I want to buy a laptop for college, any ideas?

Question

I'm heading off for college this fall, I want to buy a laptop for notes and stuff, what are the things I'm looking for? what's the price range and what brand is a sound choice for us students?

Answer 1

IBM (now Lenova).

There are several reasons.

First, IBM has always had excellent keyboards, though in recent years they've been somewhat less outstanding, partly as others have imporved. This will be important as you will be doing a lot of writing (ie, typing) and a bad keyboard will be an incredible pain (certainly virtually, and perhaps even literally; can you say carpal tunnel syndrome?).

Second, IBM laptops all have the little red touch stick thingie. It's much better than dragging your thumb over a touchpad when it comes to controlling a cursor. Thumbs are meant for strength, not precision (consult a kinesthesiologist if you doubt). and it's permanently disconcerting to use your thumb for pointing, no matter how good you get at it. Your forefinger will be better no matter how good your thumb gets. Some other vendors have licensed it from IBM (they invented it) for some of their machines, but only some; Murphy will be pleased to arrange that it won't be on the model you want otherwise.

Third, IBM has supported its equipment well, by industry standards. It is the only vendor I was ever able to locate who made available its technical manuals, so the computer shop guy in some isolated college town would have half a chance of fixing it locally. This is, like the shop manual for a car, a matter of great importance, though usually invisible.

I would, if I were you, buy two identical used or refurbished machines. (See the listing in the back of Conouter Shopper for some suggestions of possible sources, or Google if you'd like to spend some time evaluating suppliers). This is likely to be less expensive than a single new machine. Make certain that you have a chance to evaluate their operation before paying; especially the display. The cold flourescent tubes that are the backlights tend to dim and fail. Replacements are dear if done at the factory. It's practical, if very picky and delicate, to do the replacment yourself, and there is at least one supplier of replacement bulbs on the Web.

Laptops live a hard life and having a spare can be, well, priceless. Arrange to synchronize the content of the two regularly, so when one is stolen or dropped or dunked, you'll not lose too much work. This will be important near the end of term when all the papers come due at the same time. And, if it's relevant, a single docking station can service both. You'll have some trouble with folks wanting to borrow your extra machine; perhaps it can be kept somewhere else?

I would, further, not worry about having the latest and fastest and most expensive CPU or the largest and most cool display. For word processing, and most Web access, neither of these will make any difference. A large display can be a non-starter in notetaking situations as well. A non-bleeding edge CPU / graphics processor / display will cost a lot less, probably run cooler and have better battery life, than the latest most whizbang unit. You'll not be running astrophysics modelling on your laptop, and probably not doing animation for the next Pixar film on it either, so you'll not be too disadvantaged. I would make certain that you can install a DVD burner (both + and -) if one is not already installed, and that you have builtin USB2 and Ethernet (at least 100Mbps). You can use an external wireless adapter (often having better performance anyway, if only because of more easily adjusted antenna orientation) if so. And attach to most wired networks too. A floppy drive isn't so necessary as once upon a time, so you might swap that out. Though having one when there's some sort of boot touble can be priceless.

Two things which may be worth worrying about 9or installing after purchase) are increased RAM and a larger hard drive. Both are field replacement possibilities (in the IBM machines anyway) and what with software bloat and all, either or both will likely be worthwhile. Changing hard drives will invovle reloading software (the OS and applications) and IBM has long had a reasonable approach to this, which may make life rather easier.

=========
Leonova

IBM sold its personal computer business to thsi company a year or two ago. They have retained the IBM designers and their US plants, and are using the IBM name for a few years too. Leonova claim that users will see little change from the standard IBM maintained and thus far I've not heard dire things about the decrease in quality. Perhaps they will; we should all hope so. If you buy laptops from more than a year or two ago (the used strategy I suggested) you can evade most of any possible downside.

=============
if you go used / refurbished

The problem areas to lood for are mechanical ones and wear.

If the electronics works at all, your'll probably be fine.

Mechanicals:

Keyboard. Check every key for correct operation. Look for evidence of a lunch habit (food debris and such between the keys, stains from spilled drinks, ...). Make sure all drives present work, and work properly. Read and write to a floppy you bring along and to a CD (and DVD too) if there's an opticla disk writer. Bring along a PCMCIA card (make sure you check what type of PCMCIA slot that model has and how wide it is (ie, 16 bit or 32 bit...). If that slot doesn't work, your flexibility will be considerably limited.

Examine the hinge for the top, and look very carefully over the entire surface of the display for missing pixels, stuck pixels, or flickering ones. All are serious problems. Check the brightness and evenness of the backlighting in both dim and bright environments. The cold flourescent bulbs can be replaced, but it's not trivial and if done at the factory can be very expensive.

Look for broken or bent pins in all connectors. Either is a very serious issue as replacement / repair is usually not practical. Replacement of motherboard is the usual 'solution'. Not a winner.

Ignore wear on the paint job, but look for cracks in the case. These will suggest some rough treatment in the machines' prior life, and should be a warning sign of further potential problems.

Make sure all original disks / manuals are available and readable, especially for CDs and such. Inspect the surfaces carefully for any defects at all. It would be good, even, to copy the CD into memory on a machine somewhere as a test of readability.

Run a RAM test (programs are available on the Web for free) both as a test of the RaM and of the CPU. After 20 minutes or so, is the machine hot here or there?

The battery in a used machine is likely to have used up a good bit of its life. You should probably expect that you will have to replace it, if not immediately. It's here that docking stations become useful as you can use the machine hard and actually charge the battery at the same time. At least for many docking stations.

Answer 2

I'm sure you could buy a cheap laptop to take notes but as your school year progresses, I'm sure you'll find more uses for your laptop too (besides banging your roommate upside the head).

Therefore most laptops come with a CD-RW (CD burner) that can also play DVDs. It comes in handy with file back-ups and transfers to another PC. Or if you want to save your work off your PC. If you get into gaming, you'll probably want something that has a lot of RAM or has the option to upgrade the RAM that's already installed. It probably wouldn't hurt to have a nice graphics card too.

Software wise, for note taking and probable essay-writing you'll probably want to get Microsoft Office. If that's too expensive, you can try OpenOffice which is free. And being that you'll probably be connected to some sort of public network to use the internet, I recommend purchasing Norton Internet Security. It has both an anti-virus and firewall applications rolled into one package.

As far as laptop brands and prices, this is where research on your part will come into play. Prices will vary depending on what comes with the laptop so it all goes to how much you want to spend to get what quality and features you desire. Here's some personal tips on brands...

Do not purchase HP, Compaq, or Gateway. Although they're the cheapest to buy, they're also the cheapest in quality. Built poorly and with many cheap components, you'll find problems with these brands for years to come.

Dell and Toshiba can be pricey for medium-grade laptops. They're not bad to have, but each come with their own problems. Toshiba has come down in quality over the years since the company has decided to keep the costs high and use cheaper parts. Dells are the same and have frequent hard drive failures although steadily their products are improving.

The best, and most expensive are Sony and IBM. Both are quality laptops to own, but with a price. Highly recommended if you want to spend the cash. IBMs, however, aren't the fanciest to look at but it depends if you want something for people to marvel at or quality in parts and product.

Answer 3

I hear Dell is pretty good the price range goes from 600 and up

Answer 4

I read an article last week that said the best thing for a student to get is a mac. I would go with a duel core. and lots of ram so you can run more than one or two programs and not lose speed.

Answer 5

Dell has a laptop for around $500. If you can, Apple Ibook for $994.

Answer 6

dude get a dell its a crazy computer especially the dell xps m1710 there crazy and remember u always need a battery life more than 5 hours to do your homework... the price range will depend when u customize it if you just wanna get it like it is its around 900-1800 therehella good tats when i go to college imma get one of those.....

Answer 7

get a Dell cuz it is the best out there.

Answer 8

wait till next month. read this
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1093&ncid=1093&e=2&u=/pcworld/20060621/tc_pcworld/126194

Answer 9

dells

Answer 10

get a 12" macbook.... be classy!