By C. Linares
This is my second laptop in two years. The previous laptop I owned LCD screen was crushed in my luggage one week ago. I will tell you why I bought another Toshiba and why this size. 1) I needed a new computer, 2) I am college student who likes to do work either on my couch or around the pool area. I wanted something smaller and lighter than my previous laptop (15.4 6lbs)and also with more memory, RAM and a faster processor. One year ago I bought my previous lap top for about the same price and it does not even compare to the speed and efficiency of this laptop. One neat feature is a fingerprint reader for added security. This is great is you use your computer in a public place and have to leave it unattended (ie Panera). The dual processor is a wonderful feature especially if you are someone like me who runs a multiple programs at once.
i love this computer. i've got mine upped to the 2.16 core 2 duo, 2gb ram. it's super speedy, and the screen is amazing. i would recommend upgradin to the better screen and also getting the 2gb ram if you are planning on doing a lot with it.By mc "m" (chicago)
cons- because i am picky... i think the touchpad + buttons suck but i use a mouse so whatever. also, sony customer service is terrible, i recommend getting 3 year onsite repair warranty unless you want to chance sitting on the phone with sony or waiting for repairs. also, careful with the rebates- i never got mine and have heard MANY other complaints about this.
ove my Sony Vaio!!!It's my precious and I'm really happy, it has a great spacious keyboard and a screen soooo big that it is a delight to watch...with a web-cam integrated and michropone, very fast processor and a battery that lasts up to 2.5hrs which is ok. The cons well the touch pad is pretty bad and also I would have changed the way the LCD screen is locked and released with the switch. Apart from I just can't say anything bad about my VAIO.By Susy "Sue" (Caracas, VE)
My daughter had been shopping the Sony VAIO all over town when a freind told us about the deal she had gotten at Amazon. We went on line and snagged one for our daughter for college and a week later ordered one for another relative. They LOVE them.By DAVID MCQUERRY
5 STARS!
I have been using my FS810 for three months now. Got an awesome deal at 799.00 + tax. It is fast, has everything except bluetooth, which you can add for 40 dollars. It's very light for it's size and looks as cool as a MAC and draws a lot of attention at the airport. The display is truely incredible!!! Spend the extra 100 or 200 and get this Sony!
have only had the HP zv5240us for a week so it is somewhat premature to review it but I figured I would provide my initial findings. The bottome-line; you can't beat the price for what you get. So far I have had minimal problems. I had a problem with my wireless network connection disconnecting, but that appeared to be a Windows XP problem that was fixed with the help of HP Tech Support. As for performance, my biggest concern was the 4200 rpm HD. I do video editing with Adobe Premier 6.5 and I figured I would tax the system and see how the 4200 rpm drive could handle Premier. As expected, while capturing, frames were dropped, but it took alot to drop them. I had my Sony VX2000 video camera connected directly to the computer through the firewire cable and began capturing. The first test I performed consisted of slow and smooth pans and zooms on still objects with no frames dropped. I increased camera movement speed until frames began to drop. Although frames were dropped, the movement required to drop them was much faster than what I would consider to be standard videography practices and close to the point of nauseating. I also ran the same tests with an external 7200rpm HD and no matter what I did with the camera movement I could not get frames to drop. With the 4200rpm HD, I also rendered a short 20 or 30 second clip in Premier and it seemed to work fine. The clip consisted of dissolve transitions as well as some footage with adjusted speeds.By Mchezz (Connecticut)
Although I did not buy one from amazon, I have personal experience working with over a hundred T22's. This was a popular model among many corporations during the past five years, and now is being replaced with the newer T43 which has the P3-M/Centrino chipset. So many of these you are seeing for sale now are being retired from corporate use. One nationwide chain had a contract with IBM which would amount to at least 14,000 T22 Thinkpads in just their local offices across the US. My opinion of this laptop is that they are dependable and extremely well-made. Their biggest advantage, though, is their size which makes them great for travel. They each weigh in at around 5.5 pounds but seem much more compact than that number would describe. That being said, there are a few things to watch for and take note of.
Build quality of these models is excellent. I have a new Dell Inspiron 6000 that has many more features and a great LCD screen, but just feels cheap in comparison. The lid (screen half) on the Inspiron does not seem to latch evenly onto the base. So when closed, it wobbles a bit by perhaps a few millimeters. Every single one of the used T22's I examined did not have this problem. The Dell also has a flimsy CD/DVD tray while the T22's seems much more solid and heavy. All the compartments underneath, such as the battery and memory covers, seem to fit well and are easily removed.
The main thing to watch for on the T22 is pressure marks on the TFT screen, which will leave white or lightened spots on darker backgrounds. The screen can be replaced and is not terribly complex if you're skilled at taking things apart. The spec components can be upgraded easily and the CardBUS/PCMCIA will accept new WIFI cards, etc. A VGA-out is on the back so connecting a second monitor is easy, along with 10/100 Ethernet, modem, USB, keyboard and mouse ports. It also has microphone/headphone jacks, S-Video out, serial, parallel and infrared ports.
One point of interest on these laptops is that they do not have touchpads, only an eraser-nub pointer in the middle of the keyboard. Some users won't mind this at all and in fact you might get used to it quickly. The best option is a wireless notebook mouse like the one Microsoft makes which you can get here on amazon. The reason I prefer that model is you can fit the USB receiver into the underside of the mouse for traveling.
As far as Windows, I have not tested 2000 next to XP. Both will probably be fine. Make sure you look on Lenovo-IBM's website for a range of drivers/utilities if you want all the nice features originally built in to the Thinkpad. This includes the on-screen volume/screen brightness controls and the "battery maximiser" (yes, there's no Z). What that does is gives you details about the battery's performance, how many times it's been cycled and how healthy it is. Expect at least 3 hours from a good battery.
In summary, buy the T22 or spend 2-3 times as much on a slightly faster notebook that's of lower quality. Unless, of course, it's a new Thinkpad.
The MacBook Pro 17 Core 2 Duo is a nice little machine. Were it a PC, I'd give it five stars on most every count. Unfortuantely, I'm coming from a Powerbook 17 which was a perfect machine, speed aside, and so I hold it to this standard.
Firstly, the display is not as nice as the Powerbook's. The brightness is not at all uniform between the center and edges of the screen. It looks very much like a mid-range conventional PC notebook in this regard.
Secondly, when running CPU-intensive tasks, the machine is far louder than the Powerbook. The fan gets to sound about like a PC desktop, but higher-pitched. The Powerbook 17 was probably about half as loud at full speed. It's definitely enough that you don't want it in the same room if you're doing any kind of recording work.
Next, the boot and hibernation times are longer than the Powerbook. I know I've seen videos showing the MacBook Pro starting up more quickly than the Powerbook, however with the same software installed on both there's a definite longer period. It's just enough that I find I don't casually flip it shut anymore.
Lastly, while your results may vary, mine died within three weeks and is now out for service. The airport became increasingly less responsive at first, and then the whole machine started locking hard at irregular intervals -- not a spinning beachball, but a full hard lock where everything freezes and a power cycle is needed. It continued doing this even during a software reinstall, and Apple tells me that it will take about two weeks for me to get it fixed or replaced. In retrospect, I wish I'd waited to see that this iteration was solid before buying.
All this aside, the machine does pack a bigger punch than the Powerbook 17 when working. Applications are considerably smoother, games run well, and I end up doing some tasks twice because they complete so quickly that I think I messed up a command or menu option! The huge hard drive is great for so small a machine, and it turns heads in public every bit as much as the beautiful Powerbook 17 did. Further, being able to run Windows apps via Parallels (and soon VMWare!) is useful on occasion, though it's funny how little one has to do that these days.
I have had this computer 2 days now. It is just amazing. It arrived from amazon charged and ready to go. In 10 minutes I had it fully set up (it is _so_ simple to set up) and was surfing the web from my hotel.By D Cohen "Dan" (Cranford, NJ USA)
Right now I am typing this whilst listening to the music from my ipod on it!!
I never imagined a computer could be this easy to use.
The only thing the other reviews didn't mention is that it is ready to go faster than I open the screen when coming up from sleep mode which is great when you just want to look something up.
If you have an ipod then you know how easy apple stuff is to use - just get this!!
Battery life is great - it shows the remaining time in the top right corner of the screen - I am getting over 4 hours.
Dan
