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Paul Crowley ([personal profile] ciphergoth) wrote2003-01-20 03:35 pm
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Laptop choices

I finally narrowed the field to a few candidates and mailed my work a comparison chart:

http://hacks.ciphergoth.org/laptop-compare.html

All of them have 256 Mb RAM, a 12.1 inch 1024x768 TFT screen, an Intel PIII-M processor, onboard 56K Winmodem, 2 USB ports, 1 Type II PCMCIA slot, VGA out port, no serial port or floppy drive.

I really want the Portege!

Update: ...but it turns out there aren't any in the UK at all! I just tried all the resellers Toshiba recommends, plus dealtime.co.uk and pricewatch.co.uk, and none of them have them in stock. I just tried Toshiba themselves, and they say they'll contact me when they have them in stock but it could be two to three weeks, which could be a bit problematic. Aargh! If it comes down to the Dell or the IBM, which should I go for? The weight inclines me to the Dell...
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[identity profile] cairmen.livejournal.com 2003-01-20 09:10 am (UTC)(link)
The Dell looks a little underpowered - and I agree with Pavlos, you might want more RAM. Also, the Dell battery life is a little minimal, so I'd buy a second battery for it.

Or, in short, "Go for the IBM"...

[identity profile] ex-meta.livejournal.com 2003-01-20 12:34 pm (UTC)(link)
Yeah. By the time you get a second battery for the Dell to make it useful unplugged, it'll weigh as much as the ThinkPad, possibly more.

I've had some horrible Dell experiences, but only with their desktop machines. I've never had a horrible ThinkPad experience, though, and obviously I see a lot of them.

[identity profile] alienspacebat.livejournal.com 2003-01-20 02:54 pm (UTC)(link)
One thing with ram, buy256 in the machine if possible. Laptop manufacturers make their money by the 'upgrades' to the basic spec. Ram, they charge 3x street price for. Make sure one sodimm slot is free and it's not something like 128 x2 and go to http://www.crucial.com/uk (http://www.crucial.com/uk) and get another 512mb for around £150. I got my dell with 256 and did just that and now it's a mean spec!

[identity profile] ciphergoth.livejournal.com 2003-01-20 03:29 pm (UTC)(link)
hmm... what does this mean?
Memory
l Memory (RAM) std/max: 256MB / 1024MB
RAM speed: 133MHz
Optional RAM configuration: 64:128:256:512MB SODIMM
RAM type: PC133 SDRAM
RAM slots total (available): 2 SODIMM (1 SODIMM)
"There's a SODIMM slot free, but you can only put another 256 Mb in it"? Incidentally, Crucial only want GBP94 for another 512 MB!

[identity profile] alienspacebat.livejournal.com 2003-01-20 03:37 pm (UTC)(link)
Should be fine, it's a standard memory of 256, and you can have sodimms of sizes 64-512mb giving up to 1gb of ram. The thing is, if you want 1gb, you have to pull out their 256mb and put in two 512mb sodimms. But 768mb should be plenty. Good to see they leave one slot free.

Other thing I thought about is to check the hardware in each for linux compatability. Even if you will mainly be running windows, linux compatible hardware is generally better as it has built in processing rather than using 'soft' functionality on the system processor. In particular, have a look at the XFree86 compatability for the graphics
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