What's Laptop would you want

[tim fitzgerald]

Hi Everyone
I would like to know which laptop you would purchase for service calls ? I'm in the market for a new one for myself, and would like to know which you use. Reliability, toughness are essential , I certainly don't want to call myself to fix it all the time. I'm way to expensive .(lol)
I hear this question a lot from customers and I know what to tell them for home use. However I would like to know your choice for work laptops.
Tell us your dream machine if gramps left you a bit of cash.

 

[phaZed]

Nothing Dell.

i5 or i7 system with a 150-256GB SSD. Would prefer a thin laptop; "ultra portable" would be ideal.

 

[tim fitzgerald]

Do you think the price of SSD's will come down in future ? I have a 64gb ssd on a net book and use it for web browsing. Tim

 

[RichmondTech]

Packard Bell would be my recommendation.

 

[NWPhotog]

Packard Bell would be my recommendation.

lol ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

A good durable 3 year warranty business grade model.
(current processor)...an i5 is fine...powerful enough. 8 gigs of RAM
Intel WiFi much preferred
For me...13-14" screen is the sweet spot...small and light enough for always traveling, yet large enough to have a full sized keyboard and usable resolution.

I tend to prefer IBM/Lenovo Thinkpads...they seem to be the "Ford F-350 pickup truck" of laptops. Good warranty service too.

I like Dells Latitude line (again..it's a business grade lineup)....not so crazy about their cheaper home grade 1 year warranty Inspiron line. Their midrange Vostros are OK. Excellent pain free warranty.

I like many of the Asus models. Asus is a huge ODM..they actually make many of the laptops for other vendors to re-brand and resell. Many HP, Sony,..even Apple Macbook models (to name a few) are actually made by Asus. I loved their "Bamboo U series" models. They have some really nice models, and they have some blah models. I can say though...I've had horrible experiences dealing with their warranty when fixing a laptop for a client.

 

[tim fitzgerald]

I have a IBM/ LENOVO desktop with 8gb ram and 1tgb hard drive and love it and was leaning towards Lenovo for a new Laptop

 

[MobileTechie]

I'd like a MacBook Air I think. Lovely looking machine, light and would get me some Mac experience.

 

[tim fitzgerald]

Have you been playing with any of the Linux distro's the will help with learning Mac. I'm sure I'll get pounded for saying that from a lot of people, however I think it is.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Just an added note....since many of us prefer to keep our own tools "minimal cost"....there are many IBM/Lenovo Thinkpad Factory Outlet stores....on Lenovo's site itself, plus on eBay. I've purchased quite a few from both Lenovo factory outlet and some eBay stores.

They have "off lease", "returns", "cancelled orders"...and stuff like that, at deep discounts.

Case in point..my last laptop..I purchased from Lenovos factory outlet directly. it was a T60p..which was a higher end model that retailed at about 2,200 bucks brand new the way it was loaded up. I picked it up for 680 bucks. It was still brand new, sealed, only about 6 months old, never used, had 2.5 years remaining on the factory warranty.

I've picked up prior Thinkpads through some eBay Thinkpad outlet stores. All have been good deals. Sometimes you get out of country models that don't have the factory warranty anymore, but still makes a good deal..since we work on our own equipment anyways.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Have you been playing with any of the Linux distro's the will help with learning Mac. I'm sure I'll get pounded for saying that from a lot of people, however I think it is.

I've been dual booting my laptops w/*nix since the Thinkpad T-20 days.
Current laptop I'm typing from has OpenSUSE 12.1 and Win7.

 

[tim fitzgerald]

Dual booting my I old Dell Inspiron with xp and ubuntu 11.10. Also I have a mini netbook with Puppy linux, great little operating system and fun to play with.

 

[CraiGDaniel]

Razer Blade

/thread

 

[MobileTechie]

Have you been playing with any of the Linux distro's the will help with learning Mac. I'm sure I'll get pounded for saying that from a lot of people, however I think it is.

I've ubuntu dualbooting on my big laptop and Joli OS on my netbook. I don't find they really help with OSX to be honest.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Razer Blade

/thread

That's gotta get old fast.....lugging a near 7 lb laptop around all day all day all day all day ain't fun.
gimme under 5 lbs..under 4 lbs... /thread

 

[16k_zx81]

Ive got a CQ series Compaq and a L series Toshiba which I take out on service calls. I also have been known to take a 10" netbook at a pinch.

Personally I dont really care about onsite machines as I only use them for brief periods at a time. They just need to work. Thats it.

 

[tim fitzgerald]

Thats probably the most important prerequisite, I agree. Also would not a very reliable Notebook be even better?

 

[dbdawn]

I have an HP Elitebook right now, it is a business model HP laptop. I also like the new ultrabooks that are starting to appear.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Thats probably the most important prerequisite, I agree. Also would not a very reliable Notebook be even better?

I would say....depends on what you primarily do with it.

Myself...I really don't want too small of a screen or too low of a resolution.
Because as I go onsite to clients offices/networks each and ideally every day..often several clients a day....I'm always using my laptop to log into things at each client ...firewalls via web browser, or RDP into the servers, or bringing up VMWare VSphere Client, Excel spreadsheets. So several times a day my laptop gets brought out, stuffed back in the bag, brought out again, stuffed back in the bag again..etc etc. Thus..prefer lighter. And then when I get home ...after dinner...break it out on the cough again and do more remote work.

All the meanwhile..I'll have Outlook open to my office, Chrome browser, Putty, etc

Much of those management utilities need some real estate...thus a higher resolution. Have used a 12" Thinkpad X series before...was too low of a rez for me.

 

[tempusfugit]

I just bought a toshiba satellite with an i3, 4gb ram, 500 gb hdd, 15.6" screen for 380. Toshiba is reliable for me, and while its a little more plastic than the more expensive models, I don't see it breaking from normal use.. And pretty much everything would have to break in it twice for the cost to hit a "business" model.