Laptops

[ned2683]

I am looking to buy a laptop in the $1500-$2000 range. so i need to seek advices from this forum. i know there are forums for these but usually they say good things about their particular brand, and flame others (dell forum will say dells are good, others say dells are bad). so i don't really get a lot from those forums.

i am looking into Hewlett Packard since i can get one around $2000 that is 17" P4 3.02/HT, 60 gig HD, 512 mem, and 128 mb video. it is pretty decent at that price.

the thing is i keep "reading" good reviews on this model (zd7000) in fact it is the desktop replacement of the year 2003. i had it set and was about to order but then i keep hearing a mix of good/bad things about HP brand in general. mostly bad things.

however i don't know if i should take people's non-personal experience seriously since a lot of people say dell's are good, but i know they are bad from experience (and 5 of the people i know experiece)

i wish it was just easy like cars and people know what cars are reliable or not like comparing toyota's to kia's.

can anyone give me some advices on laptops?

[MTI]

HP/Compaq quality has suffered over recent years, due to price competition and manufacturing quality control. The brunt of their bad reputation comes from the higher number of consumers that are buying up the $500 systems at the big box retailers and pondering why their power supplies and switches don't last a year. As for laptops, I've found their products to be "so-so" neither terribly bad or excitingly good. Sony Vaios tend to be feature laden, slim and sexy, but overpriced and ergonomic disasters. Although they're not very exciting, I've had the best experiences with IBM Thinkpads.

[ned2683]

Originally posted by MTI
HP/Compaq quality has suffered over recent years, due to price competition and manufacturing quality control. The brunt of their bad reputation comes from the higher number of consumers that are buying up the $500 systems at the big box retailers and pondering why their power supplies and switches don't last a year. As for laptops, I've found their products to be "so-so" neither terribly bad or excitingly good. Sony Vaios tend to be feature laden, slim and sexy, but overpriced and ergonomic disasters. Although they're not very exciting, I've had the best experiences with IBM Thinkpads.

MTI: thanks for that info. i wonder how there high-end products are.

also as an interesting fact, someone has told me that every laptops are made by 3 basic taiwanese companies. like "compal" is one of them. and so this company manufactures toshiba, HP and some other one. and is the better one of the 3. therefore if this is true then i don't understand why people think toshiba are in a different league than HP's. its kinda like how some people say toshibas screen is better than Hp's, when both 17"s are the same (manufactured by the same company that does laptop's screens) maybe its the brand name that makes them bias?

i was looking into IBM's (and apple for that matter) since these are like well known to be good laptops. however they don't have 17" models or 128mb video (for gaming). or i'd be set to go

thanks for your input.

[PC Dave]

Apple has a 17" Powerbook, but it's ungodly expensive. For a Windows machine, what you've heard is right - most of them are built by the Taiwanese; the only major exceptions are Sony and IBM, and they may be built there as well, just built to their own design rather than the Taiwanese company's (which the lower end Toshibas, HP, Compaq, Gateway, etc. are). If you're shopping among those, I'd just compare specific features, warranty, and price, because they're all the same. Toshiba has (or used to) its own LCD factory (A jv with IBM, iirc), so their screens actually may be different - Sharp does, too. They're commodity products, now, so there's probably not much difference. If you want to know the scoop, get in touch with a shop in Connecticut called Micro Solutions (www.micsol.com). They've been Toshiba specialists for over a decade (I've bought 4 from them in the last 10 years), and their people are a cut above the usual electronics retail drone. They can tell you what's made where, and what the difference is.

[Botnst]

PC Dave, you got that right about the 17" Apple laptop. Who'd take that sucker out of the house? But it sure has everything.

http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.woa/72503/wo/5UqwPGYp3FXo2tWE1KeNgNmA4UY/0.0.7.1.0.5.21.1.1.1.1.0.0.1.0

They have other models, none are cheap. I have a co-worker who bought a $2k Apple. He's working on spatially explicit simulation models on his office Mac and also travels a lot. He found the laptop a useful tool.

BTW (As I hijack yet another thread), does anybody out there in computer land still program in Smalltalk? The guy I mentioned above and I are thinking about formalizing a bunch of procedures used in both GIS and simulation modeling and he argues that Smalltalk would be the best language for that. As I recall Smalltalk is a recursive object oriented programming language. But I thought it had died after a lingering illness a decade or so ago.

Is there a similar language alive and well today? Is Smalltalk still out there?

Botnst

[ned2683]

Originally posted by tkamiya
You didn't say what you want your laptop for, but for your price range, you can buy pretty much the top end products.

i will need the laptop to replace my desktop, P2 350 is no longer new technology anymore as i have found out. i also want it to be somewhat portable, but my main uses is at the house at the with an outlet. I woulda went with the toshiba and almost did, however they do not offer 128mb video card for there $2000 range laptops (only 68mb). i will also be using it for gaming so this is very important. i would have went with apple but i do not like the lack of software, oh and i can't afford them . but damn those 17" books are sexy!!

there are 4 instances that i know of that dell seems to be a bad idea my 3 friends, dad has dells. one of my friends constantly gets a blue screen of death once everyday, another one came with an intergrated wifi that did not work, and after 3 changes it never worked, so he just uses his pci slot, another friend can shut off his lap top with his knee while trying to balance it (i suppose it is hitting the motherboard), and my dad is plain just not satisfied with it. i keep hearing they are good, but u can understand from seeing **** all around me how it would make me decide not to get one.

however thank you for your input, obviously i need to do more research before i decide on getting one. sometimes i think that i am worried too much since i can always return it in 30 days anyways.

[GermanStar]

You know, you might want to check out some of the new portable desktop PCs also. Some are only slightly larger than a laptop, but offer desktop-type performance. Just a thought......

[suginami]

Dell laptops are junk.

We purchased four Dell laptops three years ago for the senior managers in the company I work for, and all four laptops broke down on a regular basis.

All suffered from hard drives that took a dump. One needed the motherboard replaced. Two of them had RAM that went bad. I have never heard of RAM going bad, but ours did.

I've used two Toshiba laptops at my previous company, and they were great. Never experienced a failure.

My boss used a Sony laptop previously, and he had no complaints either.

I know my sample size for Dell laptops is small at four, but I'll never buy another one.

[ned2683]

Originally posted by suginami
Dell laptops are junk.

We purchased four Dell laptops three years ago for the senior managers in the company I work for, and all four laptops broke down on a regular basis.

All suffered from hard drives that took a dump. One needed the motherboard replaced. Two of them had RAM that went bad. I have never heard of RAM going bad, but ours did.

I've used two Toshiba laptops at my previous company, and they were great. Never experienced a failure.

My boss used a Sony laptop previously, and he had no complaints either.

I know my sample size for Dell laptops is small at four, but I'll never buy another one.

plus four from the people i know. but strangely some of my friends still suggest them, and these are people who are really into computers and networking and stuff. i wonder why.

[Botnst]

I bought a new Dell laptop for my kid last Nov and the CD burner has failed a second time.

B

[Lebenz]

For the dollar amount you are thinking of spending you could buy both a nice desktop and a laptop.

Computers are as much a commodity as is anything else. Buy one with a name brand and you won’t go too far wrong. Dell, Compaq, Sony, IBM, Toshiba, HP and even Emachines are all suitable for daily use.

Except of course if you need tech support. Then you will end up talking to someone in India. And as often as not, the chief problem becomes understanding what they are saying.

No one brand is all that different from the other brands with regard to longevity and reliability......

Get the Apple I've had at least a dozen laptops in the last 5 years and not one of them was wortha poop.

The only one I came even close to liking was the Sony, Dell was OK as far as laptops go.

[RG5384]

i got one of the lower end toshiba's recently and have been happy with it so far. It's a celeron 2.0, 128mb ram, cdr/dvd combo drive, and 15" screen. I know the ones you are looking at are significantly better, but even being the relatively cheap model this one runs very well, and i can't remember the last time it has crashed on me. Right now the cooling fan is going out on it, but thats it and should be covered under warranty. bought it in september.
Ryan

[RG5384]

well i opened my big mouth before i should have, and wouldn't you know it almost immediately after i typed that post my computer completely crashed. Now i get a message that some system file is corrupted or missing and its basically telling me i have to reformat, and all my information is going to be lost. STAY AWAY FROM TOSHIBA!!!! ooooooh i'm heated.
Ryan

[ned2683]

I ended up getting a HP ZX5000 series. its a 15.4" widescreen and it was a lot cheper that what i had in mind before. it is $1300 after rebate. so i saved my self $800. i almost got the toshiba with a centrino. but i went for this one instead.