Notebook or Netbook
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Dell is absolute garbage, at least their laptops, I don't do much on-site service of desktops so I don't know how often the ones at work break. I have noticed that after Dell's "mascot" "dude you're getting a Dell" guy got busted for pot, their quality plummeted. I've seen a lot of Dells that are just now finally dying at 5 years, while these new ones are dying in months.
As for Toshiba, I've seen more of the newer ones failing than older ones, but nothing compared to Dell and Gateway. HPs were great up until these motherboard-eaters started showing up on the market in early 2007. Gateway...well Gateway dug their own grave and should have disappeared from the market years ago.
What can you expect though? Technology has gotten cheap enough to the point that if a basic $400 laptop lasts you only a year, then you got your moneys worth.
I hear good about ASUS laptops, just it was rumored that they'd use high-end graphics cards, while keeping other parts refurbished to keep the cost of a gaming laptop low. That comes from two of my co-workers, one who owns an ASUS laptop, but I can't verify that rumor.
As for Toshiba, I've seen more of the newer ones failing than older ones, but nothing compared to Dell and Gateway. HPs were great up until these motherboard-eaters started showing up on the market in early 2007. Gateway...well Gateway dug their own grave and should have disappeared from the market years ago.
What can you expect though? Technology has gotten cheap enough to the point that if a basic $400 laptop lasts you only a year, then you got your moneys worth.
I hear good about ASUS laptops, just it was rumored that they'd use high-end graphics cards, while keeping other parts refurbished to keep the cost of a gaming laptop low. That comes from two of my co-workers, one who owns an ASUS laptop, but I can't verify that rumor.
I've had my Dell mini 9 for about a month and love it. If your using it for a second computer a netbook is a great purchase. Great for surfing the internet and e-mail, ect. Not for all day typing or storing photos, but great as a portable.
As for dell being junk, I've heard the same comment about every computer maker out there. I've had great luck with Dell and HP/Compaq.
I picked the dell netbook because of it's SSD, lack of fan, keyboard and preinstalled Ubuntu. The Acer and HP look good too. Battery life is around 4 hours for my use, it restores from sleep in 2 seconds and boots in about 10 with Ubuntu 8.04. You can save about $50 by watching the dell outlet site for a canceled order.
As for dell being junk, I've heard the same comment about every computer maker out there. I've had great luck with Dell and HP/Compaq.
I picked the dell netbook because of it's SSD, lack of fan, keyboard and preinstalled Ubuntu. The Acer and HP look good too. Battery life is around 4 hours for my use, it restores from sleep in 2 seconds and boots in about 10 with Ubuntu 8.04. You can save about $50 by watching the dell outlet site for a canceled order.
OVERKILL
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Originally Posted By: ConfederateTyrant
Dell is absolute garbage, at least their laptops, I don't do much on-site service of desktops so I don't know how often the ones at work break. I have noticed that after Dell's "mascot" "dude you're getting a Dell" guy got busted for pot, their quality plummeted. I've seen a lot of Dells that are just now finally dying at 5 years, while these new ones are dying in months.
As for Toshiba, I've seen more of the newer ones failing than older ones, but nothing compared to Dell and Gateway. HPs were great up until these motherboard-eaters started showing up on the market in early 2007. Gateway...well Gateway dug their own grave and should have disappeared from the market years ago.
What can you expect though? Technology has gotten cheap enough to the point that if a basic $400 laptop lasts you only a year, then you got your moneys worth.
I hear good about ASUS laptops, just it was rumored that they'd use high-end graphics cards, while keeping other parts refurbished to keep the cost of a gaming laptop low. That comes from two of my co-workers, one who owns an ASUS laptop, but I can't verify that rumor.
They aren't using refurb parts. I'm an ASUS partner.
The old Toshiba Satellite notebooks; the big thick grey buggers were fantastic. But since then, quality has steadily declined.
I had one client who went through a video card and TWO motherboards in the course of a couple of months with his high-end Toshiba. He was LIVID. Combined with the fact that the bloody thing had to go to somewhere in the US to get fixed and he was without it for a month.
My sister's Toshiba went through FIVE motherboards!!!! She was using it as a desktop and apparently the sub-par cooling solution used was not adequate for extended usage as a desktop replacement. This was killing the boards. Toshiba finally advised her on this with the last motherboard replacement and so she shuts it off now and it's been OK.... Hardly what I'd call satisfactory.
DELL's higher-end laptops are decent. The Inspiron ones.... well you get what you pay for. Which isn't much.
The ACER notebooks have not had horrendous failure rates for me. Though I ONLY sell the Intel-based ones. They are inexpensive and their design and warranty reflect that. They have a far lower hinge-failure rate than the Compaq notebooks and I have had to do the CPU fans on a couple of them.
I've been selling ASUS notebooks since they were first available in Canada. I've had one motherboard failure and one video card failure. That's the lowest failure rate of any manufacturer I've dealt with in volume by a wide margin.
The Lenovo notebooks are significantly cheaper than the IBM models they replaced. They are very price-competitive with Fujitsu and ASUS now. Not sure that the quality is as good though.....
Dell is absolute garbage, at least their laptops, I don't do much on-site service of desktops so I don't know how often the ones at work break. I have noticed that after Dell's "mascot" "dude you're getting a Dell" guy got busted for pot, their quality plummeted. I've seen a lot of Dells that are just now finally dying at 5 years, while these new ones are dying in months.
As for Toshiba, I've seen more of the newer ones failing than older ones, but nothing compared to Dell and Gateway. HPs were great up until these motherboard-eaters started showing up on the market in early 2007. Gateway...well Gateway dug their own grave and should have disappeared from the market years ago.
What can you expect though? Technology has gotten cheap enough to the point that if a basic $400 laptop lasts you only a year, then you got your moneys worth.
I hear good about ASUS laptops, just it was rumored that they'd use high-end graphics cards, while keeping other parts refurbished to keep the cost of a gaming laptop low. That comes from two of my co-workers, one who owns an ASUS laptop, but I can't verify that rumor.
They aren't using refurb parts. I'm an ASUS partner.
The old Toshiba Satellite notebooks; the big thick grey buggers were fantastic. But since then, quality has steadily declined.
I had one client who went through a video card and TWO motherboards in the course of a couple of months with his high-end Toshiba. He was LIVID. Combined with the fact that the bloody thing had to go to somewhere in the US to get fixed and he was without it for a month.
My sister's Toshiba went through FIVE motherboards!!!! She was using it as a desktop and apparently the sub-par cooling solution used was not adequate for extended usage as a desktop replacement. This was killing the boards. Toshiba finally advised her on this with the last motherboard replacement and so she shuts it off now and it's been OK.... Hardly what I'd call satisfactory.
DELL's higher-end laptops are decent. The Inspiron ones.... well you get what you pay for. Which isn't much.
The ACER notebooks have not had horrendous failure rates for me. Though I ONLY sell the Intel-based ones. They are inexpensive and their design and warranty reflect that. They have a far lower hinge-failure rate than the Compaq notebooks and I have had to do the CPU fans on a couple of them.
I've been selling ASUS notebooks since they were first available in Canada. I've had one motherboard failure and one video card failure. That's the lowest failure rate of any manufacturer I've dealt with in volume by a wide margin.
The Lenovo notebooks are significantly cheaper than the IBM models they replaced. They are very price-competitive with Fujitsu and ASUS now. Not sure that the quality is as good though.....
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I don't see that Dell is 'garbage' at all. The last throw-away Dell laptops were the D600/610 line. Interestingly, I can't kill the D810's. Only one of about a hundred has croaked. They run a lot longer than the 3 years they are budgeted for. This tends to not make the end-user too happy as they have to wait another year or two before they get a new laptop.
Steve, how can you say Dell is garbage due to a hard disk dying? They don't make hard disks, neither does HP, Asus, etc. ??
Steve, how can you say Dell is garbage due to a hard disk dying? They don't make hard disks, neither does HP, Asus, etc. ??
The Dell D810s were fairly decent, aside from their CD drives ejecting out of nowhere. But then again, that model goes back to the time when Dell's quality was much better than it is now. The newer "sleek" XPS and Studio laptops are hit or miss in terms of reliability. Dell doesn't even request many parts being returned for warranty repairs on XPS/Studio laptops, which is most likely due to their killing of the models/designs.
To get technical, Dell doesn't really make any parts, they just get parts from suppliers. Like almost all of the manufacturers. Hard drive quality control is p***poor for most consumer and OEM drives.
OVERK1LL,
Thanks for clearing up that rumor, ASUS computers seem to be pretty good, just not too common where I'm at. The netbooks are gaining popularity, and most around here are Acer or ASUS, so perhaps I'll get to tinker with more of them soon.
How old was your sister's Toshiba? A co-worker told me that a few years back they made a bad design with their processor choice and the cooling systems.
To get technical, Dell doesn't really make any parts, they just get parts from suppliers. Like almost all of the manufacturers. Hard drive quality control is p***poor for most consumer and OEM drives.
OVERK1LL,
Thanks for clearing up that rumor, ASUS computers seem to be pretty good, just not too common where I'm at. The netbooks are gaining popularity, and most around here are Acer or ASUS, so perhaps I'll get to tinker with more of them soon.
How old was your sister's Toshiba? A co-worker told me that a few years back they made a bad design with their processor choice and the cooling systems.
OVERKILL
$100 Site Donor 2021
Originally Posted By: ConfederateTyrant
The Dell D810s were fairly decent, aside from their CD drives ejecting out of nowhere. But then again, that model goes back to the time when Dell's quality was much better than it is now. The newer "sleek" XPS and Studio laptops are hit or miss in terms of reliability. Dell doesn't even request many parts being returned for warranty repairs on XPS/Studio laptops, which is most likely due to their killing of the models/designs.
To get technical, Dell doesn't really make any parts, they just get parts from suppliers. Like almost all of the manufacturers. Hard drive quality control is p***poor for most consumer and OEM drives.
OVERK1LL,
Thanks for clearing up that rumor, ASUS computers seem to be pretty good, just not too common where I'm at. The netbooks are gaining popularity, and most around here are Acer or ASUS, so perhaps I'll get to tinker with more of them soon.
How old was your sister's Toshiba? A co-worker told me that a few years back they made a bad design with their processor choice and the cooling systems.
Would have been early 2000's; probably around 2002 or 2003?
To touch on your other point about outsourcing..... Oh yes. ASUS is one of the largest notebook OEM's as well. They make notebooks for MANY of the mainstream companies and have been doing so for a LONG time. WAY before they considered making their own notebook line.
Their own take on it was to have no compromises. Since with their own designs, they are the ones calling the shots, so everything they've learned in their OEM work gets applied to their own lineup with a sort of "no holds barred" approach. This leaves you with some VERY robust and durable products.
The Dell D810s were fairly decent, aside from their CD drives ejecting out of nowhere. But then again, that model goes back to the time when Dell's quality was much better than it is now. The newer "sleek" XPS and Studio laptops are hit or miss in terms of reliability. Dell doesn't even request many parts being returned for warranty repairs on XPS/Studio laptops, which is most likely due to their killing of the models/designs.
To get technical, Dell doesn't really make any parts, they just get parts from suppliers. Like almost all of the manufacturers. Hard drive quality control is p***poor for most consumer and OEM drives.
OVERK1LL,
Thanks for clearing up that rumor, ASUS computers seem to be pretty good, just not too common where I'm at. The netbooks are gaining popularity, and most around here are Acer or ASUS, so perhaps I'll get to tinker with more of them soon.
How old was your sister's Toshiba? A co-worker told me that a few years back they made a bad design with their processor choice and the cooling systems.
Would have been early 2000's; probably around 2002 or 2003?
To touch on your other point about outsourcing..... Oh yes. ASUS is one of the largest notebook OEM's as well. They make notebooks for MANY of the mainstream companies and have been doing so for a LONG time. WAY before they considered making their own notebook line.
Their own take on it was to have no compromises. Since with their own designs, they are the ones calling the shots, so everything they've learned in their OEM work gets applied to their own lineup with a sort of "no holds barred" approach. This leaves you with some VERY robust and durable products.
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Quote:
Would have been early 2000's; probably around 2002 or 2003?
That would be the time frame my co-worker was talking about. Not sure of the validity, but he said it was due to a desktop processor setup being used in the design.
Would have been early 2000's; probably around 2002 or 2003?
That would be the time frame my co-worker was talking about. Not sure of the validity, but he said it was due to a desktop processor setup being used in the design.
OVERKILL
$100 Site Donor 2021
Originally Posted By: ConfederateTyrant
Quote:
Would have been early 2000's; probably around 2002 or 2003?
That would be the time frame my co-worker was talking about. Not sure of the validity, but he said it was due to a desktop processor setup being used in the design.
Yup, desktop P4's and horrendous ventilation. Led to heat saturation by the chassis. Simply a poor design.
Quote:
Would have been early 2000's; probably around 2002 or 2003?
That would be the time frame my co-worker was talking about. Not sure of the validity, but he said it was due to a desktop processor setup being used in the design.
Yup, desktop P4's and horrendous ventilation. Led to heat saturation by the chassis. Simply a poor design.
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Presshotts (Prescott) P4's? Didn't earlier P4's run cooler before?
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I have a dell inspiron 8600, it was been a tank for me. Very good notebook, very heavy so it is not fun to travel with.
Pentium M is the processor, it works fine for me.
My brother has a newer dell that he got for 379, it is a amd dual core dell, and is very slow even after I got rid of the bloatware. Vista runs terrible on it.
Pentium M is the processor, it works fine for me.
My brother has a newer dell that he got for 379, it is a amd dual core dell, and is very slow even after I got rid of the bloatware. Vista runs terrible on it.
I've had good luck with Dell laptops.
I have an Inspiron (don't remember model) at work and it's held up fairly well and is going on three years old.
Wife recently chose an XPS laptop as her school laptop. While I don't care much for Vista, it's pretty snappy and she likes it. I find it excessively large for a laptop, but like I said, this is what SHE choose.
I've got a Dell Mini 9 that I've had for four months now. Great little computer for surfing and watching movies. The battery lasts a good 3.5 to 4 hours and the screen, while small, is very usable. The keyboard is tiny, and while I've got fat fingers, I can write an e-mail but I wouldn't do any work processing with it. I've run both XP and Ubuntu 8.10 on it - both work fine with the Ubuntu naturally being a bit quicker.
later,
b
I have an Inspiron (don't remember model) at work and it's held up fairly well and is going on three years old.
Wife recently chose an XPS laptop as her school laptop. While I don't care much for Vista, it's pretty snappy and she likes it. I find it excessively large for a laptop, but like I said, this is what SHE choose.
I've got a Dell Mini 9 that I've had for four months now. Great little computer for surfing and watching movies. The battery lasts a good 3.5 to 4 hours and the screen, while small, is very usable. The keyboard is tiny, and while I've got fat fingers, I can write an e-mail but I wouldn't do any work processing with it. I've run both XP and Ubuntu 8.10 on it - both work fine with the Ubuntu naturally being a bit quicker.
later,
b
Originally Posted By: MysticGold04
This is nice here... $379 after rebate... 6 cell battery.
Asus Eee PC 10" screen, 1GB, 160GB hdd (obviously I'll need to upgrade to 2GB)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220443
EDIT: Location updated
Finally settled on this one... we'll see how it works out... I got it from PC Connection for $410... no tax and free shipping. Hopefully the rebate will still work for me.
This is nice here... $379 after rebate... 6 cell battery.
Asus Eee PC 10" screen, 1GB, 160GB hdd (obviously I'll need to upgrade to 2GB)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220443
EDIT: Location updated
Finally settled on this one... we'll see how it works out... I got it from PC Connection for $410... no tax and free shipping. Hopefully the rebate will still work for me.
OVERKILL
$100 Site Donor 2021
Originally Posted By: MysticGold04
Originally Posted By: MysticGold04
This is nice here... $379 after rebate... 6 cell battery.
Asus Eee PC 10" screen, 1GB, 160GB hdd (obviously I'll need to upgrade to 2GB)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220443
EDIT: Location updated
Finally settled on this one... we'll see how it works out... I got it from PC Connection for $410... no tax and free shipping. Hopefully the rebate will still work for me.
Good choice. They are very well built for the price.
Originally Posted By: MysticGold04
This is nice here... $379 after rebate... 6 cell battery.
Asus Eee PC 10" screen, 1GB, 160GB hdd (obviously I'll need to upgrade to 2GB)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220443
EDIT: Location updated
Finally settled on this one... we'll see how it works out... I got it from PC Connection for $410... no tax and free shipping. Hopefully the rebate will still work for me.
Good choice. They are very well built for the price.
Originally Posted By: OVERK1LL
Good choice. They are very well built for the price.
Thanks for the suggestion. This one I think is about the perfect compromise between a full size and a smaller netbook like the Acer one. I haven't had a whole lot of experience with Asus products, but several buddies of mine and family have had computers with Asus boards for many years without issues.
Several pluses for this one - 6 cell battery, about 5-6 hours and the memory and hard disk are upgradeable... not that the others weren't, but voided the warranty.
Good choice. They are very well built for the price.
Thanks for the suggestion. This one I think is about the perfect compromise between a full size and a smaller netbook like the Acer one. I haven't had a whole lot of experience with Asus products, but several buddies of mine and family have had computers with Asus boards for many years without issues.
Several pluses for this one - 6 cell battery, about 5-6 hours and the memory and hard disk are upgradeable... not that the others weren't, but voided the warranty.
Originally Posted By: MysticGold04
several pluses for this one - 6 cell battery, about 5-6 hours
The actual life will be closer to 4 hours, but that should still be plenty for a typical domestic flight duration, etc.
several pluses for this one - 6 cell battery, about 5-6 hours
The actual life will be closer to 4 hours, but that should still be plenty for a typical domestic flight duration, etc.
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