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Laptop wish list; suggestions needed

V

videobruce

Golden Member
I'm looking into a new Laptop (Notebook, if you prefer) with the following 'wants'/preferences;

1. AMD based (no Wintel),
2. Greater than 1366 x768,
3. Widest vertical viewing angle possible,
4. 16x9 (16x10) aspect ratio,
5. PS2 mouse port
6. HDD size and memory amount not a issue,
7. CF card reader,
8. HDMI (or DVI) out (instead of VGA),
9. No HP/Compaq, E-machines or Sony,
10. No extra gimmicks, bells & whistles,
11. Well under $1,000

My biggest concern is vertical viewing angle since every laptop I have seen has had a very narrow vertical viewing angle. I also don't want/need a huge HDD or GB's of memory.
 
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The "payoff" is it's not from the Wintel monopoly. As far as that choice, it fails #2. It has to be at least 1440x900.
 
videobruce said:
I'm looking into a new Laptop (Notebook, if you prefer) with the following 'wants'/preferences;

1. AMD based (no Wintel) Microsoft still gets your money, and you get an inferior mobile processor
2. Greater than 1366 x768
3. Widest vertical viewing angle possible Vertical viewing angle, so you want to be able to fold the screen back?
4. 16x9 (16x10) aspect ratio Easy, most all of them are
5. PS2 mouse port Not happening
6. HDD size and memory amount not an issue defaults these days are like 320GB and 4GB RAM
7. CF card reader Could be tricky
8. DVI out (instead of VGA) Could also be tricky, would you settle for HDMI, which is pin compatible with DVI?
9. No HP/Compaq, E-machines or Sony
10. No extra gimmicks, bells & whistles Define extra gimmicks, bells & whistles. What I see as requirements, you might see as gimmicks, like say... wireless internet
11. Well under $1,000 Define well under, if you mean at least $200 under, which I would agree is well under $1000, then say, 'less than $800'

My biggest concern is vertical viewing angle since every laptop I have seen has had a very narrow vertical viewing angle. I also don't want/need a huge HDD or GB's of memory.
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I would suggest checking out Dell's Outlet, they tend to have good prices. Also, you never specified a screen size. Many (in my opinion) that make these threads, don't really know what screen size they want, they say 17" but I don't know if they realize how gigantic a 17" screen is. If you go for 1440*900 on a 13-14" screen, the pixels will be itty-bitty, and not everyone is crazy about high DPI.
 
Microsoft still gets your money, and you get an inferior mobile processor
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Can't do anything about that, but Intel doesn't.
so you want to be able to fold the screen back?
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I don't want to worry if the screen isn't within plus or minus 5 degrees from absolute perpendicular from my eyes when viewing or editing photos.
would you settle for HDMI
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Yes, I'm surprised VGA is still widely used.
you never specified a screen size
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I was more interested in vertical resolution, but probably a 15" would do.

As to price, that will depend on how much I will have to spend to get what I would like. I now see getting a higher end AMD ZM-8x processor will jack the price up also.
 
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PS/2 and CF ports are the only things that will be tricky.

Otherwise, look for a 15" Dell (Studio?) with 1600x900 screen, AMD processor, 2+ GB of memory, 320+ GB hard drive, and HDMI port. I can't vouch for the viewing angles, but I find that most non-premium laptop screens suck these days anyway. There are a few exceptions (some ASUS netbooks), but they're few and far between.
 
Random thoughts:

If the man wants AMD, give him AMD. I want the same, but I'm waiting for this summer's ULV parts and DDR3. Intel has good CPU's, yes, but they are overpriced, and the company's business practices stand against everything I believe in. And their graphics suck. Hyperthreading is a gimmick. They design their compiler to make competitors' chips appear slower. The compiler checks whether a chip has Intel as vendor and if not, then it deliberately won't run SSE or SSE2 code. Rather than checking whether the chip is flagged as capable of running SSE/SSE2.

There are some very good reasons to go AMD right now. Their laptop offerings are much stronger than they have been for the past 5 years or so. AMD offers a way more balanced platform than any competitor... Intel, Cyrix, VIA... I'm talking about an igp that doesn't utterly fail, combined with processors that don't utterly fail. The competition has good processors with crappy gfx, unless you go third-party and discrete.

Dell, afaik, doesn't have any current-gen AMD laptops. Just K8-based dual cores, i.e.: QL, RM, TL, TK series. The newer K10.5 architecture AMD chips are labeled M300, M500, etc... basically M and a 3-digit number. They're 45nm and much faster.

Would you be willing to do HDMI instead of DVI, seeing as they're the exact same in terms of digital video quality? If you use an adapter to a DVI monitor, there is NO conversion and NO signal loss, unlike when you adapt from VGA to DVI/HDMI, because with that you're going from analog to digital.
 
There are some very good reasons to go AMD right now. Their laptop offerings are much stronger than they have been for the past 5 years or so. AMD offers a way more balanced platform than any competitor... Intel, Cyrix, VIA... I'm talking about an igp that doesn't utterly fail, combined with processors that don't utterly fail. The competition has good processors with crappy gfx, unless you go third-party and discrete.
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Whether balanced is good or not depends on what you want to do with the laptop. I bought an Intel-powered notebook with a crappy IGP (though better than the GMA IGP that was on the Core 2 notebook parts) because I don't do any graphically intensive tasks on my notebook, but will do a fair bit of compiling, multitasking, encoding, etc, so a better CPU with more threads made sense. However, if I was looking for more a desktop replacement, a one-stop shop I could do anything anywhere, then I would probably look for an AMD notebook or a gaming notebook with a proper 'discrete' GPU.

If the man wants AMD, give him AMD. I want the same, but I'm waiting for this summer's ULV parts and DDR3. Intel has good CPU's, yes, but they are overpriced, and the company's business practices stand against everything I believe in. And their graphics suck. Hyperthreading is a gimmick. They design their compiler to make competitors' chips appear slower. The compiler checks whether a chip has Intel as vendor and if not, then it deliberately won't run SSE or SSE2 code. Rather than checking whether the chip is flagged as capable of running SSE/SSE2.
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1) I don't really think not buying someone's products is much of a protest against their business practices, especially when they are the dominant player in the market and have plenty of other willing customers to choose from. I get the principle, but in practice I don't think it works out so well.
2) Sometimes it's better to give someone what they need rather than what they want.
3) Intel's IGPs have gotten a lot better with the Core iX chips, to the point where a lot of the time they are now competitive with their AMD equivalents. This is true for the desktop, but I would assume that this translates reasonably well into the mobile market too.
4) Hyperthreading is not a gimmick. Not to mince words or anything, it is bloody awesome. Anything to get more performance out of my CPU for free is good.
5) I remember that. They tested on a VIA CPU, didn't they? It was kind of weird, and I originally thought Intel would suffer for it, but it doesn't seem like it has, and as I mentioned before I don't think on this basis going with the competition is a good idea.
 
PS/2 and CF ports are the only things that will be tricky.
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I was going to add serial ports, but I already knew the answer.
the company's business practices stand against everything I believe in.
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:thumbsup: Thank you. I don't support monopolies.
I find that most non-premium laptop screens suck these days anyway.
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This my major concern.
Would you be willing to do HDMI instead of DVI
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Yes, I will change my OP.
I get the principle, but in practice I don't think it works out so well.
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You are probably correct, but what would happen if everyone else though like that when it comes to say, voting?

Maybe I should ask; how much do you have to pay for a screen with a decent viewing angle? Something greater than plus or minus five degrees. 🙄
 
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