Reply to: Contractor Laptops

[Lumiere]

Dell Inspiron 8500 some centrino 2gb RAM 60Gb HDD Windows 7

7 year old, despite my efforts doesn't want to die

as I mostly do RD / Outlook / Office works just fine ..

[scooterscot]

Mac itself mainly for web-browsing.

You want to be careful there...

I use me Mac mainly for determining if an aircraft will stay in the sky...

[d000hg]

I've got a Dell Vostro 1000 that cost me about £300 when I set up my company 3 years ago. Bottom of the line but has been very stable, and as it's used for work rather than installing loads of crap, it still runs fast enough too.

Also have MacBook, from the short period when Apple used the unibody aluminium case for the standard MacBook range. It's very beautiful but I don't really get Macs, I have Vista dual-booting on it for development work and use the Mac itself mainly for web-browsing.

[d000hg]

It's called for, and it's not biased.

It might well be called for but it certainly is biased, the language is deliberately reactionary. In real terms, the ugly design makes no difference to me. I set the power button on my desktop to do what I want (hibernate) and similar with the laptop-close (sleep) and that's pretty much it, now things Just Work.

I always got the impression my MacBook is not actually powered down fully in sleep mode though, the battery seems to slowly drain if I leave it shut a couple of days. Do you know if it's the case?

[oversteer]

My laptop is a Dell Inspiron 8000
It has a 1GHz Pentium 3 processor and 256Mb memory running Windows XP
It weighs as much as a small car but does have a nice 1600x1200 screen


I use it at home as a (not very portable) remote desktop client

[Clippy]

10 months and you've already updated the OS Which flavour of OS did you go for? How much was it? So the total cost was?

Details as above.

When I bought the laptop Windows 7 was due to be released but existing laptops with Vista were entitled to a 'free' upgrade to Windows 7 courtesy of Microsoft.

You only had to pay for admin and P&P of the media which was £17.

Not as bad as you have tried to make it sound and standard practice when buying a Windows laptop/PC just prior to a new OS release.

[scooterscot]

320Gb HDD
Windows 7 Ultimate (upgraded from Windows Vista Home)

2) Roughly how long have you had it?
10 months

3) What do you think of it? (quick summary of good/bad points)
Overall, good all round mid-range unit which I'm happy with considering it only cost £540.

10 months and you've already updated the OS Which flavour of OS did you go for? How much was it? So the total cost was?

[Clippy]

1) What laptop do you have?
Samsung Q320
Intel Core 2 Duo T6400 @ 2.00GHz
3Gb RAM
320Gb HDD
Windows 7 Ultimate (upgraded from Windows Vista Home)

2) Roughly how long have you had it?
10 months

3) What do you think of it? (quick summary of good/bad points)
Overall, good all round mid-range unit which I'm happy with considering it only cost £540.
Good - Looks stylish, excellent keyboard and build quality
Bad - A little bit bulkier than it should be for a 13" laptop. Screen viewing angle and colour depth weak but not a major issue for me as I connect the laptop to an external display.

4) Would you recommend it to others?
Yes, if you can get it for a similar price to myself otherwise you could probably get a better unit for the RRP of £700.

5) What laptop (if any) are you looking at for your next purchase?
I really wanted a Sony Z Series but just couldn't justify the cost but maybe next time.

[scooterscot]

1) What laptop do you have? 2006 Macbook pro, last production model before they went all aluminium cast thingy

2) Roughly how long have you had it? Since 2006

3) What do you think of it? Doh. It's great, reliable, it's not slowed down, keyboard eliminates at dusk (it is practical), great audio for a laptop... best feature is OS X of course, consideration for human interface is miles beyond other OS I've experienced. I've bought a new battery since purchase, the performance dies after about 1000 charges.


4) Would you recommend it to others? Yes, if I thought they could afford it, they're not cheap you know, professionals only.

5) What laptop (if any) are you looking at for your next purchase? Another Macbook pro. No reason to look for replacement this machine will not give up. 4 years and ticking...

[realityhack]

I happen to have the same model laptop as NF - it also has a missing sliver of plastic, on the right-front edge, so it could be a design issue.

Still running Tiger though. Nothing wrong with it, and based on the longevity of my last MacBook, there won't be for another 5 years.

1) MacBook 13" 2.16GH Core Duo 2GB 114GB (Ext 1TB)
2) ~3 years
3) Nothing wrong with it - use it everyday for hours. The (incredibly technophobic) Mrs RH uses it without any issues and it can run some nicely geeky developer tools OOTB
4) Absolutely - especially if family also use it from time to time
5) Probably a Pro 15" model with the antiglare (matt) screen, and this one will be bequeathed to Mrs RH full time.

[SueEllen]

1) What laptop do you have?
Lenovo 3000

2) Roughly how long have you had it?
Nearly 3 years but has 4GB of RAM in it

3) What do you think of it? (quick summary of good/bad points)
Good points - sturdy, good for dual booting into windows and linux
Bad points - damn ugly to look at

4) Would you recommend it to others?
Yes I recommend the brand if you need to use linux either to dual boot or on it's own.

5) What laptop (if any) are you looking at for your next purchase?
I need to work out what kit I actually need as I have 2 desktop towers as well. Though I probably get the same make again as I know they work with linux without too many problems.

[doodab]

no need for nine options to turn it off just to keep managers in work: close the lid and it goes off to sleep, open it and it wakes up immediately. I think the only times I've ever fully powered down have been when doing a hardware upgrade.

I have to say that's the first time I've ever read one of Joel's articles and thought "what a load of bollocks".

It would also be fair to mention his critique could equally well apply to the apple menu.

[NickFitz]

I love the usual uncalled for and biased dig at windows

It's called for, and it's not biased.

[Spacecadet]

no need for nine options to turn it off just to keep managers in work: close the lid and it goes off to sleep, open it and it wakes up immediately. I think the only times I've ever fully powered down have been when doing a hardware upgrade.
.

I love the usual uncalled for and biased dig at windows

let me see - to hibernate I can push the power button or click the windows icon and hit the hibernate button

(screenshot from my own laptop)

If I set the system to sleep when I close the lid (an option I leave off as I don't want it to do that) then it takes 5 seconds to sleep and the same to wake up. OK not instant but quick enough

[chef]

Admin's sorted it for you - it's now multiple-choice.

many thanks