Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: redman555 on July 06, 2009, 10:24:09 PM
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Well, started college. I need a laptop that will last me atleast 4 years, can play afew games, not many though, and are pretty fast. Needs a good amount of memory. Anyone have some suggestions? I kinda wanna find one WITHOUT vista..... considering how many issues its had. I have a fairly large price range, prolly anywhere up to 1200-1500
-BigBOBCH
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If i were u i would buy a Laptop from Costco, they have a amazing return policy. You can bring stuff back to them even if its been used and over 6 months old! and get cash back! They also have alot of specials too
http://www.costco.com/Common/Category.aspx?ec=BC-EC5-Cat84&pos=1&whse=BC&topnav=&cat=56670&eCat=BC|84|56670&lang=en-US (http://www.costco.com/Common/Category.aspx?ec=BC-EC5-Cat84&pos=1&whse=BC&topnav=&cat=56670&eCat=BC|84|56670&lang=en-US)
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If you need a laptop for school and perhaps hobby (pictures, music etc.) a macbook pro is an excellent choice. It runs OSX instead of Vista ;)
It comes with fairly handy built in applications that handle photo retouching, composing etc. Everything works plug&play where in Vista you need to hunt and download drivers and third party apps to do simple things.
Basically it's only downside is it doesn't play windows games.
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If you need a laptop for school and perhaps hobby (pictures, music etc.) a macbook pro is an excellent choice. It runs OSX instead of Vista ;)
It comes with fairly handy built in applications that handle photo retouching, composing etc. Everything works plug&play where in Vista you need to hunt and download drivers and third party apps to do simple things.
Basically it's only downside is it doesn't play windows games.
with the education discount you should get a 15" macbook pro for ~$1500, only with onboard 9400M gpu though :( the mid 15" has a 9600M GT which would probably run AH ok.
plays windows games just fine :aok (use boot camp and an old copy of XP)
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I used to be an avid MS supporter and I thought Mac users were some kind of a joke.
I knew they were used in photoediting and composing by professionals though. Then came the day when through work I had to get a macbook pro. Stress have to - it was the last thing I wanted to do really. I was totally pissed off because it meant relearning everything.
After a transition period I grew to like certain things about it. How fast it starts (1 sec from hibernation) how hardware works plug and play in a snap, how it has iLife built in (some say iLife is a joke but it beats paying 1000 bucks for pro software if all you do is tinkle around on freetime).
All things added I've grown to like this laptop a lot. It still has a few things that really irritate but overall I'm thinking this is not the last mac I'm going to get. I never thought I'd say this in public but there I just did.
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Well, started college. I need a laptop that will last me atleast 4 years, can play afew games, not many though, and are pretty fast. Needs a good amount of memory. Anyone have some suggestions? I kinda wanna find one WITHOUT vista..... considering how many issues its had. I have a fairly large price range, prolly anywhere up to 1200-1500
-BigBOBCH
You most likely will not find one without vista on it. Vista is not the devil, don't make it seem like it is if you are acting on hearsay. You could contacts your school and for a fee they may be able to provide you a copy for your machine. For 1300 you have a very wide selection of machines if you go on many website such as newegg.com or tiger direct.
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BigBob...I once hated Vista and vowed to myself that I'd never get it. My mom ended up getting a Vista Basic desktop, it was okay and I still didn't like Vista. My new laptop (Studio 15) has Vista Premium on it and I've not had any problems with it. Vista is fine now, most kinks are worked out. For 1200 you can easily get a Dell Studio 15, 17 with a helluva lotta upgrades. In this I got Vista Premium, Core 2 Duo 2.2Ghz, 4GB RAM, 320GB HDD, 256MB Radeon, Backlit keyboard (which I love, btw), all for about $900. For 1200+ you can get a better Vid card, processor, maybe even bigger HDD.
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Mac is ok but I am still mac intolerant. I'm not a MS fan but most folks are used to windows. Last thing someone going into college needs is having to learn their computer along with class loads.
For the money go ahead and get a vista machine. Once you turn off all the garbage it will be fine for school work and gaming. You should be more interested in battery life. If you see yourself using the machine outside on a bench or under the trees alot then you need more battery life. If you will use it plugged in most of the time then this is not such an issue. You will want built in WIFI also to access the schools system while away from hardwired areas.
In any case good luck with your choice and good luck with your schooling!
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Do what I did...go to cyberpowerpc.com
All their laptops are gaming laptops and can be purchased for under $1000. I have mine and it plays CoD fine and AH with graphics and high res easily. While they dont produce mine anymore, I had gotten a AMD dual core, 2GB RAM, 160GB HD, and a nvidia 7600 for $760. A lot of their upgrades can be done for $10-$15 such as 4GB of RAM or 320GB HD.
Cyberpower still offers their machines with XP last I knew but honestly, when you go to school the bookstore will have software extremely cheap. To upgrade to Windows 7 shouldnt cost much at the store which is what Im waiting for. Im waiting to go back to school to get my copy.
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Laptop suggestions?
Boat anchor
Paper weight
Door stop
Sandwich press
Frisbee
Night light
Roadside Emergency light
Slide under tires to escape from mud/snow/ice
Obstacle to hide your paper airplane making
"Go fetch" with the dog
Need more? :)
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If you need a laptop for school and perhaps hobby (pictures, music etc.) a macbook pro is an excellent choice. It runs OSX instead of Vista ;)
It comes with fairly handy built in applications that handle photo retouching, composing etc. Everything works plug&play where in Vista you need to hunt and download drivers and third party apps to do simple things.
Basically it's only downside is it doesn't play windows games.
+1 .. except if you go dual-boot with windows XP you can play games..
I used to be an avid MS supporter and I thought Mac users were some kind of a joke.
I knew they were used in photoediting and composing by professionals though. Then came the day when through work I had to get a macbook pro. Stress have to - it was the last thing I wanted to do really. I was totally pissed off because it meant relearning everything.
After a transition period I grew to like certain things about it. How fast it starts (1 sec from hibernation) how hardware works plug and play in a snap, how it has iLife built in (some say iLife is a joke but it beats paying 1000 bucks for pro software if all you do is tinkle around on freetime).
All things added I've grown to like this laptop a lot. It still has a few things that really irritate but overall I'm thinking this is not the last mac I'm going to get. I never thought I'd say this in public but there I just did.
+1
I converted over to MacBook Pro last fall and I've gotten hooked. The thing runs awefully cooler than either of the two Gateway laptops I had before.
Another thing.. the battery life is WAY beyond the other laptops I had. I get 4 hours out of mine. The last gateway had a 17" screen, but the darn thing was a bit clunky to lug around. I dropped back to a 15" MacBook Pro with no regrets.
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I have only really used two Apple OS's, both with school computers...
When I started elementary school our computer lab had some kind of computers... I know they were made by Apple I can't remember what the OS was called. We had these from the time I started kindergarten in '99 (and they were not new at the time) until I was in third grade or so when the school district started to upgrade to HP machines with XP. I can't really comment on it too much because it was so long ago and I don't really have much experience with the contemporary Windows OS (which I would assume would be 95 because it certainly was not up to the same standard as 98).
In the past couple of years my school district has been renovating all of the schools, and as well we've been getting funding from Pennsylvania's Classroom of the Future program we've been getting lots of fun electronic toys. This includes computers and projectors in every classroom and (with XP of course), for the Art and English departments, Macs.
In middle school we only got to use a desktop in the Art room with OSX (as far as Macs go at least, we of course had HP's all over the place). I should say, the second year we got to use it, because the first year it sat and collected dust because it never worked. Apparently the second year it was there it was trouble free, though. It was used for Photoshop and Safari so considering they probably spent twice as much on it as on the HP's and it couldn't do anything special it was totally worth it, because you HAVE to get a Mac if you're doing anything artisitic, because Macs are better at that for some reason.
At the high school every English classroom gets 30 or so Macbooks. I have to keep in mind that this was the first year we had them but.... well...
I don't really like laptops in the first place so that wasn't exactly a great experience. Usually about 5 or so of the Macs would be missing from each classroom because they refused to work for whatever reason and they had to be sent somewhere or someone called in because no one knew how to fix them. As far as my personal experience with the interface goes, as someone who's pretty much only used Windows machines, I found it totally bass-ackwards and generally retarded. On top of that, the things performed miserably... near the end of the year I was playing a flash game on it for about a half an hour with it on the desk, and when I took it off and put it on my lap it was HOT... and then it froze as I tried to log off.The only thing I really liked was the touchpad which was better that any that I've used before. All in all it was a worse experience than using my sister's miserably bloated two year old $600-ish Acer laptop with Vista (which I put W7 on and now works pretty well, I dual boot Windows 7 on this machine now and I have to say I like it a lot).
In comparison to the miserable failures that the Macbooks were, all of our HP's are up almost all the time (I say almost because even though I've never had a 'don't use that computer, it doesn't work' personally I'm sure it's happened a few times throughout the year), and if anyone has a problem XP is so familiar to everyone it's a pretty easy to get someone to fix it (like another student/teacher, not sending the thing to admin like the Macbooks :lol )
Personally with my, probably biased experience with Macs I would never buy one, mainly because I play games.
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The main issue i have with vista, it seems like everything you download has to download a different version because of it, just seems like its more of a pain then helpful lol
-BigBOBCH
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Years a go macs were better at graphics and video... but not any more.
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I beg to differ on that point Shuffler. It was and still is true for the desktops, for the most part. Laptops, however, are another ball game. Vista has all but crippled laptops and made them useless for any power type applications.
Current Mac laptops will run circles around the current Vista based laptops.
Me, I will never own a Mac anything. I will also never own a laptop of any kind.
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dunno ... MP4 is industry standard and Apple developed, Final Cut Pro is industry standard and Mac-only, Logic is industry standard and Mac-only. For creatives, Apple and Macs still rule the roost. :)
and their laptops are still the best out there, plus they can run Windoze if you really want :eek:
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In laptops that may be true........ I'm not much on those small comps. I don't believe many do any graphics on lappys though. Many of the movie making outfits that do 3D movies use MS stuff now.
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dunno ... MP4 is industry standard and Apple developed, Final Cut Pro is industry standard and Mac-only, Logic is industry standard and Mac-only. For creatives, Apple and Macs still rule the roost. :)
and their laptops are still the best out there, plus they can run Windoze if you really want :eek:
I disagree with the general statement. Final Cut Pro is being beaten about the head and shoulders by several PC only software solutions today. Linux is also a viable solution in many production houses requiring render farms.
MP4 is an open standard, which has been replaced by H.264/AVC. The later are superior to MP4. Apple is still clinging to MP4, but the rest of the world, for the most part, is using H.264/AVC.
In the desktop realm, people use what they are used to. Apple does not have any real advantages in that area, and has not had any, in that area, for a very long time.
Laptops are another story.
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FCP is still the best selling and mostly widely used by a long way, and still what you need on your CV as a pro.
sry I meant MPEG-4, based on quicktime, industry standard and apple developed. Apple embraced H264 earlier than anyone else (all their own streaming stuff has been HD/H264 for ages which is why it look so spectacular.)
As for Mac/Windoze debate its a matter of personal taste i guess. in 20yrs of owning/using/maintaining both I know the TCO is lower for macs, and productivity higher. YMMV. alot. ;)
edit: btw pretty much the only reason I own a Non-Mac PC is because its the cheapest way to play AH :)
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Except they still use MP4 for all the iPod videos. To my knowledge they are the only company still using MP4.
Your mileage may very, indeed. I got stuck on an Apple computer once to write a driver for it. That was the worst computer experience I have ever had. To this day, I have no idea how anyone can use one of those things. I tip my hat to those who can figure it out.
I realize this can get into near religious zealous territory, so I will just say, in closing, use what you like, like what you use. Apple/PCs have areas they both excel at and areas they both suck at and it is rare when they are on the same page.
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For your budget you can get a nice Asus laptop from Newegg. I have an M70 and it has a good sized HD and decent video. The G70 is nice too.
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They all suck when not working and are all incredible when working.
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what do you guys think bout this??
http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product.aspx?Prodid=11481396&whse=BC&topnav=&browse=&lang=en-US#
-BigBOBCH
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Wow I wish I knew about that side when I was buying...dang.
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Your mileage may very, indeed. I got stuck on an Apple computer once to write a driver for it. That was the worst computer experience I have ever had. To this day, I have no idea how anyone can use one of those things. I tip my hat to those who can figure it out.
My first exposure to Apple was a Macromedia Freehand course at night school ( for grins ) a few years ago. I spent more time figuring how to interract with the silly computer than completing the course.
Not sure when it happened, but, at least with Mac OS X 10.5 ( Leopard ) they now support the right-mouse button.. probably one of the best ideas ever produced by MS. The machine is far easier to use now.
About that laptop, BigBOB.. I'd throw up caution flags if the reviewers are mentioning low battery life. 70 minutes is too short for a laptop. Almost not even worth having one.
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well thats odd, the laptop isnt even showing up on the site now :cry
-BigBOBCH
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Consider a lenovo thinkpad if you really want a windows machine. I like the T series ones for size/performance ratio. My IBM T-41p has lasted many years, and it's fully field-serviceable by the end user. I had a fan go out (after 5 years of use) while I was TDY living in a billeting room with almost no tools, and replacing it took less than an hour. It has a socketed cpu, which I of course upgraded :) The hard drive is removeable with just a few screws and you can buy an additional drive chassis for just a few bucks. Some people say that the quality has dropped since IBM sold the line to Lenovo, but I think the "thinkpad" line is still essentially the same with regards to design philosophy. They're rugged, focus on the most important features, and can generally be repaired or rebuilt with nothing but a screwdriver.
On the other hand, if I was going to buy a laptop today I'd get a macbook or the smaller macbook pro. Those things are well built and they have lots of great features. I'd run either boot camp and windows 7, or parallels/vmware and load up MS office because that's what I use at work.
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Eagl has the right idea, but that begs the question; Does the Mac lappies hardware require proprietary drivers? If the standard WIndows desktop drivers work, then you could run the OEM version of Windows XP on it (not sure BOOTCAMP will work with Windows 7 yet).
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I have had several brands. Been most satisified with my macbook and my Thinkpads. I currently use an ok Dell lappy, but it doesnt come close to the quality of the lenovo thinkpads.
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I have had several brands. Been most satisified with my macbook and my Thinkpads. I currently use an ok Dell lappy, but it doesnt come close to the quality of the lenovo thinkpads.
I agree - we use Dells at work and they're OK. Things break occasionally, but they're pretty on-the-ball about fixing them if you're still under warranty. Lenovo's are generally more solid though. On the other hand, Lenovo shut the ex-IBM plant at the town in Scotland where I'm from doing serious damage to the local economy. Leaves a bit of a sour taste in the mouth even if - at a rational level - I understand the decision.
I wouldn't touch a Mac. I've had a Macbook Pro G4 for a couple of years and other than a bit a glitz that Vista and W7 come close to matching, I don't see any significant advantage in the OS. In fact, I find it a bit cumbersome compared with Windows and Gnome.
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Eagl has the right idea, but that begs the question; Does the Mac lappies hardware require proprietary drivers? If the standard WIndows desktop drivers work, then you could run the OEM version of Windows XP on it (not sure BOOTCAMP will work with Windows 7 yet).
To my knowledge, the macs use standard hardware and can run windows or linux out of the box. You're right, I dunno if win7 works yet however I've read lots of at least partially successful stories of people installing win7 as "vista". Heck, I got win7 running in a microsoft virtual PC under winXP by using vista defaults, so I can't imagine win7 not working on a mac either at release, or very shortly thereafter.
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Me, I will never own a Mac anything. I will also never own a laptop of any kind.
Damn MSIE 8.0 ate my previous response to this... hint - use compatibility mode when visiting these forums with IE 8.
Skuzzy, I assume that's your answer because you've never NEEDED a laptop. For reasons I won't type in a second time (damn MSIE 8), I have found that I need a laptop for both personal and official business use when I'm on temporary duty away from home. To make it so I don't hate every second I'm using the laptop, I buy really high quality laptops and keep them until they no longer do what I need them to do.
Philosophy - there are 2 ways to buy a laptop if you're going to be using one a lot.
1. Get a really good (probably expensive) laptop, and keep it for many years. This usually means that after a year or two your laptop has old or semi-obsolete components, but if the overall quality is high enough you really won't care. Case in point is my T-41p. It still runs winXP, linux, and win7 great even though it's only using a single core 2.0ghz pentium-m with 2 gig ram. I upgraded the optical drive to a dvd burner (not even available as an option when I first bought the computer), I have upgraded the cpu from the original 1.8ghz cpu, I added more ram, and I'm on it's second hard drive. But the screen still looks great, the vid card still runs most DX9 games just fine, and overall it's really been a great investment.
2. Get a cheapo laptop and replace it every year. This is a great option if you aren't really into maintaining your computers, either software or hardware. You can get some really nifty laptops for about $600, and you can replace it yearly for 4-6 years for the cost of one really high-end laptop. That way you always get newer technology, and you don't have to worry so much about the thing breaking out of warranty. You only give up minor performance hits compared to other brand-new laptops and it probably won't be super thin/light, but most people don't really care about saving that last half pound of weight from the laptop case. You also won't have to worry about replacing the battery... When the battery goes bad instead of buying a new $100 battery you just get a new laptop, hurray!
Most people are probably better off going the cheapo laptop route, replacing as required. My personal choice of using option 1 is that I have some requirements that are rarely found in cheapo laptops. I require a decently fast HD, need the thing to be light enough to haul around on business trips, and want enough graphics horsepower to run anything I might install, games, CAD software, whatever. By the time I get the features I demand, I'm usually well over $1500 so I might as well get a really nice laptop and keep it for a long time. That's why if I was buying today, I'd get a macbook or macbook pro. Those have really nice hardware specs and will run any OS you care to install using bootcamp or virtualization.
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^^ well said. I'm an option 1 guy, which is why I'll be ordering a 2.66GHz 15" Macbook pretty soon to replace my 2002 G4 Powerbook (which still works just fine) :)
Last time I looked there wasnt any real competition for Macbooks out there in PC world, maybe things have changed. Heres a challenge - find a PC notebook which matches or exceeds all these specs:
15.4" LED-backlit widescreen
2.66GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
1066MHz bus
4GB DDR3
9600M GT 256MB
320GB HD
7h battery life
5.5lb
Alloy construction (Ive had enough of creaky plastic POS like viaos)
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Oh, there have been many times a lappie would have been handy, but I refuse to pay for something I am not allowed to fix when it breaks.
I recently had a bad experience reinforce this. A friend of mine had a key go dead on his keyboard of his lappie. It was out of warranty. I took it apart, found the membrane contact had ruptured and seized around the key contact. No repairing that.
I called the company that made the lappie and tried to order a new keyboard. They refused to sell it to me. They claimed it was too difficult to remove and replace so the lappie had to be sent to them for repair.
I explained, I am looking at the keyboard now and see exactly what it will take to replace it. It was out of warranty, so I would be happy to assume the risk for the repair (a dozen solder points on a flat Mylar connector). They said no. Then the kicker.
To have them replace it was going to cost $300.00.
Have you ever asked a lappie maker what the policy is concerning replacement parts on a computer out of warranty? Or does everyone assume a lappie is a disposable unit?
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the fan on my G4 TiBook went a little noisy after playing Wolfenstein on it intensively for 6 months, got a OEM replacement as well as a new F11 key from a 3rd party supplier for next to nothing. an hour with a couple of torx drivers and it was good as new. later added a faster larger HD, airport card, RAM and pioneer DVD writer again cheaply and without trouble. could have also doubled the speed with a new processor but they were PowerPC, only used by Apple and hence expensive.
2 lessons:
* laptops arent designed to game on for hours at a time every day
* cleaning your keyboard with a 1200W vacuum is not a great idea
:)
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Oh, there have been many times a lappie would have been handy, but I refuse to pay for something I am not allowed to fix when it breaks.
Have you ever asked a lappie maker what the policy is concerning replacement parts on a computer out of warranty? Or does everyone assume a lappie is a disposable unit?
You need Lenovo thinkpad. Designed to be field serviceable by the end user, sometimes with a single screwdriver (or those small double-ended geekdriver ones with standard on one end, phillips on the other, complete with pocket clip). They post the service manuals online and you could buy the entire laptop part by part if you wanted to. I'm not sure if the "ideapad" line follows the same service philosophy, but thinkpad service should still work this way.
As for other manufacturers, my best advice is to contact a third-party "authorized service center" and talk nicely to the guy in the shop, see if they'll sell you the part. Sometimes it works...
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Well, I guess I should mention the other reasons why lappies are not a good fit for me.
The keyboards. They suck. Too small, non-standard layouts, no key travel. I am not a touch typist. I bang relentlessly on the keys. Yes, you can hook up a USB keyboard.
The lack of mouse. Touch pads drive me nuts. The thimble control on a Thinkpad (do they still use that?) is atrocious. Yes, you can hook up a mouse via a USB port.
The displays are ok, but just ok, on a good lappie.
After connecting a regular mouse and keyboard, why bother with a lappie?
I tip my hat to those who can use them without getting so frustrated they want to throw the damn things into the nearest body of water. I really mean that.
In another lappie incident, a person did not want Vista on thier lappie, so I slipstreamed a copy of XP Pro together from an old version they were not using any longer and managed to get it installed. During the installation process I had to restart a few times becuase I could not control the cursor and kept accidentally double-tapping the pad. By the end of that process I was ready to take a sledge hammer to that lappie.
Me and lappies are just not a good mix. I feel the same way about cell phones that are no longer phones anymore. Or trying to talk to someone who completely loses thier ability to focus after you say more than 140 words to them.