----------------------------------- zomg Fri Jan 28, 2005 12:20 pm laptop for college ----------------------------------- thsi year is my last year of HS and im goin to college in the fall, myu parents are gonna buy me a laptop and im wondering which type i should get? which is better? centino 1.8ghz? pentium 4 3.4 ghz both have 1024mb of ram i have also heard of turion but thats not out yet ----------------------------------- Tony Fri Jan 28, 2005 12:55 pm ----------------------------------- Centrino. Lighter, cooler and have a longer battery life. If you're conserned with not having enough megahurtz, get yourself a desktop. But if you actually intend on moving around with your laptop - size and weight become a very significant factor. ----------------------------------- wtd Fri Jan 28, 2005 2:26 pm ----------------------------------- http://www.charles-shaughnessy.com/ibook.jpg ----------------------------------- Andy Fri Jan 28, 2005 3:49 pm ----------------------------------- wait for the turion.. btw, whats ur budget? ----------------------------------- josh Fri Jan 28, 2005 3:59 pm ----------------------------------- I m guessing turion is going to be AMD's competitor for the Centrino? ----------------------------------- zomg Sat Jan 29, 2005 12:32 am ----------------------------------- wait for the turion.. btw, whats ur budget? $2000 and under ----------------------------------- josh Sat Jan 29, 2005 12:47 am ----------------------------------- then I would seriously consider getting a nice powerbook (very small and light) ----------------------------------- Neo Sat Jan 29, 2005 12:48 am ----------------------------------- Dont mind my noob question but why are the centrino laptops so expensive? Even at 1.0ghz it costs more than some pentium 4 3.2ghz. ----------------------------------- wtd Sat Jan 29, 2005 12:49 am ----------------------------------- "¢ 512MB DDR266 SDRAM (256MB built-in & 256MB SO-DIMM) "¢ 60GB Ultra ATA drive "¢ Combo drive (DVD-ROM/CD-RW) "¢ AirPort Extreme Card "¢ Keyboard & Mac OS X - U.S. English "¢ APP for iBook - Enrollment Kit "¢ 12-inch TFT XGA display "¢ 1.2GHz PowerPC G4 "¢ ATI Mobility Radeon 9200 w/ 32MB DDR video memory Estimated Ship: 1-3 business days Free Shipping Subtotal $1,674.00 ----------------------------------- Dan Sat Jan 29, 2005 12:50 am ----------------------------------- Well it realy depedns on what u are planing on doing with this laptop. Like for just tyeping up documents, almost anything will work hosntly. If u are planing on taking it to every class and it is just for school things like notes then u should be looking for light and protobal. If it is for more then notes and u need somthing to test crazy theroys realting to progaming and like to game, then u whount somting with power over probotiblity. ----------------------------------- wtd Sat Jan 29, 2005 1:06 am ----------------------------------- Wow... just did a search to see if I could fid something decent on the x86 side of things and everything's either horrifically overpriced or underspecced. $1600CAD notebooks with "upto" 3.5 hours of battery life? That's pathetic. And those are the power efficient models! ----------------------------------- Paul Sat Jan 29, 2005 10:44 am ----------------------------------- My plan is for the high performance needs I'll get a good desktop. And with the difference in price between a good laptop and a good desktop, I'll buy a crappy laptop. For school stuff and moving around, ie: word processing. ----------------------------------- zomg Sat Jan 29, 2005 11:37 am ----------------------------------- Well it realy depedns on what u are planing on doing with this laptop. Like for just tyeping up documents, almost anything will work hosntly. If u are planing on taking it to every class and it is just for school things like notes then u should be looking for light and protobal. If it is for more then notes and u need somthing to test crazy theroys realting to progaming and like to game, then u whount somting with power over probotiblity. ill definitly be bringing the laptop around with me, and i wont really need it for gaming cuz my desktop servers that purpose. so i guess ill go with the centrino, the one im looking at has only like a 13 inch screen so its really small $1699.99 ----------------------------------- josh Sat Jan 29, 2005 11:39 am ----------------------------------- I would go with the mac then if you are not going for gaming, from what I have seen of them, they are really small and light and extremely powerfull. What program are you going into in university? ----------------------------------- MihaiG Sat Jan 29, 2005 1:11 pm ----------------------------------- there is also the tablet PC its a laptop that flips arounf and works like a palm pilot ----------------------------------- josh Sat Jan 29, 2005 1:42 pm ----------------------------------- not just like a palm pilot, you can do many other things. That might be a good thing to consider if you are taking courses where you need to draw many diagrams in your notes as you can just flip it over and hand draw a quick diagram. ----------------------------------- Pickles Sat Jan 29, 2005 2:35 pm .. ----------------------------------- my problem going into university next year is which to get, a desktop or a laptop.. im cheap so it will be one or the other, and the only way i could see a laptop is taking it to class, but would i even take it to class all the time i wonder? seems like the safe bet would just be to get a desktop which is cheaper. ----------------------------------- Dan Sat Jan 29, 2005 3:25 pm Re: .. ----------------------------------- my problem going into university next year is which to get, a desktop or a laptop.. im cheap so it will be one or the other, and the only way i could see a laptop is taking it to class, but would i even take it to class all the time i wonder? seems like the safe bet would just be to get a desktop which is cheaper. Well that also depends on what uni u are going to, some now have wifi all over campus. in witch case it whould be realy good to have a laptop with wifi......... ----------------------------------- Tony Sat Jan 29, 2005 3:34 pm Re: .. ----------------------------------- would i even take it to class all the time i wonder? the only reason I was taking my laptop with me is because it weighted less than a textbook :lol: and I used it as a map to find my way around the campus the first week or so.. you don't actually take notes on a laptop. But then again I never managed to get any assignments done in the residence and would prefer to go else where with my laptop to work. ----------------------------------- josh Sat Jan 29, 2005 3:55 pm ----------------------------------- so you prefer to write tham? I find that if I am taking alot of notes and don't type them up then I can't read them later (I am sped for messey handwriting) ----------------------------------- Pickles Sat Jan 29, 2005 4:11 pm ----------------------------------- ty, i probably will just get a desktop, cause i figure id probably just end up using the laptop as a desktop really, ----------------------------------- josh Sat Jan 29, 2005 4:38 pm ----------------------------------- you could get a "desktop replacemetn" like a widescreen toshiba for the odd tiem you want to take it somewhere ----------------------------------- wtd Sat Jan 29, 2005 5:24 pm ----------------------------------- I really recommend against going cheap on the laptop end and high-end for the desktop. When something in a desktop PC breaks, there's a decent chance you can fix it yourself. When something in a laptop breaks, it's gonna cost an arm and a leg to fix. This isn't entirely avoidable, and this is why laptop warranties are a good thing, but the best way to avoid it is to buy a decent laptop in the first place. Apple, IBM and Toshiba have the best ratings for quality and customer service (should things go wrong). Companies like HP/Compaq, Dell, Gateway, eMachines, etc. have abysmal ratings. My suggestion: Get a decent laptop and pair it with a nice (full-size) keyboard and mouse for your dorm room. If you're into games, buy yourself a PS2, XBox or GameCube. Two systems sounds nice, but you'll only ever be using one at a time, and you'll end up using one of them 95% of the time. ----------------------------------- josh Sat Jan 29, 2005 5:38 pm ----------------------------------- don't buy HP, y HP desktop causes me so much grief because of the stuff they put on it it is unbeleviable, can't even do a normal system restore. ----------------------------------- MihaiG Sat Jan 29, 2005 8:10 pm ----------------------------------- just reofrmat the drive...and get windXP pro orLinux ----------------------------------- josh Sat Jan 29, 2005 8:17 pm ----------------------------------- I don't want to spend the money, and I don't want to "buy" it because M$ is gunna be cutting off updates for ones that are "bought". As for Linux, I want to be able to play my games so thats out. but lets not hijack the thread o.k. :? ----------------------------------- Cervantes Sun Jan 30, 2005 9:09 am ----------------------------------- just reofrmat the drive...and get windXP pro orLinux don't buy HP, y HP desktop causes me so much grief What josh says goes farther than you think. If josh's hp is anything like my dad's, he can't reformat windows, because it's stuck on a part of the harddrive that is untouchable (that is, you can't write to it). Reformatting will remove everything BUT the OS. As for Linux, I want to be able to play my games so thats out. Heh. :shifty: ----------------------------------- Martin Sun Jan 30, 2005 9:24 am ----------------------------------- Does anyone else find it hilarious that Microsoft is abusing its product's crappy design to stop piracy? ----------------------------------- josh Sun Jan 30, 2005 9:52 am ----------------------------------- just reofrmat the drive...and get windXP pro orLinux don't buy HP, y HP desktop causes me so much grief What josh says goes farther than you think. If josh's hp is anything like my dad's, he can't reformat windows, because it's stuck on a part of the harddrive that is untouchable (that is, you can't write to it). Reformatting will remove everything BUT the OS. As for Linux, I want to be able to play my games so thats out. Heh. :shifty: yep, it is on a seperate recovery partition (the D drive). but my PC also made a set of recovery CD's when I first set it up. But I have heard that there may be cd's that will let you get rid of that partitoin if you want to format the whole drive. You may need to have a new set of XP install CD's if you do. ----------------------------------- zomg Sun Jan 30, 2005 10:52 am ----------------------------------- just reofrmat the drive...and get windXP pro orLinux don't buy HP, y HP desktop causes me so much grief What josh says goes farther than you think. If josh's hp is anything like my dad's, he can't reformat windows, because it's stuck on a part of the harddrive that is untouchable (that is, you can't write to it). Reformatting will remove everything BUT the OS. As for Linux, I want to be able to play my games so thats out. Heh. :shifty: couldnt ya just take a magnet to it :lol: ----------------------------------- josh Sun Jan 30, 2005 12:31 pm ----------------------------------- for some reason, I don't think that will work very well...... ----------------------------------- Martin Sun Jan 30, 2005 3:31 pm ----------------------------------- Back when I was your age, we didn't have fancy schmancy laptops. All we had was two sticks and a rock, and we had to share the rock! ----------------------------------- wtd Sun Jan 30, 2005 4:46 pm ----------------------------------- As for Linux, I want to be able to play my games so thats out. When you have to format and reinstall and your homework that took 6 hours is wiped out, you'll have very little time for gaming. In general, college will leave you with very little time to play games. $200 for a console and a vast array of games you can play is a pretty good deal, especially considering how fast even a good gaming PC is oing to be outdated. ----------------------------------- zomg Sun Jan 30, 2005 4:49 pm ----------------------------------- Back when I was your age, we didn't have fancy schmancy laptops. All we had was two sticks and a rock, and we had to share the rock! How old are u?!? :shock: :P ----------------------------------- josh Sun Jan 30, 2005 5:27 pm ----------------------------------- As for Linux, I want to be able to play my games so thats out. When you have to format and reinstall and your homework that took 6 hours is wiped out, you'll have very little time for gaming. In general, college will leave you with very little time to play games. $200 for a console and a vast array of games you can play is a pretty good deal, especially considering how fast even a good gaming PC is oing to be outdated. I know, I actually prefer my Xbox for most games, but I can't play Tachyon, any good flight sims, or Battle For Middle Earth on my xbox :) I am saying this from the viewpoint of a grade 10 student who still has time for gaming. ----------------------------------- md Mon Jan 31, 2005 3:55 pm ----------------------------------- Back when I was your age, we didn't have fancy schmancy laptops. All we had was two sticks and a rock, and we had to share the rock! How old are u?!? :shock: :P Martin, we're surrounded by young 'uns! better get outa here while it's still legal ;)