Best old notebook/laptop what's your oppinion?

[Dyngoe]

Hi y'all,
I'm trying to find a replacement for my old Omnibook 800ct. It has served me well, but one hard stop in my car and it tried to leave through the dash. The screen was cracked and it will cost way too much to replace for an old p133. So, I'm looking for suggestions of older (cheap) notebooks/laptops for me to use in the field. It doesn't need to be too fast or have to much space, I just want a reliable, solid machine. I await your suggestions.
As Always,
D

 

[Workin']

I have an old IBM ThinkPad 760XL P166MMX that has been (and continues to be) a real workhorse. Those older ThinkPads are really nice computers and were built to last.

 

[wyvrn]

I second that IBM suggestion. Also try the old Dell Latitudes, great notebooks.

 

[MWink]

I have a Dell Latitude XPi P133 that still works perfectly. I think it is an excellent macine for its age. I highly recommend it. You can probably get one cheap on a certain auction site whose name ends with bay.

 

[Whitecloak]

i love the digital hinote ultra 2000. it still rocks! i have played halflife and UT on it and i run windows 2000 on it with no problems either

 

[IcecreamLtDan]

Have an old Dell XPI133 myself. Great notebook, bought it brand new several years ago and never had a single problem with it. Starting to get a little old in the tooth though.

 

[Eug]

Maybe this is a good excuse to upgrade.

I found a P166 nearly impossible to use without ripping my hair out. Too slow. Personally if you I had a bit more coin I'd go with a slow Celeron if it's a new machine. To get a new machine with a slower CPU than a Celly 600 won't save you much money. You could get a used PII 300, but again, you won't save a whole lot of money unless you are very lucky.

I just configured a Dell Inspiron 2500 with Celeron 700, 64 MB, 10 GB hard drive, Office XP, DVD-ROM (last day for this upgrade), 59 Whr Li battery, 56 K modem with 10/100 Ethernet, and a 12" TFT screen for $1258. It would be a shade over $1400 for a 14" screen. This thing has a terrible video card for 3D though, but it depends on what you need it for. The 64 MB is not enough but if you buy the memory from Crucial you can get a nice cheap stick of 128 MB for a total of 192. This would make the thing a powerhouse.

Most of the used notebooks I've seen that weren't total crap cost US$1000. I personally would be wary of auctions and used notebooks without a warranty.

 

[BD2003]

Toshiba 2805-s201

C650
64mb ram
6gb hd
S3 Savage IX 8MB
Yamaha 754
Internal LAN/Modem
TV-out
8x dvd
13 inch active matrix

Plays games like a champ, just as good as any desktop. Throw in some more ram and a hd and youre good. GOt mine for $750 off ebay, upgraded the hd to 20gb and the ram to 192...

 

[Workin']

<< I found a P166 nearly impossible to use without ripping my hair out. >>

I guess everyone has different pain thresholds. Or maybe it's because my hair is almost gone... I use my P166 ThinkPad every day. It has 104MB RAM and a 6GB HD, runs Windows 2000 and Office 2000 just fine, surfs the web as fast as my PIII desktop computer (damn 56k modems!), happily plays mp3's, does everything I need it to do. Looks like it just was unwrapped from the factory. However, the only game I ever play on it is Solitaire. I got it off *bay for under $300 6 months ago. Compared to $1200+, I think even the dumbest among us can see there is quite a difference there. Like enough to build a 1GHz+ desktop machine. Or buy an 18&quot; LCD panel for the desktop. Or go on a cruise. Or buy a nice TV. Or make a mortgage payment.

Just my 2 cents worth.

 

[Eug]

<< I use my P166 ThinkPad every day. It has 104MB RAM and a 6GB HD, runs Windows 2000 and Office 2000 just fine, surfs the web as fast as my PIII desktop computer (damn 56k modems!), happily plays mp3's, does everything I need it to do. Looks like it just was unwrapped from the factory. However, the only game I ever play on it is Solitaire. I got it off *bay for under $300 6 months ago. Compared to $1200+, I think even the dumbest among us can see there is quite a difference there. >>

Yeah, maybe I was a bit harsh. RAM certainly does help, and if you can get one for $300 that's great, esp. with 104 RAM. Around here though, if you want any sort of warranty (even just 30 day) it's gonna cost ya $500 for something like a P166 used, and that's with no DVD, no Ethernet, and no software (besides Win98), and usually with 3 Gigs of hard drive space. What I quoted had much more than that - you can go cheaper if you want. It doesn't mean you have to, but new is a viable option in many instances, since you can get a Celly 600 loaded (with CD but not DVD) under US$1000. (P.S. I wrote US$1000 for my used numbers but that was a typo. It should be CAD$1000, which is about US$650. But even that isn't quite correct, as you can get a functional used one with a warranty under US$600. )

I'm not an ebay type though. I generally will consider used without warranty only if I can actually test the thing in front of me for a while - therein the problem lies. ebay does have some killer deals. If I could get a good P166 like you did for $300, I definitely would have considered it.

 

[Workin']

Granted, auctions aren't for everyone. And there certainly is more than a little crap for sale on them. But with patience and lots of communication with a seller (to get explicit details, photos, etc.) plus knowing EXACTLY what you are looking at (gotta do lots of research) you can get an occasional killer deal. Or you can be robbed blind.

I also didn't mention that my P166 came with a 2GB HD, I ugraded to the 6GB which I got off *bay for $48. So really I guess I spent just under $350. But I had a guy offer me $50 for the 2 gigger but I kept it just in case, so then it would have cost me $300. But the original computer included a Megahertz 56k modem and a Linksys 10/100 NIC (oh, and a decent cas, too). Haven't seen such a deal before or since... but you never know when one might come along.