Laptop advice, help...I suck... Options

[Guest_CANNONBALL_*]

I thought I would ping you guys for your personal or professional opinions on laptops. I figured the people on this forum are a bit more hip to this stuff than the mil or contractor boards.

I need one...asap. I don't need one of those indestructible powebooks or whatever they are called. I don't plan on throwing in a big pile of sand and shit.

needs to have good battery life, powerful enough to play some movies/games/wifi/etc.

although they may all have that capability now.

the last time I purchased one was in 97...so I am totally out of the loop. I'm sure I could just go to bestbuy and get one, but when throwing down more than a grand the last thing i want is buyer's remorse...you know?

I am not against getting a mac either. I have no platform loyalty...I just want to be sure that it's compatible with the formats used for gaming...because all work and no play makes jon a sad boy.

help please.

[Seeker]

how much are you looking to spend on it?

[Guest_CANNONBALL_*]

ideally around 1500

though I would go up to 2500, no higher (I need to save some $$ so I can go surfing soon and not have to camp and get assraped by filthy mexicans).

plus it's not like I'm fuckin splitting atoms wiht the notebook...mainly movies, games, interweb, photos, etc...I just dont want it to bog down or crash. I've gotten too used to my desktop to put up with slow shit.

[impala454]

depends on what kinda games you want to play, but i'd say $1500 gets you a pretty damn nice notebook nowadays. if you want to play the latest 3d games you'd prob have to spend more, but you have a pretty nice price range there.

i don't know much about the notebook market right now, but my biggest advice for people buying notebooks has always been get as big of a screen as you can afford.

[Guest_CANNONBALL_*]

depends on what kinda games you want to play, but i'd say $1500 gets you a pretty damn nice notebook nowadays. if you want to play the latest 3d games you'd prob have to spend more, but you have a pretty nice price range there.

i don't know much about the notebook market right now, but my biggest advice for people buying notebooks has always been get as big of a screen as you can afford.

thanks for the input. I figured that most notebooks today would be a bit better than the POS I have from 97.

at this point that thing is nothing more than a library of my written works and coursework.

and plays a mean game of solitaire...

[Seeker]

yeah 1500 will get you a damn good laptop nowadays

dell has some pretty good deals/offers going on this week: http://www.dell.com/content/topics/segtopi...en&s=dhs&~tab=2

only bad thing about dell is that you can't get an amd chip, which is cheaper and faster than intels

[Seeker]

fujitsu laptops: http://store.shopfujitsu.com/fpc/Ecommerce...do?series=S2110
toshiba laptops: http://www.toshibadirect.com/td/b2c/clin.t...mputers&seg=HHO
acer laptops: http://global.acer.com/products/notebook/index.htm

all 3 of those carry laptops with amd chips i believe

just showing you that you have more options besides dell/hp

[Guest_CANNONBALL_*]

awesome thanks!

[jonathan83]

get alienware


haha just kidding.


yeah, I got my laptop a year and a half ago from Dell and it was only like $699. i still use it and it fits most my needs (just can't play super big games on it).

[zetec]

i actually found a nice HP at frys the other day... (yeah it surprised me too).

After having a bunch of dells and toshibas pass through my hands, i'd have to say go with toshiba over dell. aside from that, get what you want, and buy the best screen resolution possible. the LCD is the one thing you can't upgrade no matter what. (yes, some laptops have upgradeable mobos/cpus now, but whatev.) It's also the most expensive part of the laptop. so yeah. that.

[Divergent Realit...]

get alienware


haha just kidding.


yeah, I got my laptop a year and a half ago from Dell and it was only like $699. i still use it and it fits most my needs (just can't play super big games on it).

my old roomie got an alienware laptop. it has a max battery life of one hour.

the thing is massive.

[Guest_CANNONBALL_*]

I really do appreciate you guy's input...

I was wondering...can you play games on macs? I ask because I see where a game comes out and it's xbox, ps2, pc...but it never says macs.

I'm an idiot.

[pebkac]

I really do appreciate you guy's input...

I was wondering...can you play games on macs? I ask because I see where a game comes out and it's xbox, ps2, pc...but it never says macs.

I'm an idiot.

Yeah, there are plenty of games available on the Mac. The problem is getting your hands on them.

Of course you could buy one of the new intel macs and run windows too.

[zetec]

the only problem with getting a macbook/pro is that they still only come with one button, so if you're bootcamping to XP, you'll have to install a hack or something of the sort (or use an external mouse) to right click.

the hack isn't hard to find, and there's also some people that set up the motion sensor to right click. (they "tap" the computer next to but not actually on the mouse button, and it senses it)

[Testm0nkey]

what

[pysex]

it's easier to just get an external mouse for your laptop if you're going with the macbook/pro


or you can always hold control down and click the button to get the right click features

[dauss]

I like the IBM Thinkpads. I got a T60 for my graduation and its pretty cool. I'm sure it could run games pretty well, but I don't usually play anymore.

[Seeker]

ibm doesn't make thinkpads anymore, they sold their thinkpad business off to the chinese company lenovo

you could get a lenovo thinkpad but they're bugged by the chinese gov (the u.s. gov refused to renew their thinkpad contract with lenovo after ibm sold off the thinkpad business)

[dauss]

aren't the new apple macbooks made in china? ban apple too?

[Seeker]

if they're manufactured by a company run by the communist gov like lenovo

the u.s. gov refused to buy lenovo pcs, i'm just passing the word along

[zetec]

the us government has done a lot of stupid stuff though.

drop in a bucket.

[kcroxyoursox]

actually with the whole right click thing they are starting to make them now on apples. yes its still one button but if you push the button towards the right end of it then its just like right clicking. stupid why they dont just do two since thats one of the biggest complaints people have about apples.

[Spectatrix]

"Right-clicking" is easy with a Mac... you just hold the freakin' button down to bring up the kind of context menus you'd get with a two-button mouse. Or at least that's how it worked on the Macs I've used...

[pysex]

or you get a two button mouse...........................................................................
....

[jonathan83]

ok let's get back to cannonball's laptop and off stupid apple mice.

[Dogmeat]

I've been REALLY happy with my HP Pavillion 4000 series ... I've had it for a little over a year now and it hasn't missed a beat since I've owned it. I use it for everything from homework to media stuff....about the only thing it sucks for is 3D games...

Does well enough with AutoDesk Inventor though ...

[Seeker]

i have a compaq and this thing really takes a beating

i got it 4 years ago and i haven't even reinstalled windows once

[Guest_CANNONBALL_*]

someone brought up macbooks...

I'm considering one of those too. my buddy who's an engineer said his was the shit.

I'm concerned with the wifi thing...as of yet have not messed with it. ok so witha pc platform he told me that you have to configure something each time you go to a different hotspot, whereas with the mac it interacts with it without dicking around with it.

so for the pc wifi people...is it really that much of a hassle?

[Seeker]

its not that big of a hassle anymore on the pc, but the mac wifi is still easier

you're not gonna be able to run any of your pc programs though and mac only has shitty programs

the laptops themselves are actually pretty decent if you can get one with a big enough screen without going bankrupt... do NOT get a 12 inch screen, i would go for 15

[Dogmeat]

the mac is "so easy" it's hard.

it's fucking like computing with duplo blocks or some shit. it's so "easy" you can't fucking make anything out of them, heh

[zetec]

"Right-clicking" is easy with a Mac... you just hold the freakin' button down to bring up the kind of context menus you'd get with a two-button mouse. Or at least that's how it worked on the Macs I've used...

yeah that doesn't work so well when you dual boot to XP... which is what we were talking about.

[Spectatrix]

yeah that doesn't work so well when you dual boot to XP... which is what we were talking about.

No, that's what YOU were talking about. Everyone else was just talking about right-clicking on a Mac in general.

[zetec]

the only problem with getting a macbook/pro is that they still only come with one button, so if you're bootcamping to XP, you'll have to install a hack or something of the sort (or use an external mouse) to right click.

the hack isn't hard to find, and there's also some people that set up the motion sensor to right click. (they "tap" the computer next to but not actually on the mouse button, and it senses it)

uh... yeah... i brought it up... then it carried on from there and everyone else started talking about it, apparently they missed the bootcamp thing too.

and anyways, whoever said the wifi thingie about pc's versus laptops;

what the fuck are you talking about?

the 802.11x specifications are the exact same no matter what platform you're on. if you want it to auto-connect to whatever available AP has the best signal, you click one lil box in settings. the XPSP2 wifi interface works fine, although sometimes it can be a prick, as can pretty much any other wifi management program. (especially that intel proset shit... good card, bad software). same thing with the apple software. it may look prettier or something, but it all does the exact same thing. it's a ratified networking standard. if one worked differently, it wouldn't be able to interoperate. (*cough*cisco/aironet wifi compatibility mode pieces of shit*cough*)

The only management software that i've seen that ALWAYS does what it's supposed to is the bulky ass annoying cisco Aironet software, and that shit's pretty much fucking antique. user friendly it ain't, either.

so yeah. no reason to base your platform purchase on something as trivial as wifi management software. hell, you could run both xp and apple software if you bootcamped. same hardware, same protocol.

[theIncredibleEdi...]

I am wanting a Macbook also.....I have played with them a lot and they've been hella nice. If you get a macbook, let me know how it is.

[Rocky]

The mac is more expensive no matter what bullshit people try to feed you.

now if you WANT their library of default software, then you may really dig it. Just see if thats what you want. I personally don't find their hardware configurations/prices worth consideration.


And the mouse thing, 1 button mouses are long gone. Hell, get a mighty mouse or somethin !

And as far as upgrading the LCD ? Fuck you noobs, you can upgrade the Dell LCD on their notebooks. They claim that if you get the supa pimp LCD it looks equivalent to their LCD monitors.

HP laptops seem to be cheaper than Dell honestly, but they have fewer customizations (on the website at least). It all depends on what kind of machine you are looking to build.

Thinkpads are pimp. I evaluated one recently and I have nothing but good things to say about it. Battery life was impressive, the screen looked fine enough, and the onboard video was rather decent. A bit pricey though as far as I'm concerned.


If you DO decide to go to a pc/windows based notebook, make sure you get the Operating System CD also. Don't fall for that "built in restoration" shit. Don't get me wrong...images are badical, but you really are a fool to NOT get a physical cd (for a whopping 10 bucks usually, mind you !) of your Operating System.


Whatever you do end up getting, here are a few things to consider for your needs :

- CPU : Intel is releasing a new line of their Duo Core Processors (this is a very good thing) that is supposedly going to drop their power consumption a considerable amount. This means your battery will last longer , weee. These notebook CPUs are to be out this August. So wait until at least then.

- RAM: Get 1GB, none of that 512MB bullshit. The price jump over 1GB is too much, 1GB will handle your needs and more


-Hard Drive : most shit comes default with a 60/80GB 5400 RPM hard drive. Its a bit much to upgrade to a 7200RPM (they access data faster), and you probably don't particularly care TOO much about that. Just know that with the prices of Hard Drive these days, you could always plug in a quality External Hard Drive for massive storage, that is portable also !


- Video Card : Web flash games and shit are getting a little more and more demanding. Try to get something with a video card upgrade. Not the onboard default ! This can tack on an extra 100-150 (even more if you go more big time) but if you want this bad boy to last, its a worthy investment.

[GOB]

http://slickdeals.net/#p7757

[zetec]

thinkpads phone home to china and give away your nuclear secrets.

[dwhntx]

Do your part in supporting Communism, buy a thinkpad.