What Laptop Now?

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Originally Posted by bobz

^ We could have done a lot of things. Thing is, though, once you get far enough past college, it's no longer about check out what I can do; real world dev is about getting shit done as easily as possible. Which, in our work environment meant having a single work station where you can do everything, from server side dev and testing to admin to presentation to whatever else. If your shop reached a different conclusion as to the easiest comprehensive approach, then great. And I really don't see why you need to turn every conversation into a pissing contest; grow up dude.

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Exactly. Getting shit done. It's why I like a Linux box for my job and it's the reason I was issued one. They made me use windows for a while and I was always poaching logins on UNIX machines so I could do stuff. I installed Cygwin but it didn't have that seemlessness I wanted. It always felt like an add on.

As far as working disconnected, ya, Chromebook isn't really your thing. It's come a long way, but the options are better elsewhere. That wasn't obvious from your initial post. Sorry, my bad. My travel usually involves internet or mobile data coverage and then I use my phone as a hotspot. I don't do what you do.

I'm still in disbelief that 4GB of memory can run Win10. I've tried and I've pulled my hair out and given up. It was too slow. So either you found something special or we have different thresholds for the definition of slow. I am going to reserve the right to gnash my teeth whenever I hear someone say windows is better because it's UI is modern. It's only better because it does what you want and you are willing to put up with it's shortcomings.

Yeah, what can I say, double the RAM and double the storage would have been better, and maybe I should have held off for that, but I got sick of the old travel unit and I pulled the (cheap) trigger, and, for the price and the purpose, it's going to do the job for now. As my third-in-the-pecking-order computer, it's fine. And it sure is nice having app compatibility with the handful of big and little things I'm used to. But if Win updates bloat it out and I run into the limited headroom, this thing may yet be running Linux someday.

You may try Asus ROG. It's a giant

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Originally Posted by bobz

^ We could have done a lot of things. Thing is, though, once you get far enough past college, it's no longer about check out what I can do; real world dev is about getting shit done as easily as possible. Which, in our work environment meant having a single work station where you can do everything, from server side dev and testing to admin to presentation to whatever else. If your shop reached a different conclusion as to the easiest comprehensive approach, then great. And I really don't see why you need to turn every conversation into a pissing contest; grow up dude.

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I don't give a fuck how you brogram, Dick. But you did mention how everyone in your elite culture "stuck the box under the far end of the desk and interfaced with it via multiple terminal windows on Mac or Windows"...presumably with a fucking SSH app before Win 10 Pro came out 5 years ago. I just get tired of phony snideassed motherfuckers like you trying to act like you do something impressive, or that some kid in Pakistan isn't going to outmode you next fucking week. I want a bluer favicon and I need it tomorrow. And oh yeah, there'll be a ticket for your goddamn WYSIWYG editor not working on Firefox since the patch.

^ The usual burst sphincter post from highanger. Go away. (Kind of funny, though, how some keyboard warrior in Alaska thinks he can bluster his way into establishing that he knows so much better than major Silicon Valley companies about what does and doesn't work for doing server dev.)

My wrangler tracks perfectly on the highway. 75mph with one finger on the wheel. ;)

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Originally Posted by Cruiser

My wrangler tracks perfectly on the highway. 75mph with one finger on the wheel. ;)

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Do you keep a spare engine on the floor, tucked under the far end of the dash, for when you need to make up shit on the internet?

I'm pretty much settled on a mid-tier Dell product in the XPS or Precision / Vostro / Latitude lines. Where / when is best to buy? Annual sales of some sort?

xps - probably overkill but nice machines, built well
precision - for engineers - thick, workhorses
latitude - basic business machines that are pretty robust
vostro - lower tier latitude.

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Originally Posted by Mazderati

I'm pretty much settled on a mid-tier Dell product in the XPS or Precision / Vostro / Latitude lines. Where / when is best to buy? Annual sales of some sort?

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Annual sales- other than Black Friday and Cyber Monday, they seem to constantly have some model or series on sale from time to time, more discount if they have a larger inventory and surplus from time to time (but the last few years, there were fewer surpluses with the chip shortage, larger demand from work from home units, and China shutting down their factories due to Covid quarantines. It is getting better though.

As stated each have a bit of a niche. XPS some are smaller screen usually and convertible between standard screen/tablet mode and for those that are road warriors not wanting to carry a heavier unit. The Precision is basically their workstation line, not really super portable, desktop replacement. The Latitude is their main line of business class in many screen sizes and some ultrabook styles also... Vostro is their small business line- a step above their full consumer line, but not as good usually as the Latitude series. Avoid the Inspiron which is their cheapest and consumer level with the lower end screens and cheapest cases that can break just looking at them wrong...

Decide- screen size you want (13 or smaller for light weight, etc.) 14 or 15.6 inch screen, or desktop replacement of 16 or 17 inch and not very portable. Touch screen model or tablet mode important? And then the things like do you REALLY still need an optical drive for DVD/CD or want a lighter thinner ultrabook series.

https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/dell-laptops/sc/laptops

I am typing on a new HP 16 inch - for fucking around on the Net, and watching online training Videos . I have VM's located at Red Hat and Intel for personal growth

I like this cheap HP 16 inch i3 8 Gig it was 400$ with an Office 365 subscription.
Device name MTTBig16inch
Processor 11th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i3-1125G4 @ 2.00GHz 2.00 GHz
Installed RAM 8.00 GB (7.67 GB usable) - I could probably stuff 32 gig of ram in here
Device ID xxxxxxxx
Product ID 00342-20953-67156-AAOEM
System type 64-bit operating system, x64-based processor
Pen and touch No pen or touch input is available for this display
Edition Windows 11 Home
Version 22H2
Installed on ‎3/‎10/‎2023
OS build 22621.1265
Experience Windows Feature Experience Pack 1000.22638.1000.0

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Originally Posted by NBABUCKS1

xps - probably overkill but nice machines, built well
precision - for engineers - thick, workhorses
latitude - basic business machines that are pretty robust
vostro - lower tier latitude.

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Originally Posted by RShea

Annual sales- other than Black Friday and Cyber Monday, they seem to constantly have some model or series on sale from time to time, more discount if they have a larger inventory and surplus from time to time (but the last few years, there were fewer surpluses with the chip shortage, larger demand from work from home units, and China shutting down their factories due to Covid quarantines. It is getting better though.

As stated each have a bit of a niche. XPS some are smaller screen usually and convertible between standard screen/tablet mode and for those that are road warriors not wanting to carry a heavier unit. The Precision is basically their workstation line, not really super portable, desktop replacement. The Latitude is their main line of business class in many screen sizes and some ultrabook styles also... Vostro is their small business line- a step above their full consumer line, but not as good usually as the Latitude series. Avoid the Inspiron which is their cheapest and consumer level with the lower end screens and cheapest cases that can break just looking at them wrong...

Decide- screen size you want (13 or smaller for light weight, etc.) 14 or 15.6 inch screen, or desktop replacement of 16 or 17 inch and not very portable. Touch screen model or tablet mode important? And then the things like do you REALLY still need an optical drive for DVD/CD or want a lighter thinner ultrabook series.

https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/dell-laptops/sc/laptops

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I've been limping my laptop along for almost a year. The better three-quarter's laptop shit the bed the other week so it was time. Ended up with a Latitude and XPS. Thanks for the info.

I watch movies generally speaking on an Acer Chromebook. What would be an upgrade screen and sound wise? Thx.

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Originally Posted by byates1

I watch movies generally speaking on an Acer Chromebook. What would be an upgrade screen and sound wise? Thx.

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There are some cheap refurbished and new 15.6" laptop might give you a boost all around if you want to go cheap. There are good deals on new $500-1000 laptops as well. Really depends on the size and spec of your current Chromebook and what you want to spend

$261 Acer 15.6" refurbished consumer level laptop, after 10% off from ebay: https://www.ebay.com/itm/27592377494...patUYbhOPRAJoP

$320 Dell Inspiron 15.6" refurbished (mid level business laptop) after 40% off "CYBER40DELL" : https://www.dellrefurbished.com/item...591-000071&p=1

$349 Lenovo 15.6" new Ideapad consumer laptop: https://www.bestbuy.com/site/lenovo-...?skuId=6549067

$490 Lenovo 15.6" new gaming laptop (probably the best screen+sound of this bunch): https://www.ebay.com/itm/30512053497...patuX78jGaMt3g

I alwasy buy Lenovo for the win, my ski bud had an electronics store in small town, so i went on what he told me came back to th store, he said Lenovo never came back

before lenovo they gave me IBM's which took 3 yrs to write down and i had 5 of them

My last 3 laptops I bought and liked have been from Lenovo. Prior to that the laptops I had, and did not like, were from Dell and HP.

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Originally Posted by alpinevibes

There are some cheap refurbished and new 15.6" laptop might give you a boost all around if you want to go cheap. There are good deals on new $500-1000 laptops as well. Really depends on the size and spec of your current Chromebook and what you want to spend

$261 Acer 15.6" refurbished consumer level laptop, after 10% off from ebay: https://www.ebay.com/itm/27592377494...patUYbhOPRAJoP

$320 Dell Inspiron 15.6" refurbished (mid level business laptop) after 40% off "CYBER40DELL" : https://www.dellrefurbished.com/item...591-000071&p=1

$349 Lenovo 15.6" new Ideapad consumer laptop: https://www.bestbuy.com/site/lenovo-...?skuId=6549067

$490 Lenovo 15.6" new gaming laptop (probably the best screen+sound of this bunch): https://www.ebay.com/itm/30512053497...patuX78jGaMt3g

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Thanks for the reminder, I needed a new old laptop. Still a day left on the Dell refurbished sale.

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Originally Posted by XXX-er

I alwasy buy Lenovo for the win, my ski bud had an electronics store in small town, so i went on what he told me came back to th store, he said Lenovo never came back

before lenovo they gave me IBM's which took 3 yrs to write down and i had 5 of them

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IBM became Lenovo (which was building them for IBM) when IBM got out of the Laptop and small computer business (other than labeling some register and POS stuff still...

Is there a time today when the dell 40% thing end? Thoughts on warranty purchase. I live in BFE and typically don’t participate in optional warranties because it can be a pita to use compared to going to an independent computer repair place.

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Originally Posted by bodywhomper

Is there a time today when the dell 40% thing end? Thoughts on warranty purchase. I live in BFE and typically don’t participate in optional warranties because it can be a pita to use compared to going to an independent computer repair place.

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Ends Thurs. 11/30, 10:00 PM CT.

I'd skip a warranty as realistically at the price you'd pay to repair or replace yourself (and in our lovely age of consumerism, planned obsolescence and Moore's Law) there's little to be truly saved on a cheap laptop in the event of something happening.

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Originally Posted by alpinevibes

Ends Thurs. 11/30, 10:00 PM CT.

I'd skip a warranty as realistically at the price you'd pay to repair or replace yourself (and in our lovely age of consumerism, planned obsolescence and Moore's Law) there's little to be truly saved on a cheap laptop in the event of something happening.

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Thanks!

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Originally Posted by RShea

IBM became Lenovo (which was building them for IBM) when IBM got out of the Laptop and small computer business (other than labeling some register and POS stuff still...

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Yup, I had 5 or 6 IBM LT's over the years, each one was better than the last but I never had an LT go the full 3yr amortization period without breaking maybe we were hard on them ?

Back in the day If my LT broke it was my job to fix it myself but if i didnt get it going pretty quick it would screw me up cuz I really needed it to service other computers so it was easier to call a 1800 # and they would courier me an LT from the pool of LT's in Toronto which was a sure thing, I just swap memory/ battery/ HD and I would be back computing in < 24 hrs

I left IBM just after the LT's and desktops became Lenovo about 20 yrs ago at that time IBM kept 19% ownership of Lenovo which could have changed

I've since bought 2 lenovo cuz its good stuff

I've been pretty happy with Lenovo laptops, that's what I usually had at work.

At home I've had an HP and then two Dells (XPS and an Inspiron). Each of these did pretty well and lasted about 5 years. The Inspiron I'm using now recently died. Repair shop was able to recover all data and replace the hard drive, and it seems to be back and running fine. Just ordered a Lenovo to replace it. The Dell will go on travel/backup duty.

Have to be careful which Lenovo. The Thinkpad branded T series ones were always good even after IBM. The R series sucked

I like Lenovos as consumer machines: solid, light, good heat and battery management--but I think I've only had T-series.

I've had pretty good luck with Dell's Precision workstation line for about 20 years (10 machines so far: 3 in use, 4 passed along/back to IT, 2 video card failures, both well aged, and one refurb killed by their on-site/next day service tech, netting me a nice upgrade).

The 1-year warranty rang up at $39, which seemed good for buying sight unseen but maybe not if it'd been $300. Used to be they'd sell you a 3 or 5 year warranty with the refurbs, but then again they weren't 80% off in those days, either.

I'm curious now if there's a big difference between the Precisions and the consumer machines--Inspirons usually look similar.