OT: what notebook comp to buy???

[kyleN20]

im headed to the next level of education, and i need a notebook PC. i want a apple i-book, with a 14 inch display, and a super drive, when shopping around and checking reviwes it seems to be a good choice and value. apple to me seems to be a little bit like bmw, kinda a enthuiest computer or somthing like that.

thanks for the input

kyle+

[Alexlind123]

IMO, mac is not an "enthusiast" computer at all, if any computer were it would be a pc because you can upgrade them just as you can your bmw. an apple might work great for you, but instead of upgrading for a few hundred dollars you can buy a new apple for a couple thousand. Also, if you are using a conventional PC now, you would have to get used to an apple computer and having a funnny mouse among other things.

[uscharalph]

im headed to the next level of education, and i need a notebook PC. i want a apple i-book, with a 14 inch display, and a super drive, when shopping around and checking reviwes it seems to be a good choice and value. apple to me seems to be a little bit like bmw, kinda a enthuiest computer or somthing like that.

thanks for the input

kyle+
If I were buying one, it 98% would not be an Apple, but that's just me.

[SharkmanBMW]

im headed to the next level of education, and i need a notebook PC. i want a apple i-book, with a 14 inch display, and a super drive, when shopping around and checking reviwes it seems to be a good choice and value. apple to me seems to be a little bit like bmw, kinda a enthuiest computer or somthing like that.

thanks for the input

kyle+

I cannot help with the computer, but are you aware that you sig pic is still not working?!

we are still seeing the red X

[brodee]

Hopefullly this thread won't turn into the normal apple-vs-pc debate that most do.

First thing you need to think about is what it's going to be used for. Mainly word processing? graphics? etc. Then decide what to get. I'm personally a PC person for a lot of reasons. I build my own computers so I'm not real fond of paying the price for a mac just for that. I also us a LOT of different apps and work with a lot of hardware that I connect to my computers. Most of this won't work with a MAC, or at least won't work easily with one.

For graphics mac is a good choice. I don't think because of power like it used to be, but because of standards and your peer group. If everyone else is using a mac and you aren't it can make it difficult to work together.

If it were me, I'd get a new Dell. The price is great, they are a nice machine, and you can upgrade them later if you want reasonably. They also should do anything any teacher will ask you to do, and they come with a great warranty. I've had 4 Dell laptops, 3 Toshibas, and over 100 IBM's.

[infinity5]

apple overrates their hardware speeds a whole lot.. i mean, they ARE swtiching to intel structure aren't they? they're also insanly overpriced. the I-books look so cool though, i'd get one too :) but then i couldn't play any games on it, or use lots of other software i have.... and never upgrade/customize it. oh, and fooling with settings seems to be nearly impossible in the user-friendly mac world :)

[Jay 535i]

I'm a graphic designer and I use both Macs and PCs every day.

My advice is the same as it would be if you were buying a car: Buy what you like. They all do the same thing, and a few seconds here or there are really just academic. Get the one you dig. You won't go wrong either way.

[tim s]

strong, reliable, & a 3 Year Parts & Labor Warranty up front.
the only thing we sell.
my niece is a graphics designer using mac, she still uses a pc for other stuff.
tim s.

[Garlic Breath]

I have an Apple PowerBook and a Dell pc. If i were to buy another laptop or computer it would be an Apple.

[liquidtiger720]

Laptop - Sony Vaio...just cause they are cool. Toshiba's usually are the cheapest around.

A desktop- build your own.

[Gayle]

My understanding is you want to go to UCLA and study finance.

As a relatively recent MBA graduate, I think you will have software issues if you go the apple route. The business world and the programs are geared toward PCs.

I can personally testify to Dell's warranty. When I started back to biz school bought what was then the fast, big closet version. After a year it was medicore compared to what was available and I had paid 2x what the same was selling for a year later. People who were giving me a hard time about why had I bought so much storage a year later were buying machines with more. About 3 years later just before the extended waranty expired, my computer overheated and developed issues. Worked fine as long as the room didn't get to hot. Would not work at all when it hit a certain temp. Sounds like a BMW.

Dells on line techs are a bit of a pain. If you have a problem, the somehow manage to cut you off if you go over 15 minutes. It ruins their stats. But you eventually get one that that will hang in there for you. They sent out service people and did one organ transplant after another another. Then they finally called it in for an autopsy and gave me a newer refurbished one that had the currently acceptable speed and space. That got me through another 3 years.

When we got new ones we bought a laptop and a desktop through Dells outlet store. They have the Dell waranty. They are ones that people buy and return. It is the Sears Scratch and Dent store of computers. You get a lot of bang for your buck doing that.

You really have to start with what and how will you be using it to make decisions but my theory is they can never be too fast and never have big enough closets. Just one womans opinion.

[Randell]

at work I have a Dell D600 (1.6ghz 2gb ram) and a Toshiba Tecra M2 (1.6Ghz 1gb ram)... the dell is by FAR the better machine, and it has nothing to do with the amount of ram it has

so i would definitely recommend Dell if you are gonna go down that road. they are trying to take over the world with ridiculously low prices, but the machines have the quality to back them up. most people in the company i work for use the same Dell laptop (D600), and i've NEVER seen one break

the same can't be said for Toshiba, the last machine we had bulk amounts of (Tecra 2100) were so bad they gave us a 'we're sorry for selling you rubbish' trade-in program for new Tecra M2s... which are better but they're crap to use.

then of course there's apple.. they look funky but the last one i used was a powerbook circa 1998, i'm sure things have changed a lot since then!

[Jay 535i]

If you're going to go with a PC, Dell is great. Or get a savvy friend who'll help you build the same system from off-the-shelf parts for half the price.

[liquidtiger720]

I feel left behind, because I don't have a laptop, and everybody in college sitting next to me has some new fancy doodad, with thier apple ipod stuck into thier ear canals.


The one reason why I want a laptop is wifi! Surfing bimmer.info during bus. 100 (read....boring crap) is priceless.

[Gayle]

Wifi is awesome. Can't wait til it becomes even more ubiquitis.

[tim s]

first was a failed back light, 10 minutes on the phone & had rma setup including wait time, unit was picked up & returned within 3 working days.

second was a failed motherboard, 15 minutes on the phone & had my rma setup including wait time, unit was picked up & returned in within 2 working days.

third was a power supply on a unit 2 weeks out of warranty, 15 minutes on the phone & they shipped me a replacement power supply at no charge had it next day.

my point is i never had to spend an insane amount of time on the phone to get the issues resolved, i have delt with hp, dell, & toshiba in the past all with never spending less than an hour on the phone running through pointless things they read on their screens. with panasonic i call & describe to them what i did to get to the base of the problem. they have yet to disagree or deny my rma request. they have even left us keep the customer's hard drives so that they would not lose any data. the last hp we had serviced the tech support would not even help troubleshoot anything until we ran a system restore. hp also told us that the first thing they do is run a system restore resulting in losing all your data when they recieve a unit for service.

sorry for the short rant.
i have been selling & repairing pc's for small business's over 8 years & have learned how valuable my time really is.
i much rather not sell it if i have to fix it.
tim s.

[brodee]

sorry for the short rant.
i have been selling & repairing pc's for small business's over 8 years & have learned how valuable my time really is.
i much rather not sell it if i have to fix it.
tim s.

When people used to ask me what PC to buy I told them to narrow it down to 2 or 3 brands then call their tech support #'s and find out how long you're on hold before talking to a person. Then remember the next time you're calling it would be because something was broke and you'd be frustrated and that a long hold time would make you even more mad. Use that info to help you decide.

[Gayle]

When people used to ask me what PC to buy I told them to narrow it down to 2 or 3 brands then call their tech support #'s and find out how long you're on hold before talking to a person. Then remember the next time you're calling it would be because something was broke and you'd be frustrated and that a long hold time would make you even more mad. Use that info to help you decide.


Yeah, Dell does suck in that regard. Besides the long wait to get to a tech, if you have anything seriously wrong, be prepared to go though a lot of techs who will transfer you or put you on hold and you just mysteriously get cut off when you exceed the 8 or 10 or 12 minutes they are supposed to handle calls in. Before I get challenged on being negative about service professionals, let me tell you that I had two good Dell techs flat out tell me that a lot of their colleagues do that trick to keep their stats up. Having been through this I still bought Dell when I replaced.

[tim s]

are contracted, as in they are not owned by dell. i had a customers notebook i shipped to them not working, it came back not working, i called them again spend another hour on the phone, shipped it back out a second time, got it back the second time not working, called again, told them keep it until it works, tech says we can't do that, in the contract they are required to ship the unit back out within 24 hours, fixed or not.
it only took 2 1/2 weeks to get the unit repaired.

my other big complaint is dell wants to ship you the parts & talk you through installing them. they tried to do this with another client's notebook, i asked dell if they where going to pay me to change the board. they decided to have a tech come on-site since i complaint for 15 minutes about the extra the customer paid for a 3 year on-site warranty.

the only toshiba i ever sold to a customer came in 1 week with a dead keyboard, i sent it to toshiba, they claimed for 3 weeks they did not recieve it, after i threatened to contact police with the signature provided by the shipping company they found it within 2 hours. 2 more weeks go by & they tell me the unit it to new & they don't have parts. they shipped it back to me & i return it to my dist.
this unit was now almost 2 months old & the customer demanded a refund.

as for hp the distributed an update for their integrated wireless adaptor that after installed would no longer allow it to connect to any linksys wireless router older than 3 months old version. they had no fix for this & told me to buy a new linksys even though the linksys i had worked fine with the notebook for 6 months & other wireless adaptors connected no problem.
before we came to this conclusion there was about a months time & we shipped it to them twice. i talked to a repair tech & he told me they purchased all new wireless test routers & ap's every 3 months.
i was that frustated with hp i had to let my brother (business partner) call hp.

obviously these are the worse of the stories i have, but i do have more.
life it to short to be calling tech supprt for hours onsomething you have money invested in that does not work.

tim s.

[brodee]

are contracted, as in they are not owned by dell. i had a customers notebook i shipped to them not working, it came back not working, i called them again spend another hour on the phone, shipped it back out a second time, got it back the second time not working, called again, told them keep it until it works, tech says we can't do that, in the contract they are required to ship the unit back out within 24 hours, fixed or not.
it only took 2 1/2 weeks to get the unit repaired.

All my Dells had next day on-site service. Had them replace the mother board in one and then later the keyboard. Showed up the next day with the right parts and had it done within an hour, didn't have to ship anywhere. Of course the company I worked for at the time paid for the warranty so I didn't have to :)

[DaCan23]

Price no option - IBM/Lenovo Thinkpad or Sony

Price is an option - Toshiba or HP/Compaq

Dells are garbage, my GF has had 2 Dells via work and they are cheap junk, their PCs are worse, they use the cheapest parts.

I've had 3 IBM Laptops and they have all been great.

[granit_silber]

im headed to the next level of education, and i need a notebook PC. i want a apple i-book, with a 14 inch display, and a super drive, when shopping around and checking reviwes it seems to be a good choice and value. apple to me seems to be a little bit like bmw, kinda a enthuiest computer or somthing like that.

thanks for the input

kyle+
Kyle,

I am an Apple-lover. after many years of forcing PCs with complicated instruction sets to do things that they should have done out of the box it was refreshing to move to a platform that intergrates seemlessly.
While it is true that Apple is switching chip providers they are not installing pentium chips into their machines. Intel is developing some really awesome stuff that will, once again, revolutionize the PC market.

In terms of stability, Apple is amazing. While it is true that ANY computer can crash the approach that Apple has taken seperates the OS memory from the application memory (read: no blue screen of death). No crashes in almost 3 years!!! They are also less suseptable to viruses. Not because they're bulletproof, but because a lot of virus writers use a system derived from Linux (as does the Mac) so they don't write a virus that could come back to get them.

Upgrading:
It's always funny to hear people who have never used/owned a Mac offer an opinion on them. They are as upgradable as ANY OTHER COMPUTER. With the exception of notebooks. (other than memory and components selected before the build NO Notebook is truly upgradable). Apple desktops use industry standard components and standard ports, they just do it better. Also, don't be discouraged by the lower speeds of the PowerPC chips. With it's reduced instruction set and data throughput, my 1Ghz G4 chip outpaces many Pentiums that are rated at 2Ghz and above.

In the end the choice is up to you. I purchased my powerbook almost 3 three years ago and it still outshines a lot of the stuff out there. However, the penalty I paid was reduced compatability (games) and a higher cost. That being said this is the first computer I've owned that has been viable for longer than 18 months.

Now that I've unloaded in this post. I am not a PC hater! For me and the things I do and the way I do them Apple is the best fit. However Dell, Gateway, Archer, Toshiba, And Sony all make some great notebooks with huge feature sets.

Happy computing!
-ashley

ps I'd spring for the more expensive powerbook vs. iBook

[granit_silber]

Gayle,

What software issues?
I own Microsoft Office: MAC (which is way better than normal Office)
Netsoft clients - got 'em
Novell got it

My wife has the only Apple in her company and after the IT guys got over being scared of it, they worked it into their network. Now, they are pushing for the entier company to switch over.
-ashley

[Alexlind123]

Get a sager or prostar laptop. They are the same physically, just with a different name, i think prostar is cheaper.

[genphreak]

I use Unix, Windows (various) and since Apple introduced OS-X I have cautiously been testing the waters. Their FreeBSD based OS has stability, performance and flexibility that Windows Vista will never equal. It is also more secure (by design and implementation) plus the hardware is immensely better (materials, design, construction, etc.).

My economy choice would be a nice Intel machine plus a decent copy of Linux and X, (www.linspire.com) but a PowerBook is simply the pinnacle of modern mobile computing with the benefit that it is slim, light and doesn't run Windoze. :) Just my 2c worth... opinions vary everywhere. My advice is steer clear of windows entirely now.

The only problem with an Apple is it is expensive and has a silly apple logo instead of a silly blue and white propeller one.... ;) GP