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need some help looking for a used laptop...

X

xSauronx

Lifer
First, I run linux, so sound/video compatiblity is a must. Ive been looking around the FS/T forums and ebay lately hoping to find something to act as an upgrade to my inspiron 1000:

Celeron 2200mhz (ugh)
768mb ram
40g hd
sis sound/video/lan
15" lcd
cd-rw/dvd

i like the 15" monitor and 3 usb ports...and thats about it. its been pretty sturdy, thats for sure. but its slow, and i multitask *alot* when i use it for work and the cpu pegs 100% way too often for me.

i can spend about $350 or so. my main concern is sound/video/cpu since anything else could be upgraded if im not happy with it. a 14"lcd is fine for me as id rather have power over the screen real estate.

im thinking a pentium m/pentium 4-m (i understand they are quite different) and would *love* something with nvidia graphics. ive been eyeing R3X thinkpads and the like but they all have radeons, and latitude c840s but theyre a p4m, and id prefer the pentium m if i can.

the latitudes and thinkpads catch my eye as well since i understand they have a good build quality.

any suggestions? built in wireless isnt necessary, itd just be nice. ram/hd/optical can all be switched out to whatever i need so thats not what im concerned with
 
stay away from the Latitude C840. At a former company, I had one provided to me and that was a creaky, over-heating, malfunctioning piece of junk. Mine had a GeForce Go440 video card and it would overheat and freeze if I were playing a game. It would also do that if I was compiling code sometimes too. The ethernet port stopped working unless I pressed down on the side. Overall, that has been my worst experience owning a laptop. I actually convinced my boss to upgrade that machine (which was around $2500 new at the time) to a $3000 HP NC8000 which was probably one of the best laptops I've ever owned next to my MBP.

If you're running Linux, the Thinkpads seem to work pretty well with it. I think there's even a site out there that devoted to Thinkpad users running Linux. Stick with the P-M, it's much better heat and battery wise. Plus I think they're faster anyways. I wouldn't be too concerned about the ATI chipset in Linux. You probably won't be taking advantage of it anyways (unless you're planning on running Compiz/XGL/Beryl whatever it is now). My Dell Inspiron 9200 has an ATI Radeon 9700Pro and it runs Ubuntu 7.04 very well with the eye-candy provided by Beryl. But I'm just as happy without the eyecandy and the machine just feels snappier anyways. In fact, if you're willing to spend $500, I'll sell you my Inspiron... 😉
 
well ill be running XFCE no matter what i go with, i like it over gone/kde but i *do* want compositing to work ok, and if i could slap a couple of older games on it would be nice.

shame i dont have a bag that would hold the 9200....17", yipes 🙂

maybe ill look into the radeon support more and see how stable the drivers are. ATI recently announced they wanted to improve linux support, but i imagine it would take a while
 
i just found a new sealed 1501 with turion dual core 2.0ghz, 80gb drive, 1gb ram, ati 1150 256mb grfx, truelife glossy 15" widescreen, wifi, vista home premium and office 2007- all for $600. the key is to get lucky and find the desperate sellers... the only problem with the 1501's are no internal bluetooth support, and no svid out. pretty big disadvantages actually, but i still found it to be a good deal.
 
i *thought* i was lucky last night. i was bidding on a t4X thinkpad with a 1.7ghz P-m and 1gig ram and was the high bidder for a while...

then i got sniped :|

under 2 minutes to go and the price shoots up 60 bucks

so close....oh so close 🙁
 
dont feel bad, you might have dodged a bullet. my t40 just went bad because i had a bad bios flash apparently, and it locked me out with a password i dont know. with thinkpads, there is no way around it- its a brick. you can pay $100 on the street to get it unlocked but screw that. im not buying thinkpads anymore, theyre nice but also too proprietary. toshiba's and dell's are my favorites for many reasons.
 
any other thoughts? ibm/thinkpads do have a good reputation, and i think i can squeeze one in my budget. the latitude 600s may be another option but i dont know much about them. there are *alot* of those and t40s available
 
also, when i was looking for mine, i made sure the video would handle vista aeroglass. not for the looks, but mainly for better compatibility with future programs.
 
godfvckingdamnit i got sniped again! does this happen on *every* ebay auction for christs sake? outbid 5 bucks in the last 2 minutes!
 
hey dont feel too bad. i just put up a 1gb stick of DDR-SO PC3200 Crucial ram for no reserve $1 start bid. 40min to go and its at $35 shipped! 😱 man this better shoot up QUICK
 
ps- as a buyer/bidder, I NEVER bid until the last minute! literally the last 10 sec, i must always be the last one to bid. thats how i roll, so hopefully thats whats happening to my auction. xsauronx- the best i can tell you is to figure the max amount of money you want to spend, then set a timer to go off 15sec before auction close. be ready for it, you want to hit 'confirm' with less then 10sec to go so nobody else gets a chance to outbid you. by far the best practice for buyers, i HATE when people rack up the bid days before it closes!! but when im a seller of course its different.



update on that auction- $30 shipped. for a good-as-new crucial 1gb stick of ddr-so pc3200 ram bought 3 months ago at the egg for $105 shipped. this one hurts. shoulda sold here, i just see so much toll complaints i was a little hesitant.
 
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