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General discussion

Infinite Laptops

Mar 26, 2005 11:04AM PST

With so many laptops to choose from I don't know where to begin.

All I want the laptop to do is word processing, running programs like Matlab or Mathematica and surfing the internet.

Now i understand i can get one that performs all these operations for a low price, however i hate waiting!

When i click the application i want it load almost instantly.

So what kind of laptop should i get? I was told that centrino is great for word processing and has a good battery life. Any opinions?

Discussion is locked

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now to explain
Mar 26, 2005 11:24AM PST

Centrino is not a procesor, it's a marketing sham

Centrino is what Intel calls it's new mobile solution
based around the Celeron M (phu yuck) and the Pentium M (mmm...wholesome Pentium M goodness)

Celeron M laptops are cheap
Pentium M laptops are very expensive

both get good battery life, as their CPU's designed from the ground up for mobile use (following Intel's normal design standards, the Celeron M is based off the Pentium M, which is based off the Pentium III, which is why it's such a good CPU)


i would say your "i need it to load instantly" request can be handled easily
you don't need a Pentium M for that

and btw
nothing with a comptuer is instantanious, so please, don't expect it to be

but i can certainly understand you not wanting it to be slow in the sense that it takes it 5 minutes to load Word, which would make it horribly un-productive

you also need to understand that for a laptop to get online you need an internet connection and either a wire going to it, or a Wi-Fi router and an add in card (Centrino equipped notebooks sometimes feature onboard Wi-Fi reception, which would mean you don't need the card)

as gaming is not something you want to do, I would suggest this notebook
http://www.newegg.com/app/viewProductDesc.asp?description=34-115-171&depa=3

The AMD Sempron 3000-M should be easily capable of anything you'll need, and should give you decent battery life


if you need more battery life, consider this guy:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=34-115-181&depa=3

it's basically trading the Mobile Sempron for a Pentium M 715

and trading slow integrated graphics, for slow integrated graphics...from a different company

if you want more power on all fronts
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=34-114-127&depa=3

that Toshiba should deliver with flying colors, Radeon X600 (around GeForce 6200 level of power), faster Pentium M, 60GB HDD, 512MB of DDR

all the notebooks i've suggested use 512MB of DDR
i'd say 512MB is the minimum


this one would offer more CPU performance, but less graphics power:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=34-110-148&depa=3


save with this one:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=34-146-046&depa=3

this would probably be another quick book:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=34-224-004&depa=3

larger HDD, more RAM, and a faster CPU than anything previously shown, i'm not sure how the X600np stacks up to the Mobility Radeon 9700 though...


basically same thing but from Acer:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=34-115-180&depa=3


here is a tablet PC:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=34-148-011&depa=3


better tablet PC:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=34-110-125&depa=3

this one would be a beast, faster than anything else i've suggested this far:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=34-115-178&depa=3


alright, this would be fastest notebook you could buy:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=34-224-008&depa=3

it weighs 12 lbs and probably has less than 4 hours of battery life, it would get hotter than...yeah

it's a DTR, not a notebook


i'd say grab a nice Pentium M book and be happy

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Why all Newegg?
Mar 26, 2005 11:35AM PST

I would say customize a laptop from either hp or dell or wait a couple of months for the 64-bit tsunami to reside first. My recommendations is for you to wait for the first 64-bit pentium M. If not, get a current pentium M. Toshiba is good choice.
Roger

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um
Mar 26, 2005 11:59AM PST

they aren't newegg built
there are:

Acer
IBM
Toshiba
Fujitsu
and ABS notebooks suggested there

customizing isn't a bad idea, except that Dell sucks, and HP is expensive

also
64-Bit Pentium M's would cost a fortune (a normal 32-bit Pentium M 2GHZ is around $600, consider a 64-bit, and it's Intel...we are talking $1100 CPU here)


you don't need 64-bit BTW
and the next mobile chips from Intel aren't going to be 64-bit Pent M's

their going to be Dual Cored chips, on the Yonah core
should be out in Q4

64-bit chips atm aren't gonna help you in the future, as everything is going dual core...