Tuesday's QNI with'The Prestige' on DVD

[tamaranth]

Backed up just in time... No interweb at
Originally uploaded by tamaranth

= dead laptop (luckily I had been warned by its cries of pain, and had backed up contents).
= no interweb at home
= no DVD player
= writing Nanowrimo on reliable old Thinkpad as supplied by reddragdiva for my very first Nanowrimo in 2004.
= new laptop when flat is sold and I am back in the black. Suggestions? (Windoze, sorry.)

Comments

[woolymonkey.livejournal.com]

Fear my PC is going the same way. At least will still have DVD capability.

[the-magician.livejournal.com]

I can only offer meta suggestions, sorry ...

... and these are all based on my personal requirements though I shall try to flag those so you can use them to determine what you're not interested in.

a) I have a desktop machine, so I'm not looking for an all-singing/all-dancing desktop replacement
b) I have wireless internet at home, so built in wireless is *good* (but having wired ethernet in Japan was essential ... but I've never used the built-in dialup modem)
c) I tend to download far too much stuff and hard disks are never big enough, so a DVD *writer* is good
d) Having got a big 15" laptop (4:3 screen) with a resolution of 1024x768, I now really REALLY think that that resolution is pants and want at least 1200-odd across on a new machine
e) Wide screen is nice :-)
f) Multiple USB ports are brilliant. My work laptop currently has three USB ports, in which are the mouse, the external keyboard (if I'm going to be typing for any length of time, I want a better keyboard than 90% of laptops!) and, at the moment, my mobile phone charger/sync cable (though sometimes it's my USB memory stick, or my iPod cable). And many laptops are now coming without "legacy" PS2 mouse/keyboard sockets (though you can get a USB to two socket adapter, and my company gave me one with my laptop)
g) my 15" laptop is too big and too heavy to carry around with me easily, even the slightly smaller work laptop is too big ... so I'd go for something in the 12-14" widescreen for a general purpose portable machine, possibly even smaller if I were travelling with it regularly. Among other things it makes it easier to use on planes and trains where it has to fit between you and the seat in front with enough room for typing comfortably.
h) trackpad/touchpads are "ok" but I prefer a mouse, and I'm currently using a Belkin optical "mini" mouse with retractable cable (it also has colour changing LEDs inside, but I didn't need those, they just happened to be in the mouse I liked for under a tenner)
i) the option of taking out the DVD drive and sticking in a second battery sounds good to me, but I'd want both ...
j) at work, even for people plugging and unplugging their machines at least once a day, they've decided not to issue docking stations as standard, so I've gotten used to not having one
k) but I have a Kensington stand that holds the laptop nearly vertical, so the screen on the laptop is at eye height when I'm sitting at the desk. Yes, it *requires* having an external keyboard, but that's fine by me. And the HP/Compaq laptops we have will drive both the internal screen *and* a second screen (in my case a 17" LCD) to provide a work space that's two screens wide, great for having up the original document on one screen and all the edits and tools on the other (or having the original and the revision on separate screens).

After that, memory is expandable, CPU isn't, so if there's a tradeoff between CPU power and memory for price, then I'd buy the CPU and upgrade memory later when I could ... however I want to do some intensive stuff from time to time on my machine, for other people I'd possibly argue the other way around, that a slower CPU will use less power (hence longer battery life) and extra memory will make XP or Vista run faster.

I'm happy with the HP/Compaq machines (both my work one and my own one), and I've been happy with Dell in the past. Otherwise I have really nothing else useful to add.

[marypcb.livejournal.com]

the cpu battery thing isn't that clear cut. AMD is lower power in both senses and there isn't a good mobile AMD chip that's not dual core. Either way you can just set the chip speed to lower to increase battery life in the power plan.

[marypcb.livejournal.com]

don't get a Sony - never expandable enough though very cute.
Tosh are good but HP are better value. Personally I don't like Dell but many do. Acer are getting very interesting. Lenovo still do ThinkPads but alslo cheapie own brand.
Laptops change too often to give a definitive model so use something like my laptop buying guide http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/Mobile-Buyers-Guide,review-2360.html or something more up to date to work out what features you'll get in what price range. Then pick a make you like. Personally I'd reccomend whatever HP is in your budget and get that.

[jezza1956.myopenid.com (from livejournal.com)]

Note horror stories about after sales service on Sony. Avoid. We used to sell people Thinkpads when they were IBM and I gather the Lenovo versions are still good.