best notebook/laptop?

[WTF]

I would stay away from Toshiba, no matter what rebates, or freebies the best buy/ circuit sity employee tries to push on you. I have had first hand experience with 3 sattelites that have numerous problems. All have had the AC connection go, battery life is dismal, and they all like to overheat and randomly shut off.

Dell is a great value.

If you got deep pockets get a thinkpad or toughbook.

Apple has some good machines; but I couldn't be at peace with myself if I bought one (fear of the un-familiar)

 

[RichP]

Dell is a great value.

Especially if you like buying outdated antique hardware at good prices LOL.... They at one time made good desktops then went after the server/business market, their stuff sucks but they do buy it by the ton though....

 

[beakie]

I would think a lot of time should be put into figuring what you will be using it for before you decide to buy one.
I got myself a Dell Inspiron 9300 over a year ago, knowing I would play a few games (none for over a year now tho) but mostly be downloading music and movies, surfing the web and some word processing here and there.
The best thing I bought for it was an external hard drive. The only things I download to my laptop HD are the programs I use and that came on it. All else goes onto the external HD so my laptop doesn't lag or get full of garbage. I can honestly say that the performance between day 1 and now has hardly diminished at all.
Figure out what you want it for, before you go spending lots of money.
Many new computers out there do WAY more than is needed by the average home user. I gave my sister my old desktop and then she and her husband went out and bought a new one thinking my old one was too slow... than I told them they spent $1800 on a computer that does the exact same my old one did... surf the web, look at their camera's pictures and some word processing.
Know what you want, find someone who will sell you what you need for a good price, and not try to squeeze in a few extra's for a REALLY good deal that add up on the final price tag.

 

[fbueller99]

I would not recommend toshiba either. I have a Tecra. After a little over a year mine crapped out completely. I had the extended warranty but it took 4 trips back to the repair shop to get everything working properly.


Another thing I don't like about this one is parts cannot be upgraded. I wish i could have upgraded the video card to handle newer games.

 

[casm]

I would stay away from Toshiba, no matter what rebates, or freebies the best buy/ circuit sity employee tries to push on you. I have had first hand experience with 3 sattelites that have numerous problems. All have had the AC connection go, battery life is dismal, and they all like to overheat and randomly shut off.

Weird... Mine and the couple of other people I know with them have loved them. The only real complaint I've had was that the door covering one of the PCMCIA slots broke off, but that was largely down to me inserting a card wrong and having it take the door out with it when I wrenched it out.

Apple has some good machines; but I couldn't be at peace with myself if I bought one (fear of the un-familiar)

Gotta say... The current generation of Macs are really kicking some serious ass. I've been an OSX fan for close to seven years now, and given what they're doing with the Intel hardware vs. the PPC/Gx stuff it's like night & day.

Another thing I don't like about this one is parts cannot be upgraded. I wish i could have upgraded the video card to handle newer games.

Most laptops won't let you upgrade the video card. I'm not terribly familiar with the Tecras, but you should be able to at least upgrade the HDD and RAM without too much trouble.

One thing that's worth pointing out, too, is that a laptop isn't a laptop isn't a laptop. It's worth spending the extra cash to get one that's essentially a desktop replacement rather than an occasional-use machine: this is one area where you really do get what you pay for, and the brand doesn't make much difference.

 

[CheapXJ]

Either a thinkpad or the macbook.

I'd nod towards the macbook simply because it'll do everything the PC will do AND everything a Mac will do.

eveyrthing else is crap & a waste of money. I've had TONS of laptops, from off brands to the big ones, acers & compaqs were my least favorite although the LTE286 compaq was a damn reliable machine, which STILL works) Dells were hit or miss, I had a nice toshiba which I really liked for the time (p166) some were good some were not, but the only ones that were consistantly good were the thinkpads. They were ALWAYS on top as far as reliability and battery life go.

yeah, you'll pay more, but it'll still work even when its considered stoneage junk.

I dunno about bulletproof, but the thinkpad IS beerproof... the DVD/CD burner isn't beerproof, but the rest of it is.

WHATEVER you do, get AS MANY FEATURES AS YOU CAN AFFORD! upgrading is either impossible or rediculously expensive.

 

[Kittrell]

Yeah, you'll pay more, but it'll still work even when its considered stoneage junk.

Bingo! My G4 is 6 years old now, and still a far better machine then the brand new Dell 600m I had for a bit. The G4 cost around $3,500 in 2001, more then half of what I paid for the Dell a year or so ago. With inflation, the G4 is roughly a $4,000 laptop today. Most people don't even drop that for a desktop...........

 

[artsifrtsi]

I prefer Dell as well... if for no other reason, you can get the "Complete Care" add-on to your warranty... covers accidental damage, like having the lappy in the garage with you and dropping a sledge on it... can any other brand cover that?

 

[Kittrell]

I prefer Dell as well... if for no other reason, you can get the "Complete Care" add-on to your warranty... covers accidental damage, like having the lappy in the garage with you and dropping a sledge on it... can any other brand cover that?

My G5 Desktop is fully insured, from theft to accidental damage.

 

[RTicUL8]

I did all my research at http://www.notebookreview.com/.

I decided on a Dell 1505.

However, you will find this site impartial and VERY useful. :thumbup:

 

[RichP]

I did all my research at http://www.notebookreview.com/.

I decided on a Dell 1505.

However, you will find this site impartial and VERY useful. :thumbup:

Alot of it has to do with what you want to do with it. Asus laptops are also high quality and able to be upgraded, similar to building a PC from scratch, they use industry standard busses so things like video cards can be changed and upgraded on them only limited by physical size. However that can get pricey and you really have to know what you are buying, generally beyond most laptop owners who are not builders too. If you want expensive and high performance, www.tadpole.com but look at ~$4K to get started and the sparcIII is FAST if you can live and work with solaris [good OS by the way and run gnome for the windows manager it's very useful].
Notebook review, well, anybody who dedicates 30%+ of their screen space to advertising and many commercial links is to be taken with a grain of salt.
I also have a dell Latitude X-1, tiny puppy, good screen and 2gig of memory. It does application builds for our jboss java stuff just fine, takes forever to startup but is liveable. I also like that there are no plugs in the back to forget to unplug, all the usb, power, 1394, etc are on both sides. I also like that it does not have an internal optical CD/DVD drive but has an external one. I hate replacing fixed internal opticals in laptops. When the lasers die on the optical it is just a matter of getting another external usb one.
To me a fixed optical in a laptop is a show stopper, I won't buy one, the opticals crap out on a regular basis. But thats just me, when I build something I expect it to run for a few years with out any problems.

 

[Begster]

I'm going to agree with Casm, and who ever said Toshiba. I am typing on one right now, and my bro has had one for the past 4 years. They have great features and are good machines. I used to never think that Toshiba was a good laptop comapany, until I saw how my bro's work, and until 2 of my friends at work said buy nothing but Toshiba.

Dell = Crap, stay away.

While looking for a Laptop, my friend who works on computers and knows a ton about them told me this. Toshiba or Gateway, preferably Toshiba. Dells he is always working on, stay away, Sonys break down a lot too. HP are really crap.

Macs are good too, I have used them a bunch and htey have a ton of nifty things and programs, and its true that you can dual boot into Windows. But I am so used to PCs and know a bunch about them that I didn't want to switch now, and plus its easier becuase you would have to get windows anyway to run the programs I need like AutoCAD, Matlab, etc.

 

[Kittrell]

If I went with a windows based system, it'd be a Thinkpad. As far as Toshibas go. I have a friend who parent's bought him the $700 one, it's a heeping piece of shit. His dad has a Toshiba too, but it's a 17" and is very nice. You get what you pay for. Look to spend at least $1,500 on a new laptop to get something worth your time.

 

[Begster]

If I went with a windows based system, it'd be a Thinkpad. As far as Toshibas go. I have a friend who parent's bought him the $700 one, it's a heeping piece of shit. His dad has a Toshiba too, but it's a 17" and is very nice. You get what you pay for. Look to spend at least $1,500 on a new laptop to get something worth your time.

Ya, thats probably why because it was so inexpensive.
I got mine for about $1,300, and I got alittle over 2GB RAM, 120GB Harddrive, 1.83GHz, DVD burner and multi drive, a fingerprint scanner (make life that much more easy for those lazy people like me, so you can just swipe and then your passwords are entered online, or when you boot up, etc. A dual mode mouse pad, so after you tap a certain area, it lights up blue and you can click on the different buttons and it will shorcut to different programs.

Its much cooler in person, and it makes everyone go "oooooooohhhh" when it they see it.

 

[artsifrtsi]

My G5 Desktop is fully insured, from theft to accidental damage.

But is that through Mac, or a private ins co?

 

[KarlVP]

I just got an alienware. It rules.

When I got mine it was either Alienware or falcon NW.


www.alienware.com

www.falcon-nw.com

 

[RichP]

I just got an alienware. It rules.

So, how do you like that tripple overpriced dell laptop
[in case you didn't know, Dell bought alienware about a year or so ago]...

 

[KarlVP]

So, how do you like that tripple overpriced dell laptop
[in case you didn't know, Dell bought alienware about a year or so ago]...

Yes, I know this. But it still kicks ass. I got a military discount too. And I'll put this computer up to any dell with similar specs to a bench test. We can see which one overheats first.

Falcon NW is the BEST, but they were a little bit out of my price range.

 

[Sting25]

I love my toshiba m200 Tablet

I say skip the laptop and get a tablet PC.