Laptops

One thing that may possibly help when this question gets asked around here is for the poster to declare their "price range."

There is such a massive variety of devices available now - asking what kind of laptop you should buy is like asking what kind of car you should buy.

For instance, you say you want to "email friends back home and watch TV/movies." Well you can get one that will do that for $299. The higher you go from there, the more powerful and bullet-proof the system becomes. It's easier for the folks here (a wealth of experience and knowledge) to give more applicable advice if you have a target budget.

Note that properly mounting the laptop adds a lot to the ability to withstand shock and vibration, even in the mid-range machines.

And, there are about 1000 other members and non-members reading this over the coming days and weeks because they have the same question.

Here is a rough guideline, for instance:

$300-$400: budget notebooks and good netbooks. Fairly low-end horsepower, but able to do what you are asking. Notebooks not likey to be built with highly robust components, but a $400 netbook would be a solid one. The trade-off would be no CD/DVD drive (without purchasing separately) and a smaller screen.

$400-$600: Very nice netbooks and mid-range notebooks. Mid horsepower on the notebooks, but a good tradeoff between speed, reliability, and price.

$600-$900: Upper end of the "mid-range." Bigger screens, more memory, faster multi-core processors. The reliability goes up in this range.

$900-$1200: beginning of the higher-end notebooks and the low-end Macs. Fast Windows machines with lots of memory and multi-core processors the norm. Blue ray players and SSD hard drives begin to appear here.

$1200-1500: Middle of your higher-end machines here. Robust components and most bells and whistles are available. Some "Toughbooks" fall in this range.

$1500-$2000: High-end Windows notebooks and most Macs. Large screens, fast processors, blue ray player/burners, 4 Gigs+ memory, huge hard drives, and SSD drives becoming prevalent. Several very robust brands including some Toughbooks here.

$2000-$3000: Many high-end notebooks and the upper Macs. Very robust with top components. Lots of SSD drives and Toughbooks available with all bells and whistles.

$3000-$6000: "Enthusiast and bulletproof" machines. The fastest multi-core processors, large SSD drives, Blueray burners, Win 7 Ultimate, waterproof and drop-proof Toughbooks, super high-res screens, gobs of fast RAM, and full-service extended warranties. These are high-end gaming rigs and upper end Toughbooks. The fastest and toughest systems.

As you can see, just saying "what should I get" leaves a lot of room. They almost ALL do email and play movies these days.

Now if you said, "I'm looking for a new Windows 7 notebook with a 15" to 16" screen, at least 3G of memory, Bluray, and at least a 150G SSD hard drive. My budget is $800-$1000." Well, that would get you some precise replies methinks.

Hope this helps somewhat.

 

Keep in mind that all this stuff is tax deductible. I would know, I spent half the day at HR Block writing it off.

 

Yup. EVERYTHING. I'll bet those hours at HR Block were worth it!

 

Back to School Deals

Actually now that Back To School is going full blast, almost ALL the PC manufactures are offering really good deals.
Dell right now has some good deals.
http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/sna.aspx?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&~topic=weekend_deals&dgc=EM&cid=57895&lid=1478841&acd=SWVT36-A9OFX-C0FS1I-BW3KJT-5P0I8-v1


If he's not too choosy, check Best Buy and other big box stores.
If he can get an Educational Discount somehow, those are always the best deals.
Apple has some tempting ones out there now.
http://www.apple.com/mac/


For students they're giving away and iPod Touch with the new back to school computers.
http://store.apple.com/us/browse/campaigns/back_to_school?aid=www-naus-bts2010-00051


Parallels, the PC emulation program is on sale most places for $40. So buy a Mac, spend $40 on Parallels and have two computers in one. Would be real good for kids as they bounce back and forth between PC and Apple programs all day long.


If he's tech savy, most cost effective with latest technology would be to go to Dell Outlet:
http://www.dell.com/us/en/dfh/desktops/ct.aspx?refid=desktops&s=dfh&cs=22


Hope that helps someone.

 

I have had a laptop in my truck since 02. Started off with an expensive Dell, a $400 HP(that was 5yrs ago) and 2 high end gaming Dell(major heat) units. All sit in my passeger seat running 24/7 with my streets and trips GPS while driving. The only failures were a cracked screen and a dead screen.None of these failures had to do with being in a truck. If you want a TV tuner, look at the USB sticks that sell for about $100. I wouldn't recomend any stand if your going to use while driving as the vibration is the biggest enemy. The whole heat issue is really over blown, mostly by companies to sell laptop coolers. Computers will ,like a truck, shut down before any damage is done. Your legs might get warm if it's on your lap but the computer won't be harmed. If your still worried about heat get an Intel Core 2 Duo processor with a P designation(P8400-P9800) and integrated graffics.

 

Ive run a Dell Inspiron 1720 for nearly 4 years out here,it was built to order with an internal modem (no external gizmo's to get in the way and get broken off)
Nice 17" screen makes movie watching pretty nice.
Its big enough to cover my steering wheel,which is much nicer then those little notebook thingys.

NOT ONE SINGLE ISSUE SINCE DAY ONE!
yeah,I would buy direct from Dell again,no doubt.

 

Yup,
CB Radios
GPS Updates
Laundry "Soap"

" E V E R Y T H I N G"

 

buy a refurbished toughbook. i had nothing but problems with my toshiba. when the hard drive recently failed for the second time in a year, i found a toughbook on ebay for 700 bucks. best laptop ive ever owned. looked like brand new and had been upgraded with 120gig hard drive, cd/dvd, bigger ram, etc. i ran the model number thru panasonics discontinued model website. it came originally with 40 gig hd and floppy drive, and cost $5000. prett good deals on eBay

 

macbook

Easiest to use when going from location to location.

 

you might want to limit the usage while the truck is moving. rough patches of road can put a lot of strain on the hinges for the screen.