 x 1050 if possible Anything larger (inch-wise) may be ok, but be carefull that it doesn't get too small. /Jan Do you know why it's important to make fast decisions? Because you give yourself more time to correct your mistakes, when you find out that you made the wrong one. Chris Meech on deciding whether to go to his daughters graduation or a Neil Young concert
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Mike_V wrote:
I'm looking for a good laptop for college and wanted to know if anyone here has any recommendations.
Buy the most with what you can afford.
"The largest fire starts but with the smallest spark." - David Crow
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dan neely wrote:
One mroe thing on this list, are you planning on using it for all 4 years, or replacing it midway through your degree. This is more of an issue with a laptop since you're much more restricted in what you can upgrade.
Thanks, and I guess both of us should add, is this going to work with an existing desktop computer, or will this be the sole computing device for the whole college experience? hmmm I like that... college experience... ;) _________________________ Asu no koto o ieba, tenjo de nezumi ga warau. Talk about things of tomorrow and the mice in the ceiling laugh. (Japanese Proverb)
It would most likely be my main computer. My roommate and I (whoever that may be) might end up having a desktop in our dorm, but with a laptop I don't have to share ;) I was planning on using it for as long as I can. I am a CS/E major, so I will be doing development. And I'd like to be able to do some OS dev on the side (which means being able to run an emulator for easy debugging) and perhaps play SimCity (although that last one is definitely a "want") Thanks, Mike