my current work laptop is on its last legs. battery wont hold a charge, hinges are pretty flexible, screen has a few dead pixels, etc. just an old, worn out, free to me laptop.
what i need out of one:
internet access
ability to use USB
ability to play video
good battery life
compatibility with winaldl, ls1edit, tunerprort, etc.
word processing
good screen quality for editing tunes while driving
good durability
while at walmart today, i got to looking at their laptop selection, as my wife was taking forever. i found an acer netbook for 250 that will supposedly fill all my needs. will it?
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Acer-AOD255E-13281/15657784
i havent bought a new computer in close to 10 years, and my laptop is 8 years old. so its not like im used to something blindingly fast. i just need something that will do the job for cheap.
thanks for any help you can give me.
Michael
Shiny screens in a car = six.... also I've run into some probe with certain programs due to the relatively low resolution of my network... pin is its not super easy to find cheap non shiny screens
Other thing is do you need a serial port... that's something rare these days...
$100-300 off-lease corporate laptop from Craigslist/TigerDirect. P4 Centrino class should do for your purposes nicely - just max out the RAM when you get it. You are going to hate the lack of resolution and screen size with a netbook. Go for HP or Lenovo for best results. If you need a serial port, you are absolutely going to need to go this route, or possibly even older.
Ipad 2 = the microwave oven of computing... It really does nothing well, but the alternative is so detestable that it caught on.. It pretty much is only good as a toy for surfing the internet or checking email. They tried them out for the exec's at work for traveling and easy access to email. There is an app that allows you to access work email through it, but the machines were not purchased by my company, cause the IPad choked on opening spreadsheets and ppt's, and the functionality to edit a spreadsheet is poo.
I'd say no Ipad cause they're too expensive and I am inherently against apple products, too much flash not enough substance.
Just go to www.slickdeals.net or woot.
I found this laptop on sellout.woot.com http://discountlaptopshop.com/p-17-dell-latitude-d830-18ghz.aspx
You can buy 4 of those laptops for the price of the Ijunk.
Get yourself a nice desktop machine. For the money, it will run circles around this "mobile" crap. Get a good inverter and run it off of that. If you are creative with the seatbelt, you can find a way to secure the monitor reasonably well. 
MacBook. One you go Apple, you will enjoy owning and using a computer again.
MacBook would have been my first suggestion, too, but I'm not sure how well it plays with the tuner software.
Personally, I don't like cheap machines, be it laptops or desktops, but especially laptops. Too many corners cut quality-wise, not much in the way of long-term support etc. Keep in mind I'm a programmer so I spent a lot of time with computers so my requirement might be a little different.
Anyway, if MacBooks are out I'd look for an ex-corporate Lenovo laptop - not the consumer models but the corporate ones that are a lot more robust. They aren't cheap, but they last a lot longer than the cheapo ones. I still keep an X31 around in case I need something that runs Windows and still has a genuine serial port, plus my wife uses an X41 that I got her used a few years back. Both "just work".
Off lease machines are the way to go. I would poke around on the big makers web sites and see what you can find.
I swear you can drive over one of the business model Lenovo laptops with a tank and it will still work afterwards.
I have a cheap Wal-Mart Acer laptop. It was less than $400 in 2009, and it has served me well. My only issue is the heatsink clogs up in a month or two, and canned air doesn't clean it out too well due to the design. This is something that seems far improved with nicer machines. It's like they designed this laptop to get hot and thermal throttle to the point of uselessness so it would get replaced quickly.
My suggestion is that no matter what you're looking at, you need to find reviews on that model.
any new multicore laptop machine is going to feel like light years beyond if the old one is single core. Even netbooks.
yeah, macs are out of the question. so is non windows based OS.
i do not need a serial port, as i now have usb converion ALDL cables, due to the serial port on my current laptop not working anymre.
i believe that the ipads do NOT have windows based OS, so therefore they are out of the game.
also, a nice desktop machine is out as well, due to not being able to do datalogging without a few miles of extension cords.
would making out the RAM om a netbook get me where i want to go?
where do i find these off corporate lease laptops?
thanks
Michael
I just bought a Lenovo, based on their reputation for durability (my laptop gets moved around a lot, and isn't treated as kindly as it ought to be).
Recently, I had the opportunity to use an iPad for a few hours a day for a week. It's pretty slick, but if you touch type or need a keyboard for an extended period, you ought to try one out first to see if you can tolerate the on-screen keyboard. For me, I can't, and will therefore not buy one. Yes, you can buy a keyboard for it but, um, that's basically a laptop.)
0.02
The ipad does work for some, but it's pretty limited. As mentioned, the OS is a cellphone OS, so it's only going to run stuff that Apple thinks they can sell.
That said, my wifey wanted one, and despite my futile counsel to the contrary, she has one, and loves it! Primary use is as a go-anywhere, out-of-office email reader. It also sees a good bit of use as a handheld video game. In her words: "I don't want a laptop, I want a toy."
Lenovo Outlet
Dell Outlet
I have gotten stuff from the Dell outlet and have been very pleased. One other thing, I would stay with Business class laptops. They tend to be better at staying together after being moved around alot.
In reply to Rusted_Busted_Spit:
In addition to business laptops tending to be more durable, they tend not to be filled with bloatware like consumer machines. That said, my friend, who works in IT, told me about www.pcdecrapifier.com, which helps you to easily remove all the extra E36 M3 that consumer machines come loaded with.
In reply to procainestart:
I also work in IT and I can not stand all of the crap that gets loaded on a machine right out of the box. The first thing I do when I get a new machine, or work on one for someone is to reload the OS without all of that stuff.
paanta
Reader
4/11/11 2:59 p.m.
huge-O-chavez wrote:
Ipad 2 = the microwave oven of computing... It really does nothing well, but the alternative is so detestable that it caught on.. It pretty much is only good as a toy for surfing the internet or checking email. They tried them out for the exec's at work for traveling and easy access to email. There is an app that allows you to access work email through it, but the machines were not purchased by my company, cause the IPad choked on opening spreadsheets and ppt's, and the functionality to edit a spreadsheet is poo.
I'd say no Ipad cause they're too expensive and I am inherently against apple products, too much flash not enough substance.
Just go to www.slickdeals.net or woot.
I found this laptop on sellout.woot.com http://discountlaptopshop.com/p-17-dell-latitude-d830-18ghz.aspx
You can buy 4 of those laptops for the price of the Ijunk.
In this case a laptop is probably the best choice, but the iPad having too much flash and not enough substance?
It's a 1.5lb machine running a BSD Unix, with more computing power than I had on my CAD workstation 10 years ago, all with an interface that my 3 year old can use. It can access and view almost any file format on almost any type of server (NFS, Samba, AFP, SFTP, FTP, POP, IMAP, etc), run an ssh tunnel and vnc viewer to connect to a desktop securely, function as a file server, etc. It's packing an accelerometer, magnetometer, gyroscope, capacitive touch screen, HD video camera, IPS display (you can count the laptops available with an IPS display on one hand), quad-band GSM/802.11n/Bluetooth, aGPS, and incredible graphics hardware. The whole thing weighs less than two cans of coke and has a 10+ hour battery life. That seems substantial to me, though I can understand not being able to see past the pretty glass and aluminum enclosure. :)
As for whether or not it's good for work, that depends on what you need. I used to wander around with stacks of 11x17 documents, a paper notebook for drawing in and a laptop computer for taking notes/sending email/giving presentations. Now I get by with the iPad and its video output adapter, a pen, and a stack of index cards when I'm out of my office.
It's not intended to replace a laptop. I dunno if it's the best choice here, and sure, Apple is run by a bunch of evil motherberkeleyers, but they do deserve a little credit. I'm pretty confident that 5 years from now almost everyone will have something that looks like an iPad.
