Flavors of Vista

Post by **Kills On Site** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 3:32 am

Well soon (2 months most likely) I will have to purchase a laptop for college. As one can imagine this computer will come with a flavor of Vista and will require connection to various wireless stations, printing, networked drives and whatever awesome things an engineering school might have. Now the laptop of choice for me is a HP with a Core 2 Duo. They offer three forms of Vista, only two of which I am concerned with. There is Vista Business 32-bit or Vista Ultimate 64-bit. Now I don't think I will really need the extra things from Ultimate, any media center types of stuff will be done via my desktop. My question is, since the Core 2 Duo is 64-bit, what exactly is the advantage of the 64-bit Vista Ultimate over the 32-bit Vista Business.

Post by **Kills On Site** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 3:48 am

Also, since this topic is about laptops, what about laptop cases. I am looking for a satchel type case and something very protective. While protection is paramount, I like something made of canvas or cloth rather than leather, that is to say something more durable and less business like. What brands are good cases.

Post by **FragaGeddon** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 5:46 am

You can get some nice backpacks that are designed to hold a laptop.
I don't like satchel type cases.

Post by **dzjepp** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 5:23 pm

If you are going to be doing engineering work on it then 64bit will help you in the long run. When programs are coded to take advantage of this they can run more efficiently (ie., faster).

Post by **obsidian** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 5:48 pm

Don't get a case that looks obviously like a laptop case. It's more likely to be stolen.

Post by **Kills On Site** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 9:39 pm

Someone gave me that tip so I might go for a backpack case. Still has to be able to hold a 17" laptop. What brands make good durable cases?

Post by **Turbanator** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 11:13 pm

which hp laptop? the pavalion dv series, cause bewarned they have terrible reliability...

Post by **dzjepp** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 11:29 pm

i have a dv6000t runs great, no complaints so far (had it for 4 months) so wachu talking bout willis? also i got it after hearing a lot of positive comments about it

Post by **Kills On Site** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 11:35 pm

Well I was looking at the dv9000t. When I posted the topic "Laptop Recommendations" nobody mentioned HP having bad reliability, infact it was highly recommended. If not HP, what brand then, and I truly hate Dell. One thing I really like about the HP is the button above the touchpad that allows you to turn the touchpad off or on, very easy and instant. I also like the nVIDIA 7600 Go.

Post by **Turbanator** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 8:40 am

Now I'm speaking from a european perspective, but with any dv series notebook, the "touch" buttons along the top can be initiated with static electricity, use a piece of paper and rub it to charge it up, and hover it above the buttons to see. You'll notice you can hover anything statically charged above the power button and it'll turn on... big deal you say? well... problem with these laptops is that when the lid is closed and they're placed into a carry case, as they rub down the side of the case they charge up. The notebook boots up as the static activates the power button and then overheats.

Backlight failure is very common with this range. Admittedly these faults are more so the case with the more portable dv2000 and dv6000 series, as people don't really close the lid and carry around the dv9000 series so much in a bag... but still.

Of all the vendors I range (I stock Sony, Toshiba, HP, Fujitsu, Asus, flybook, Apple, Samsung), HP hands down has the heighest returns rate. I'm lynched by my returns department and my service department for ranging them.

Post by **Turbanator** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 8:43 am

last range (1st gen vista) had roughly a 10% returns rate... most vendors sit between 3 %and 5% (5% is a bad case).

PS: new notebooks will be launched in may from HP, again, with centrino pro coming out (code name santa rosa) the centrino duo platform is cheaper for everyone, thus you'll either get more bang per buck or the unit will overrall cost less bucks.

Post by **Kills On Site** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 8:47 pm

Thanks for the tip about Centrino Pro Turbanator, now I am definately waiting. Since you work in a store Turb, what brands of laptops seem to have the most consistant and best reliability and customer satisfaction.

Post by **Turbanator** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 10:33 pm

I don't exactly work in a store, but we'll leave that for another day...

Tosh seems to hands down have the best reliability for years running, they are also going through a chassis refresh with the launch of centrino pro, so you'll get new A200 and P200 chassis, there'll also be a new 13.3" tosh launching this quarter, but the release date is unconfirmed.

Post by **Turbanator** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 10:35 pm

I personally have a sony, but I don't pay for my notebooks, I had a fujitsu lifebook before this and it was great too.... when I was recommending a laptop for my girlfriend though, I recommended a macbook, if you're not playing games are savvy enough to bootcamp, then macbooks are great.

Post by **Kills On Site** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 12:17 am

I have had 2 or 3 people, all mac fanboys, telling me to buy a macbook and run Windows on it. While I don't have anything against Mac, I think I should get a windows-based laptop for Windows. Well I do have one thing against macs, the one button mouse, which they put on the macbooks, can't stand no right click.

I am kind of a big screen junkie, that is why I like the dv9000t, but I guess I can settle for a 15.4. The problem with the dv6000 for me was it had lower battery life and a smaller, with dedicated and shared memory, graphics card.

Does Toshiba have any student discounts or anything of that nature? Well I found that Toshiba has customizable laptops. I like that you can choose 1GB is a 1 DIMM configuration, that can save me money now and then when I upgrade I only have to buy one stick instead of replacing 2 512s.

A few highly desired items for me is a Core 2 Duo, 2GB or RAM running at matched to CPU speeds, Vista Business or Ultimate in a 64-bit mode, nVIDIA graphics controller with dedicated, or as they now call it discrete, memory, and Bluetooth. I really want Bluetooth so I can connect a laptop mouse without any extra dongles or object sticking out of the laptop.

Post by **dzjepp** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 12:35 am

Are you going to be gaming on it?

Post by **Kills On Site** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 1:03 am

I don't intend to be doing heavy gaming, but I would like to be able to have a few games between classes or whatnot.

Toshiba has 20% off of customizable Satellite A200. If only they will keep that up after Centrino Duo Pro emerges.

Post by **Turbanator** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 9:06 pm

In england, the new tosh boxes were released today, except the santa rosa skus.

Pee two hunderd - 143
Pee two hunderd-144

^^ these seem to be the santa rosa skus in the uk, the tell tale is always the wifi, normal centrino is 802.11a/b/g and santa rosa is 802.11a/g/n

Post by **Kills On Site** » Thu Apr 19, 2007 12:52 am

Well on the customizable A200 it has the option of that new AGN WiFi, model 4965, which is what is said to be planned for the Centrino Pro, but it does say

Wikipedia wrote:Some newer models (as of quarter 1 2007) of the Napa platform contain the newer 4965AGN (a/b/g/draft-n) wireless cards.

However, shouldn't the tell-tale sign be a Core 2 Duo processor with an 800 MHz FSB? Wikipedia on Santa Rosa.

Now this is said

Wikipedia wrote:The Santa Rosa platform will be branded as "Centrino Pro" when combined with the enhanced security technologies Intel introduced with vPro and will be called Centrino Duo when they are not used

so perhaps I should not say Centrino Pro.

At any rate, shouldn't these new Santa Rosa notebooks contain at least the option for an 800 MHz FSB Core 2 Duo?

Post by **Turbanator** » Fri Apr 20, 2007 10:34 pm

that may be true about the 4965AGN, but I've yet to see a sku built with the 4965N wifi chip which isn't also using a Santa Rosa platform. With the notebook product becoming increasingly commodotised, it's hard to find details on cache, bus speed and even sometimes CPU speed, with retailers often just referring to the CPU ratings (Txxxx) instead. Thats why its usually a good tell tale that a unit is santa rosa when you see the 802.11a/g/n rating.

Post by **Turbanator** » Fri Apr 20, 2007 10:36 pm

oh and at the very least, if it's not santa rosa, it's atleast the latest napa platform...

Post by **Turbanator** » Fri Apr 20, 2007 10:39 pm

btw: even though i don't like to recommend hp to friends, launched this 14.1" beauty today and thought it was quite crunchy
http://www.microanvika.com/product.asp? ... O=HEW14735

Post by **Kills On Site** » Fri Apr 27, 2007 12:20 am

Well I am really hoping that Toshiba will keep their 20% off the A200 and 15% off the P200/P205 after the new Centrino platform arrives. Don't suppose Turb would know how long the rebates on customizable laptops is.

Also, for saving money I intend to get the laptop configured with 1x1024MB RAM and then buy another stick from Kingston or Crucial since they are cheaper than Toshiba. Does this sound like a good plan to you guys?

Post by **Scourge** » Fri Apr 27, 2007 2:17 am

I don't know if they would let you at your school or whatever, but you can get the 32 bit business and order the 64 bit version alternate media for about $10. Which is what I did. My disc ought to be here in about another week.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/1 ... fault.mspx

Post by **Kills On Site** » Fri Apr 27, 2007 3:37 am

Would that require a reinstall of the OS? I know laptops have some pretty specific drivers that are needed to make everything work well. I also have no clue if Toshibas come with a reinstall disk.