[kwlug-disc] Laptops.

[Paul Gallaway]

On Wed, Jun 3, 2009 at 7:28 PM, Daniel Jolkowski <danijolk at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I'm not looking to spend a whole hunk of money, somewhere in the range of
> one thousand dollars, so I am not expecting to get a horse anything.  It
> just needs to be able to handle some really minor work with photographs and
> have decent enough battery life to be useful unplugged.  No electricity at
> home and it would be excellent to be able to get through a DVD before needed
> to charge.

My wife has been using one of the original MacBooks (core-duo) for 3
years. Hardware has been reliable enough and I have to say the build
quality/engineering compared to other laptops I've used/seen is really
good.  The  keyboard is weird but comfortable so try-before-you-buy
applies. OSX is alright, it wasn't my decision so OSX is still in use
but the best part for me was that it integrated well enough with my
home network/Linux systems. Everything [useful] I know about OSX I
learnt from my experience with Linux. There are lots of people on the
Ubuntu forums who dual-boot these so you could look there to see if
there are any outstanding hardware compatibility problems with the
current generation (e.g. wireless). The Apple Store occasionally
offers discounted refurbished models with the same warranty as the new
products which could get you to your budget requirements.

I've personally used and have considered buying from the Lenovo
ThinkPad line. As with anything that starts out with Windows, Linux
compatibility may vary. Lenovo was at one time selling systems with
Suse installed not sure if they still do this and the information
about it on their website is slim to none so you may want to call them
to get more info. There's also a deal currently available on the
T-series laptops if you do a search for 'lenovo' on the redflagdeals
site.

With the CDN dollar getting better you might also be interested in
supporting one of the pre-installed Linux system builders like
System76. However, I suppose Dell qualifies here as well...

You're right, too many options. $1,000 budget can get you a lot of
system for your dollar these days IMO.
-- 
~pAul.