Buying a laptop
Jan. 14th, 2006 09:35 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ciphergoth
A few months ago I poured coffee into my beloved Thinkpad, and the screen died. It turns out that no-one can get hold of replacement screens for a ThinkPad X30, which is a bit sad. I've been using Jess's laptop in the meantime, but she's getting a bit sick of it, and anyway I need one to take to Belgium. I don't like to buy big expensive things without gathering the wisdom of the lazyweb!
I have only one really strong requirement: it has to be light. Around 1.5kg is good, lighter is better, anything above 2kg is right out. In particular, please don't advocate any Apple laptop that weighs above 2kg, which I think is all of them.
The next most important thing is battery life. Everything else is just the usual tradeoff of features and suchlike. All light laptops have 1024x768 screens, except the Dell/Samsung WXGA ones that have 1280x768. All laptops you can buy new come with Bluetooth, WiFi, built-in Ethernet, and so on. 512Mb RAM will be plenty for most of the things I want to do. It doesn't seem to be possible to determine for sure which ones support WPA2, sadly; I'm just hoping that means they all do. Similarly, it seems to be very hard to find out how good they will be with Linux, but they're all usually OK. I'm assuming the warnings against Vaios from a couple of years ago stand (I've done this before).Any recommendations? A whole bunch of options are listed here. So far these seem to be the main contenders:
| Model | Price | Mass | Battery life | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dell Latitude X1 | £1042 | 1.15kg | 3h06 | 1280x768 screen. I am typing at one right now! |
| Toshiba Portege M300 | £1012 | 1.6kg | 6h10 | |
| Toshiba Portege R200 | £1262 | 1.3kg | 4h40 | updated to add this one - seriously seductive shiny and current favourite |
I welcome your thoughts! But please let me re-iterate: DON'T TELL ME TO BUY A MAC!. I know it's an inevitable consequence of pretty much any computer-related question, but I did specifically ask for a reason.
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no subject
Date: 2006-01-17 02:22 am (UTC)You could move up to a 1.45kg X41, and get 7-12 hour battery life.
no subject
Date: 2006-01-17 08:24 am (UTC)As it happens the bit where I say battery life is the next most important thing, and the column in the comparative table for battery life, has been there since the first revision of this post, but don't worry about it because I'm always grateful for suggestions.
Buying from a non-UK supplier will result in a big cost saving no matter what I buy (the exchange rate on technical goods is something like £1:$1 or worse) but they make it such a PITA with warranties and import that it's still not worth it. Otherwise everyone would do it...
By the way, who are you and what brings you to my journal? Thanks!
no subject
Date: 2006-01-17 04:22 pm (UTC)ThinkPad warranty is worldwide. You have to pay the VAT on the import, but you still save a bundle. I bought a ThinkPad for a friend and shipped it over.
I'm mathew, as you'd find out if you followed the link back to the journal page for this ID. :-) Also, I cheated on the prices somewhat, because I get a hefty employee discount on ThinkPads.
no subject
Date: 2006-01-17 04:37 pm (UTC)Initially the bit about Apples was mentioned only once, without emphasis. I brought that bit forward after the second or third person recommended one despite my giving clear reasons why they weren't suitable. I guess no matter what you do, you can only get people to take in one or two of your criteria at most, and you just have to choose which two matter most. Another time I'll list three criteria in bullet points.
I liked my old ThinkPad a lot, so this is tempting.