4200 rpm vs 5400 rpm...help!!

Arent compaqs made by HP now and HP is a good brand isn't it? Does anyone in this forum think a compaq laptop is any good?

HP bought Compaq several years ago, but at the time the two were just competing for the top bottom feeder spot anyway, so nothing much has really changed since then. Except that HP killed off some of the good things Compaq picked up when they took over DEC, like the Alpha processor and Digital Unix (which they renamed to Tru64) that were heads and shoulders above HP's similar offerings.

Anyway, it's been many many years since HP was a good brand for anything more than graphing calculators and laser printers (if you can find third party drivers for them). Anything else with their logo slapped on it, I tend to avoid.

When it comes to laptops, my first choice would be Apple. More so when they were designing a lot of their own hardware in the PowerPC days, but even still. Next up would probably be IBM/Lenovo. Fewer frills, and slightly more expensive, but put together very solidly. Dell is a distant third. Depending on who their supplier was for the time period your particular unit was built, the system could be of pretty good quality, or it could suffer from some kind of catastrophic failure in the not too distant future. Exploding motherboard capacitors and laptop batteries (made by Sony to be fair) have been major problems for Dell lately.

The rest I tend to avoid for various reasons... Toshiba since they're focused on the Asian market more than the US and Europe. Sony for trying to say that basically turning the system on is enough of a change to refuse to offer support... Gateway because they're another bottom feeder, and one that has been circling the bankruptcy drain for quite some time now. Etc, etc.

Moral of the story is... A Compaq system would look pretty, but would probably fall apart pretty quickly. If not physically, the cheap components used in its construction would be a never ending source of problems, since Windows doesn't take too kindly to poorly constructed hardware. And with laptops, there's very little you can do about cheap shoddy hardware, unlike desktops where you can usually mitigate the damage to a degree.

Make sure that you get your original Microsoft software, not HP backup disks or their own printed installation disks. Why? If you replace the hard drive later the HP disks are normally worthless when you change the hardware and then you will be paying for a new OS as well. Of coarse, HP will be happy to re-sell you new software.

This is the number one reason, not to buy HP/Compaq.

Although I've only done it a handful of times, the Recovery discs for HP's and Compaqs generally work fine when ONLY a replacement HD is needed.. Of course, those were IDE hard drives and in most cases, were stock HD replacements...But at least twice, I've used a different size HD as the replacement.

Still, a new "full" OS disc is always nice to have...just in case.

Hope this helps.

Grif

I do not agree. I have had many laptops over 10 years of time, and I found that a faster HD was the easiest way to speed up the performance of a laptop.

4200 RPM drives are very slow and will definitely slow down a laptop during most activities. A 5400RPM drive is the minimum that I would recommend, 7200RPM which are widely available are definitely preferrable. Most decent desktops these days have 7200RPM drives and it definitely makes a difference.

I just recently purchased a small form factor Fujitsu laptop that has a 4200 RPM drive (nothing faster is currently available) and the performance, especially during disk-intensive operations such as booting, loading an application (e.g. outlook, word, etc.), hibernation are unbelievably slow.

thanx. i think i agree with u there except im gonna buy the compaq from radio shack's site and cause its only $550 after rebate.

Or you could get a:
Dell Inspiron 1501 Notebook with AMD Athlon X2 Dual Core TK-53 Processor, 15.4" WXGA TFT, 1GB DDR2 SDRAM, 80GB hard drive, and 24x CD-RW/DVD Combo for $449 with FREE Shipping! at Dell
Dell Small Biz

ive been doing alot of searching and dell was actually my first choice but its not $449. not at their site anyway. it actually comes to $663. i trust dell way more than compaq which is why i was so concerned about getting a compaq.

The link I gave directs you to Dell, the laptop I specified, and right there, on that first page, shows the price as $449.

How I found out about that deal was from GotApex.com, which is one of many deal "click-through" websites that tell you where the deals are, and possibly what special conditions (codes or additional options)might be needed to arrive at the deal.

GotApex does not sell computers, or anything (I believe), but only directs you to other sites (Dell, CompUSA, NewEgg, TigerDirect, Costco, etc.).

dude i did not notice that link but just yesterday after u told me about it i went to dell's website and i selected the features u said and it came out to $663. also on the link u gave me they have 80 gb and 120 gb hard drives and when u go to the site manually and select the 1501 you see that the starting price is $499. wats going on here?

The link you did not see is right there in Post #8, it looks like: Dell Small Biz.
Notice the underline? Hover your cursor over it, notice the cursor changing to a "finger" (assuming you have the default cursor styles). That's a link! Click on it.

That link/deal is now gone, since generally those deals only last a few days. I was surprised to see that the link worked yesterday, when I responded above. I am not surprised to see it dead now.

You should check the GotApex (<- that is a link!) for any new deals coming along recently. For example, they have this one right now:
"Dell Vostro Notebook with AMD Dual Core, 15.4" WXGA with Anti-Glare, 1GB DDR2, 80GB Hard Drive, CDRW/DVDROM, 256MB Video, 802.11, and WinVista/XP from Only $499 with FREE Shipping!"

yea its cancelled. well its im sure there will be big back to school sales in august so ill get some good deals then.

its in the small business section and i was looking at the home section. thanx for ur help and im gonna add gotapex.com to my favorites.

I finally put to rest my Dell Inspiron 5000 notebook. I bought in the spring of 2000. I had/has a 12 GByte 4200 rpm disk. Never a problem but it is/was slow. Just bought a Dell Latitude D8200, it has a 80 GByte 7200 rpm disk. 4200 rpm disks are old technology, 5400 rpm is current and the industry is slowly moving to 7200 rpm disks.

well the computer im using now is like 2 yrs old and has 7200 rpm hard drive. my other computer has a 5400 but i still couldnt tell the difference because this computer has a faster processor and more ram. and the market also has 10,000 rpm hd and faster than that too i think. lol i bet theyre way too expensive though.

I just bought the same Compaq that you are considering-was on sale last week, for 449-499 at Office depot and circuit city,bou not on sale this week. I had a Compaq before and still works great!
I would be very concerned about buying Dell. Just that they hide their offers and make it tricky for the average but loyal client to access, tells me that the company is not trustworthy. Last year, I tried to get a laptop with 2coupons. It would not accept them, though both coupons said they were valid with other offers. Customer service(via e-mail, led me on a dance and would not refer my case to a supervisor, despite repeated requests.Then finally, one rep. inadvertantly accepted my claim was correct, but instead of letting the sale go through, for the first time, I got the supervisor. He then told me they would not give me the offers, even though technically I was right!
Well, how can you trust them to give you a high quality product?

Dude,
Have you not heard of the FTC (federal trade commission)? If Dell had a coupon(or coupons) and refused to honor them, get the FTC involved or a lawyer (this one of the few cases I believe in lawyer involvement). The allowed punitive damages can make it worth while and hopefully the intented goal of making them think twice the next time a customer wants to use two valid coupons together will happen.

BTW, I'm not an attorney and this is not legal advice.

Ok guys I wanted to go with the compaq but on the site that ChuckT gave me, www.gotapex.com, I was able to find a dell for $599. It should be much better than that compaq and that acer. It has an Intel Core 2 duo 1.8 GHz 256MB ATI Mobility Radeon X1400, 1 GB memory, and a 120 GB 5400 rpm HD. The original price was $1119 but you get a huge discount after you enter a coupon code they give you on gotapex.com therefore, I'd like to say thank you chuckT.

It also includes an 8x DVD dual-layer burner and b/g wireless.