ITT you suggest good laptops to me for college...

[TMM]

hey everybody... been a while since i've posted here, but i'm coming out of the shadows with a question...

seeing as i'm going to college soon, i'll be needing a laptop for schoolwork/personal use, etc. now, i know how to use computers well, but i don't know how to choose them. it's potato-potahto to me...

What i'm looking for is something DURABLE (very important, i can be rough on things), with a Windows OS, medium-sized (like, say, 15" or so? i don't want to squint at the screen but i don't want to carry around a flatscreen TV...), light-weight would be nice, with wireless capabilities (i assume most/all laptops have this nowadays...). it'll mostly be used for web surfing and writing. I know nothing about memory capacity, but i want a substantial amount because i like having more of something rather than less. Preferrably at, around, or below $1000.

Is that a narrow enough list? it's about all the important things i can think of at the moment.

thanks much in advance,
 
tmm

[Harold Tuttle]

[TMM]

haha... something tells me here that OS choice wasn't... well... a choice.

tmm

[Hawkmoon]

http://www.toshibadirect.com/td/b2c/laptops.to?price=Less%20than%20$600

http://www.toshibadirect.com/td/b2c/cdetland.to?poid=445850

http://www.toshibadirect.com/td/b2c/pdet.to?poid=445693

[Doggy Daddy]

Excellent battery life.

[S. Williamson]

Excellent battery life.

But dear lord... when it comes to changing the battery, you're better off just getting a whole new one. 

Do they even make slide rules anymore?

[seeker_two]

But dear lord... when it comes to changing the battery, you're better off just getting a whole new one. 

You think changing the battery is hard....try uploading pics on the screen saver... 

[lee n. field]

Do they even make slide rules anymore?

There's a company in Japan that does.  I picked up a circular slide rule at a garage sale, and went researching it.  Still made.

Now where'd I leave that silly thing...

-----added-----

Concise.co.jp circular slide rule

[roo_ster]

Business class laptops, all the way.

Dell Latitude
http://www.dell.com/us/en/business/notebooks/latitude/ct.aspx?refid=latit&s=bsd&cs=04&ref=lthp

HP
Much improved over the older Compaq/HP mediocrities of yesteryear

http://www.hp.com/sbso/busproducts_notebooks.html

Lenovo THinkpads
IBM/Lenovo has been the standard by which all others are judged for years

http://shop.lenovo.com/SEUILibrary/controller/e/midmarket/StdAffinityPortal/en_US/catalog.workflow:expandcategory?c&current-catalog-id=12F0696583E04D86B9B79B0FEC01C087&current-category-id=8FA114A7D9FF4F38AE8E19B36EC665A7&affinity=midmarket


Dell Outlet
If you don't have to have spanking new, Dell outlet is a good discount option to get a business-class laptop

http://outlet.us.dell.com/ARBOnlineSales/topics/global.aspx/arb/online/en/InventorySearch?c=us&cs=28&l=en&lob=LAT&s=dfb


Refurb / Off-Lease

If you are a little adventurous and can install your own OS, this is a very viable lower-cost option.  Definitely the way I'd go, were it my decision.  But, I have the requisite licenses and have no problem installing on bare metal.

Here are some links I shamelessly copied from G98:
http://www.pcsurplusonline.com/cat.cfm?CatID=6&SCatID=180
http://www.geeks.com/
http://stores.ebay.com/LapkoSoft_W0QQcolZ4QQdirZ1QQfsubZQ2d33QQftidZ2QQtZkm
http://www.bobjohnson.com/
http://www.spintradeexchange.com/index.html
http://www.pcexchange.com/
http://www.laptopcloseout.com/usa/enter.html?target=front.html&lang=en-us
http://www.usedcomputershop.com/pcdesktops.html

[bedlamite]

http://www.sphere.bc.ca/test/sliderule.html

[Perd Hapley]

medium-sized (like, say, 15" or so? i don't want to squint at the screen but i don't want to carry around a flatscreen TV...),

Is a seventeen-inch laptop like carrying around a TV?  For myself, I'd pick one of those, just so my hands have some room on the keys. 

[Gewehr98]

The Apple Kool-Aid is strong with that bunch, nicht wahr?

[lee n. field]

What i'm looking for is something DURABLE (very important, i can be rough on things), with a Windows OS, medium-sized (like, say, 15" or so? i don't want to squint at the screen but i don't want to carry around a flatscreen TV...), light-weight would be nice, with wireless capabilities (i assume most/all laptops have this nowadays...). it'll mostly be used for web surfing and writing. I know nothing about memory capacity, but i want a substantial amount because i like having more of something rather than less. Preferrably at, around, or below $1000.

light weight, medium sized and durable -- pick two. 

Wireless, goes without saying.  Everything now will have it.

I have a old Dull Lassitude that meets basically all your requirements except light.  Cost me zip, and I got parts to rebuild it twice over if need be.

[Kwelz]

Macbook or Macbook Pro.  Add windows.  problem solved. 

[zahc]

Acer aspire one or whatever similar sub-notebook has replaced it as the best value as of now. With the remaining $700 go buy a desktop.

[lee n. field]

A bud of mine has that Acer netbook.  The keyboard is  painfully small to use.

I participated in a webinar on selling our vendor's OEM version of the Intel Classmate netbook.  One of the participants claimed to use it as his only laptop.   Riiiiight.  A netbook that my 10 year old niece complained about the keyboard size of.  Right.

[zahc]

A bud of mine has that Acer netbook.  The keyboard is  painfully small to use.

People are different I guess. I'm over 6 feet tall and have large hands; but the Aspire One's keyboard is perfectly comfortable and fast for me to type on. Actually it's quite fast because the keys are so close together. The original eeePC's keyboards were indeed too small, though.

[Perd Hapley]

Excellent battery life.