Situation: you are crossing a large, cold and deep body of water on a stormy day in a ferry that is overloaded with orphans. It tips and begins to sink rapidly. What do you save, an orphan or your notebook computer?
We got an Elite Group PC laptop out of Germany. Lightweight, built in WiFi, DVD burner, blah blah blah…and have had NOTHING BUT TROUBLE with it. Don’t get one of those. Sent it back twice. Service is okay but I want a PC laptop that WORKS. Grrr.
(Found you looking for Austria blogs this AM. Gruss Gott from an American in the Ennstal, surrounded by cows and snow.)
Depends on the price you want to pay. The most popular laptop at notebookreview.com is the Dell Inspiron 6000 ($1100), but they have a basic system that’s not bad (Dell Inspiron B130).
Those Inspiron 6000s are sweet, but I had to play with a few of them recently and had quite a bit of trouble getting their built-in WiFi adapters to work and found that I needed to install a separate adapter and get it working before the built-in ones would pick up the bindings and work on their own.
It was an irritation for me, but it might be worse to deal with if you’re not comfortable with mucking around like that.
What Wildsoda said. In fact, I have a 12″ iBook that’s looking for a new home, having found itself displaced by a 15″ Powerbook. If you want a shiny *new* sexy, powerful, Mac-tastic machine, we can help you with discounts.
Andy
I can third, or fourth, or whatever, a 12″ iBook. The screen is kind of small, though. That said, I’ve had mine 2.5 years and am very happy with it.
I think they’re around 950 euros new at the minute. There’s rumblings that a new, improved iBook could come out tomorrow (Tuesday), so, um, don’t buy one right now.
paul
I’ve had good luck with a Toshiba, except when my son stepped on the screen, but I fixed that myself.
Don’t get an Apple, they are such a monopolistic company with their proprietary hardware and software.
All right, I’m mostly bitter with Apple because of their price gouging on Nano’s as demanded by many people for Christmas this year…
mig – your Windows software *can* work on a Mac. You can actually run Windows on top of Mac OS. But it’s slow, unless you have tons and tons of space (both hard disk and RAM). Still, there’s MS Office for Mac, and almost all other software too. And the new Macs all include lots and lots of software already. And these days, exchanging files is not a problem any more. A Mac will be able to read Windows PC files without any trouble.
And for discounts – if you have any connections in academia, the education discounts (both for students and teachers) are the best you will find.
I bought an Apple 12″ iBook four years ago, and it still works, and it’s still fast enough for everything I do with it, I never had a virus, and I never lost any data due to software problems or crashes.
My only grudge is that if you buy one of those these days, they’re so much faster and cheaper than four years ago.
Gordon
The U.S. online apple store is selling Office at a discount when you buy a new Mac. Too lazy to check if that’s true elsewhere. And if it breaks, your wife can take it to the Ginza store for repairs the next time she goes to Japan.
I have heard some complaints about the iBook’s lack of sufficient memory and the price of software for the Mac, but I can’t comment from experience.
I’ve used a lot of junky Dell laptops at work, but that’s what I have at home too, because I got it for free. I don’t think I would pay money for one.
Hey, So, it’s been awhile since I wandered by here. Last time I was in the neighborhood, you didn’t have an RSS feed. However, now you do (he says, stating the obvious) so I will be more in evidence in the future…
Anyhow, I’m confused. Is this exercise about determining where one’s values lie or is it about getting a new laptop? If it is the latter, then we are on the same ferry boat at the moment. At the moment I am leaning towards an Apply, but I want to see how the Intel chips work in the new machines first. On the other hand, the Dell machines are quite nice and have a pretty good reputation.
Now, if we are *really* talking about making a hard choice, I’d have to go with the orphan…namely because I will *always* have a big old thumping desktop machine which will have my life on it. The laptop will be synced, but not vital for my survival. Nothing portable will have that responsibility in my life. Besides, the big thumping desktop is attached to a home network where I have all my necessary-for-life files backed up one a “spare” (read less powerful) machine. If my primary goes down, I do have a backup in the wings I can use until the main ‘puter gets repaired/replaced.
So, it’s not really a hard choice for me…the orphan-laptop one. The Apple-Dell choice is much harder…
I’d save the iBook AND a couple of orphans — iBooks are light. Hopefully the orphans are too. (Also, I’d have all the info on my iBook backed up on a jump drive, in case the orphans had been fed a particularly strarchy diet, poor things. Then I could ditch the iBook, save the orphans, sell my story, get a new computer, and continue working with my data.)
Save the orphan, but make sure you either save your notebook as well, or be sure you have a computer at home so that you can write in your blog about how you saved an orphan.
If you try to save the notebook, you’ll sink to the bottom like an old parable. But if you grab an orphan, you can make a quick and simple flotation device by blowing deeply into his lungs a few times and then pinching his throat closed.
flerdle
Unless the notebook is already in a waterproof case, you’ll have a harder time of trying to make it survive in some sort of functional condition than with the an orphan.
orphan, because you are smart enough to have a backup zip drive??
paul
How recently have the orphans been backed up? Are the orphans running legal software and do you have the installation disks for the orphans? If so, save the laptop… Otherwise, hire one orphan to send your mail, one to keep your calendar, one to store all your old files, and one to run from house to house with printouts of your blog… then you won’t need your laptop..
I recommend a Macintosh iBook (12″ or 14″, your choice).
seconding wildsoda.
We got an Elite Group PC laptop out of Germany. Lightweight, built in WiFi, DVD burner, blah blah blah…and have had NOTHING BUT TROUBLE with it. Don’t get one of those. Sent it back twice. Service is okay but I want a PC laptop that WORKS. Grrr.
(Found you looking for Austria blogs this AM. Gruss Gott from an American in the Ennstal, surrounded by cows and snow.)
Dell. I love my latitude x1 with 4 year warranty :-)
Depends on the price you want to pay. The most popular laptop at notebookreview.com is the Dell Inspiron 6000 ($1100), but they have a basic system that’s not bad (Dell Inspiron B130).
Those Inspiron 6000s are sweet, but I had to play with a few of them recently and had quite a bit of trouble getting their built-in WiFi adapters to work and found that I needed to install a separate adapter and get it working before the built-in ones would pick up the bindings and work on their own.
It was an irritation for me, but it might be worse to deal with if you’re not comfortable with mucking around like that.
Personally, I like ThinkPads.
The only way to narrow down your options is to decide on your price range, the amount you want to pay for it and how much you can shell out.
What Wildsoda said. In fact, I have a 12″ iBook that’s looking for a new home, having found itself displaced by a 15″ Powerbook. If you want a shiny *new* sexy, powerful, Mac-tastic machine, we can help you with discounts.
I can third, or fourth, or whatever, a 12″ iBook. The screen is kind of small, though. That said, I’ve had mine 2.5 years and am very happy with it.
I think they’re around 950 euros new at the minute. There’s rumblings that a new, improved iBook could come out tomorrow (Tuesday), so, um, don’t buy one right now.
I’ve had good luck with a Toshiba, except when my son stepped on the screen, but I fixed that myself.
Don’t get an Apple, they are such a monopolistic company with their proprietary hardware and software.
All right, I’m mostly bitter with Apple because of their price gouging on Nano’s as demanded by many people for Christmas this year…
mig – your Windows software *can* work on a Mac. You can actually run Windows on top of Mac OS. But it’s slow, unless you have tons and tons of space (both hard disk and RAM). Still, there’s MS Office for Mac, and almost all other software too. And the new Macs all include lots and lots of software already. And these days, exchanging files is not a problem any more. A Mac will be able to read Windows PC files without any trouble.
And for discounts – if you have any connections in academia, the education discounts (both for students and teachers) are the best you will find.
I bought an Apple 12″ iBook four years ago, and it still works, and it’s still fast enough for everything I do with it, I never had a virus, and I never lost any data due to software problems or crashes.
My only grudge is that if you buy one of those these days, they’re so much faster and cheaper than four years ago.
The U.S. online apple store is selling Office at a discount when you buy a new Mac. Too lazy to check if that’s true elsewhere. And if it breaks, your wife can take it to the Ginza store for repairs the next time she goes to Japan.
I have heard some complaints about the iBook’s lack of sufficient memory and the price of software for the Mac, but I can’t comment from experience.
I’ve used a lot of junky Dell laptops at work, but that’s what I have at home too, because I got it for free. I don’t think I would pay money for one.
So there you go, I bet that didn’t help at all.
you’re a very bad man and will be given absolutely no christmas presents next year.
also very funny.
Heh heh.
I’m sorry, of course I meant I’d recommend saving a 12″ or 14″ orphan, your choice.
Hey, So, it’s been awhile since I wandered by here. Last time I was in the neighborhood, you didn’t have an RSS feed. However, now you do (he says, stating the obvious) so I will be more in evidence in the future…
Anyhow, I’m confused. Is this exercise about determining where one’s values lie or is it about getting a new laptop? If it is the latter, then we are on the same ferry boat at the moment. At the moment I am leaning towards an Apply, but I want to see how the Intel chips work in the new machines first. On the other hand, the Dell machines are quite nice and have a pretty good reputation.
Now, if we are *really* talking about making a hard choice, I’d have to go with the orphan…namely because I will *always* have a big old thumping desktop machine which will have my life on it. The laptop will be synced, but not vital for my survival. Nothing portable will have that responsibility in my life. Besides, the big thumping desktop is attached to a home network where I have all my necessary-for-life files backed up one a “spare” (read less powerful) machine. If my primary goes down, I do have a backup in the wings I can use until the main ‘puter gets repaired/replaced.
So, it’s not really a hard choice for me…the orphan-laptop one. The Apple-Dell choice is much harder…
I’d save the iBook AND a couple of orphans — iBooks are light. Hopefully the orphans are too. (Also, I’d have all the info on my iBook backed up on a jump drive, in case the orphans had been fed a particularly strarchy diet, poor things. Then I could ditch the iBook, save the orphans, sell my story, get a new computer, and continue working with my data.)
Seriously, though — iBook goooooood.
Save the orphan, but make sure you either save your notebook as well, or be sure you have a computer at home so that you can write in your blog about how you saved an orphan.
If you try to save the notebook, you’ll sink to the bottom like an old parable. But if you grab an orphan, you can make a quick and simple flotation device by blowing deeply into his lungs a few times and then pinching his throat closed.
Unless the notebook is already in a waterproof case, you’ll have a harder time of trying to make it survive in some sort of functional condition than with the an orphan.
I second Sarah – a choice made easier by the fact that my notebook is a Moleskine 6″…
It depends. Orphanned what?
orphan, because you are smart enough to have a backup zip drive??
How recently have the orphans been backed up? Are the orphans running legal software and do you have the installation disks for the orphans? If so, save the laptop… Otherwise, hire one orphan to send your mail, one to keep your calendar, one to store all your old files, and one to run from house to house with printouts of your blog… then you won’t need your laptop..