When buying a notebook?

[Xain]

I'm in the market for a good, high end laptop for a decent price 2nd hand, but I've realised I know very little about laptops. What should I look for and what should I avoid?

I would not be using it as my primary machine so I doubt Doom3 will be on the menu, but I would like decent 3D capabilities should I feel like a game of Rise of Nations or something like that while I'm on holiday, it will mainly be for web usage and development (VB, PHP, Html). Looking on eBay, it appears there are two main types of gfx cards - ones that share the system memory and ones that have their own. Are cards that share system memory as bad as they sound? Is there a good way to tell whether a card shares or not?

I've heard that some manufacturers limit the OS by only releasing one set of drivers, forcing you to buy a new notebook if you want a new OS. Is this true? This is bad, but not utterly awful as long as it ships with a decent (NT core) OS, I guess. Who does this, if anyone? Looking around, IBM seem to sell good technical laptops which look like bricks, the Sony Vaios are just but may be suspect technically while Compaq/HP strike a good mix of technical quality and visual quality. I guess technical is more important, but I would like something nice looking. Have I got my manufacters right? In short, who's good and who's bad?

I have a mobile phone with GPRS and both Bluetooth and a USB cable to connect it to a PC. Can I use it has a modem? I know I'll go through my monthly bandwidth at a hell of a speed but it would still be nice.

 

[tommigsr]

hmm....so you're looking for a 2nd hand notebook? or a brand spanking new one? compaq x1000 series are pretty nice visually and are very good at games as well. they have the radeon 9200 video and the memory is independent, meaning it is not shared with the main memory. i would recommend this or the dell 600m or the dell d600 lattitude. generally, notebooks come with the preconfigured OS, but most of the newer ones are built for upcoming os upgrades as well...because i'm sure they will have the driver updates. these major companies most often do. IBM, imho, is way overpriced. if you got the money, then go ahead, but i'm a cheapie but quality type of guy in the hot deals forums, the dell and compaqs have sales every so often, so go in there and check once in awhile. if you have bluetooth on your phone, and the laptop has bluetooth, you can use it as a modem. what service do you have?

i have sprint right now and it enables me to surf the net with a usb cable. no monthly bandwidth limits, good for checking emails on the go. 112kbps speeds

 

[TBP]

Originally posted by: tommigsr

i have sprint right now and it enables me to surf the net with a usb cable. no monthly bandwidth limits, good for checking emails on the go. 112kbps speeds

Sorry a little off-topic. Would you mind sharing how to get internet access through Sprint PCS? I couldn't find any useful information on their website. I'm current a SprintPCS customer.

 

[tommigsr]

what phone do you have? you just need to download the software from sprint...the sprint dialer, and you're good to go. you do have to have vision on your phone in order to go online. private message me if you want to get into detail about it.