the_music_man

i'm buying a new laptop for college in july or august and i thought i'd start looking now. apparently i've been out of the loop cuz i have no idea whats good. I have my eyes on this Sony FS series which uses Intel Centrino Duo. Is this good? I was researching and someone said it might not be good in the longrun cuz it's not 64bit...i also saw something about AMD Turion 64 and X2 ? can someone just give me their advice on which cpu i should be looking @? my budgets around $1700

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Sazar

I would go with a centrino system either way because of the better battery life and cooler temps.

64-bit computing shouldn't make much of an impact anytime soon and unlikely during the viable life of your notebook.

Are you looking for a desktop replacement or a portable product or something in between?

It'll be easier to suggest stuff if you have some more details

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Spooch

College + Laptop....

One word: Thin and Light with a not so big screen and a good graphics card.

Or maybe you could try a Tablet Pc. I am a proud owner of a Toshiba M205-S810 Portege. Love it for college, I have handwritten notes and stuff.
You could get my model of tablet on ebay for about $1,600 more or less.

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Kush

yeah i would go with the centrino now, yeah i dont really care much about amd intel war anymore which you will care about the battery and centrino duo will do that part well, as well as being dual core, which is good, sony is usually less bang for your buck however, because you buy the sony name, check out some dell or acers or even lgs that use centrino duo my friend might get an lg with the x1600

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Johnny

One word - DELL ...

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Sazar

I would consider giving the XPS 1210m a look-see when it is released, especially the ones with a discrete graphics solution.

Look for a release sometime this month or next month.

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ming

Isn't the Sony FS series only single core? They've been around for a while now. Sony has released the FE series which I know have the Core Duo processors.

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Sazar

Here's a link to the XPS 1210

http://www.techpowerup.com/?11408

It's a very nice looking device, I really liked the feel of it. The top is like a pleathor covering and the bottom is extremely well vented. The vents are plastic but they feel almost like felt or cloth. The carbon color design is excellent and the keyboard feel larger than the older 700M series. It is actually more similar to the Latitude X-1 keyboard.

It's an all in one device and the screen feels a lot larger than it really is. Plus it is a very clear/bright screen. It's also relatively quiet.

I would suggest going with the larger/heavier 9 cell battery to get the best battery life out of the product (bout 4.5hrs or more typical use).

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Johnny

That does look like a nice pc, sazar. I'll be checking it out some more ..

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Sazar

Oh yah, it's nice

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the_music_man

opps ur right! this is the one i want

And Sazar, do they have any laptops similar to that Dell one except with a 15'' screen? 12's a little too small for my eyes

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Sazar

There are 2 other versions.

One with 14" and one with 15" screens.

They don't have the same color scheme though.

And if you are spending that much, I would suggest going with the Latitude D-820 or 620. Much more durable than the regular inspirons.

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Techno Child

hmm..... ive seen these notebooks advertised for quite some time, however i don't really need another one yet so i never got around to trying one.... nice prices too


http://www.cyberpowerinc.com

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Nick M

A word about CyberPower; I bought one of my machines from them about four years ago - granted, this was more then four years ago and I don't know how things are now - anyway, the PC shipped and the case was a bit dented...but mostly I just didn't like it. They paid for shipping back and gave me a refund. I ordered a different PC right after and over a lengthy period of time, some components failed; I had their three year warranty and without question, they sent new parts in every case.

They were nice to deal with then and had decent prices.