dad wants to buy a laptop

[otispunkmeyer]

he works away , month on month off

so these are the reccommendations i gave him, and i said dont believe any of the bull places like comet or pc world give you

look for a centrino, preferably Dothan core (designated by intels new numbering system?)
shoot for as high a cpu speed as you can, (its probably gonna have to last a while)
at least 512mb ram
at the very least a 40gb hdd, 60-80 is a better area
avoid on board graphics, even though hes doing no gaming, a 32mb fx5200 or mobility radeon 9200 is better than onboard

at least a cd/rw drive, plenty of usb ports (ie 4 or more)

dont know how much he wants to spend, he would probably like it to be not too expensive, but my dad often has the habit for splurging out on things like this. ie he came back with a 36inch sony wega after a quick trip to town. lol

 

[Baked]

Buy a Dell. No seriously, just buy a dell w/ extended warranty.

 

[Rhin0]

the Dell's are pretty nice. Hard to beat them, especially peformnace wise. Getting service can suck sometimes though.

My buddy had a gateway laptop with the Athlon 64 in it. It was only 800mhz I think but it ran great and the LCD was outstanding. I really like that it had a little scroller on the touch pad too. It seemed like a nice laptop.

Personally I have been looking at the Toshiba laptops too, they are work a look as are the IBM thinkpads.

 

[Spikesoldier]

get a dell

the widescreen ones are niceeee

 

[DaveSimmons]

I'd say not to get the fastest CPu, but one or two steps below it. Even a 1.6 P-M is quite fast in XP. Even if Longhorn might be out next year that doesn't mean there will be any good reason to upgrade.

A 1.6 - 1.8 GHz, 512 MB RAM, 60 GB hard drive is a nice combo without paying hundreds more for a slightly faster CPU or a little more disk space.

 

[quakefiend420]

Originally posted by: Rhin0
the Dell's are pretty nice. Hard to beat them, especially peformnace wise. Getting service can suck sometimes though.

My buddy had a gateway laptop with the Athlon 64 in it. It was only 800mhz I think but it ran great and the LCD was outstanding. I really like that it had a little scroller on the touch pad too. It seemed like a nice laptop.

Personally I have been looking at the Toshiba laptops too, they are work a look as are the IBM thinkpads.

800mhz A64?

 

[0roo0roo]

warrantee matters.

 

[Sunner]

Originally posted by: quakefiend420

Originally posted by: Rhin0
the Dell's are pretty nice. Hard to beat them, especially peformnace wise. Getting service can suck sometimes though.

My buddy had a gateway laptop with the Athlon 64 in it. It was only 800mhz I think but it ran great and the LCD was outstanding. I really like that it had a little scroller on the touch pad too. It seemed like a nice laptop.

Personally I have been looking at the Toshiba laptops too, they are work a look as are the IBM thinkpads.

800mhz A64?

Probably just throttled down due to power saving.

 

[powerMarkymark]

I was forced to get a Dell (Latitude D800)for business purposes and I like it.

As for service, it is great.

One of my USB ports stopped working and within three days of askling for service, a repairman came to my home and replaced the motherboard.

Took him 15 minutes and I was good to go.

I recomend Dell.

Marc

 

[otispunkmeyer]

having seen the quality and how badly fvcked up my mates inspron was before he started messin with it i have the right mind to leave dell well alone,
his inspron is poorly built, and the screen is just awful..ive never seen something so washed out, back light leaking is a major prob too, dell loaded his laptop full of loads of junk such as AOL, etc

anyway u cant just walk into a shop and buy a dell, my dad likes to buy from shops (even though it will cost more) for the simple reason that if it breaks he can march in there and tell them to sort it.

hes been looking at sony, HP, and toshiba laptops, but we are going on holiday to california this year so he may just decide to wait till then seen as £>$

 

[corkyg]

Today, one of the top rated laptops is the H-P 1000Dv. Avoid Sony - too proprietary and gimmicky. Toshiba and IBM are both good. Dell can be a crapshoot depending on the model.

I looked at a new H-P yesterday and was really impressed by a tiny toggle switch that simply turned the #@*%! touchpad OFF. Yea! (I hate them!)

 

[imported_NoGodForMe]

Tell him to buy a full blown Sager 9860.
Message forum is here
http://notebookforums.com/
and you'll buy it from www.pctorque.com because they run the board, and have the best service. If he gets one, you can play games on it when he's in town. Look at the benchmark section.

 

[biostud]

Depends on what he's using it for. If it's only for office programs then get a cheaper pentium-M. 512Mb ram is good, onboard video is ok for office programs and if you have 512mb ram atleast.

I have a pentium-M 1.4Ghz 512mb ram and onboard ATI video, and for office programs this is sufficent. I can even play CS (not source ) and it handles divX fine as well.

 

[wisdomtooth]

Originally posted by: otispunkmeyer
he works away , month on month off

Sounds to me like he would use the laptop as a business machine while on the road.

If that's the case, it's a no-brainer-- Go IBM Thinkpad T42. THE business laptop. Very portable, gold-plated warranty, very high build quality. Has the specs you recommended for him.

 

[JackBurton]

I've tested the Dell D600, D800, m60, and X300. I LOVE the X300. SUPER light (weighs ~3lbs) and 7hr+ battery life with the extended battery. I would HIGHLY recommend the X300 with the media base and a DVD±RW drive. It comes with a 1.4GHz processor (low votage processor) and I'd get 1GB of memory to go with it (get the memory at Crucial). AWESOME laptop and super light.

Note: This laptop is geared more toward mobilty, so if you are planning to do some hardcore gaming, this isn't the laptop for you.

 

[corkyg]

Originally posted by: wisdomtooth
If that's the case, it's a no-brainer-- Go IBM Thinkpad T42. THE business laptop. Very portable, gold-plated warranty, very high build quality. Has the specs you recommended for him.

I second that motion! That would be my choice. I am probably like your dad - (I belong to AARP!) and I travel a lot. My laptop is for digital photography , email, an occasional movie, etc. NEVER GAMES!!!!

 

[magomago]

Originally posted by: corkyg

Originally posted by: wisdomtooth
If that's the case, it's a no-brainer-- Go IBM Thinkpad T42. THE business laptop. Very portable, gold-plated warranty, very high build quality. Has the specs you recommended for him.

I second that motion! That would be my choice. I am probably like your dad - (I belong to AARP!) and I travel a lot. My laptop is for digital photography , email, an occasional movie, etc. NEVER GAMES!!!!

Finally! My firne has a T40, omfg its such a beautiful laptop. Even a year after purchase it just looks soooo good! You know you can't mess up with that! Once me sees the poiwer, and slimness of IBM, other bulky laptops are just not worth it

 

[CraigRT]

my favorite laptops are the Toshibas lately.

I've setup 3 17" Toshiba Setellite's in the last few months, very nice systems.

 

[alteredNate]

All I have to say is that over 2 years ago I bought a dell inspiron 8200 with a 1600x1200 15" LCD and it still runs like a champ. The screen brightness/contrast is very good, the performance of the computer itself it very good (for being over 2 years old) and as far as service goes they're replaced the few small problems I've had with it painlessly.

I'd highly recommend them for laptops.

 

[SaintTigurius]

ACER FERARRI would be the best laptop for your dad..

 

[bookman]

Buy a Thinkpad - they are silent and very well built. Also, dont focus as much on processor speed - it isnt as relevant for the type of use your dad is likely to have (i.e. not gaming). Rather make sure he gets at least 512 MB, or even 1 GB.
This was the suggestion I gave to my dad three months ago, and he is very pleased with his new laptop, which replaced an old Dell PIII.

 

[oog]

i think you should advise your dad on the weight for a laptop. if he's going to carry it around, i wouldn't go with much more than 6 lbs. i would try to keep it under 6. surprisingly, this knocks out quite a lot of laptops.

 

[gtd2000]

I used to have a Dell Lattitude when I worked for Siemens but IMHO it was a very cheap and nasty and somewhat unreliable laptop

Check out the $500 Toshiba for sale at Best Buy (AR!) in the Hot Deals section - should be good enough with Celeron M CPU.

I'm an eMachine M6810 user and I like it very much - great keyboard and general performance

 

[dc5]

Fujitsu S6231 the fujitsus are often overlooked, becaues they aren't that popular in the US, however, it is more popular in asia. the notebook is thin, lightweight, durable, what more can you want? the price tag isn't as bad compared to thinkpads too.

spec:

Intel Centrino 1.6ghz Mobile Processor (2MB L2 cache, 400MHZ FSB, Dothan core)
13.3" XGA TFT Crystal View Display capable of a max. 1024x768 resolution
Windows XP Professional Edition
512 MB DDR333 so-DIMM, 200 pin SDRAM (512MB x 1)
Intel 855GME Integrated Graphics
60GB hard drive (4200 rpm)
Modular Super-Multi DVD drive (4x DVD-R, 2x DVD-RW, 24x DVD+R, 2.4x
DVD+RW, 2x DVD-RAM, 8x DVD read, 16x CD-R, 4x CD-RW)
Integrated Intel PRO/Wireless 2200BG (802.11b/g)
11.5"(w) x 9.3"(d) x 1.28"(h) (max)
Weight: 4.07lbs with DVD/CD-RW drive, 3.63 lbs with weight saver

 

[suse920]

dell 600m