New computer?

[packrat]

We're talking about getting ourselves a new computer for Christmas. Ours is from...2004 I think? JD wants to get a laptop. We currently have a desktop. I don't know much about laptops..not that I know a lot about desktops either, but that's what I've always had. What kind of laptop should we be looking for? We have an external hard drive (not connected yet, haven't gotten that far), is that something we can also use w/the laptop?

Any direction to point me to what kind of laptops we should look at? We'll probably go to Best Buy and mess around w/them too.

One thing I'll miss is we have a really large monitor, and that is soo nice for looking at sparklies and things.

 

[Missy]

I know nothing about computers but I do know I love love love my macbook pro. We have 3 apple macbook laptops- my dh just bought the third and I wish I could remember what he said was different about the one he just got. Something about the hard drive being one piece? I am sure I messed that up but he is in meetings all day so cannot tell you the correct info right now except that we both love the macbook pro. I know it is the workhorse of the apple laptops (according to the genius guys at apple) and I who am computer incompetent really loves it! I've had mine for 3 plus years so far.

Good luck and happy computer shopping!


ETA: Only thing I hate about apple is that you can only use their products with their stuff. So the charger I am using is apple (and expensive) and they need replacement too often. I think I am on my 3rd charger now. That pisses me off but because I do love their laptops I deal with it. I own nothing else apple for that reason.

 

[VRBeauty]

I'm by no means an expert, but from a functionality standpoint I think there's virtually no difference between a laptop and a desktop model these days. Most laptops have all the computing power and storage your average consumer would need, and then some. From the user's standpoint of course you're getting portability but the tradeoff is you have a smaller screen and keyboard. The smaller screen would be an issue if you normally have several windows (say more than three) open at once.

Missy - I think what you're referring to is that the latest apples have only hard drives. There's no place to insert a disk or floppy ( ) drive. The assumption is that the material you used to use that drive for can now be downloaded from the internet. I have an apple and it's been great! The one proviso I'd add if considering an apple though is that it doesn't come with the microsoft office suite, you have to buy "office for apple" separately and it's fairly pricey. Apple has a low-cost "Iwork" program which it says is the same as having MOffice, but I found that it didn't play with MOffice products all that well. (Fortunately my employer's MOffice license allowed me to purchase a the Office program for home use for very little.)

ETA I've had my Apple for maybe four years now, and I've never had to replace the charger. I considered buying one once though when I left mine at some out of town location, and I agree - their accessories are expensive, and you generally don't have the option of buying a "generic" version like you can with a non-Apple PC.

 

[GreenBling]

If you like the mobility of a laptop but really really miss having a large monitor, you can consider connecting the lap top to big screen so you can have best of both worlds

I think the first thing you need to decide is whether you want to use Mac or Window. And in any case, if you are using it for standard stuff like emailing, basic office work, photos, music, nothing too techie or fancy, I think most laptops released in year 2012 should accommodate your needs. Do try out the new Window 8 touch screen laptops, quite cool feature. No harm playing it at the store even if you don't need that!

 

[packrat]

Thanks everyone! We have apple's at work, but they're old and I can't do any of the online work I need to do so we're getting new ones. What I have now is iBook G4, whatever that means! It was a bit of a change coming to work here, getting used to not using a desktop and not using Windows.

Neither of us are super techy people..I still have to show him how to insert pics in threads from Photobucket for a couple of the forums he frequents. We just would use it for forums, facebook, hotmail, that kind of stuff, and pictures.

He brought up seeing a commercial for a laptop that could flip around and be used as a tablet. Not sure we need anything that fancy.

I hear a lot of good things about Apple..my lead teacher loves her laptop and says it's so user friendly and has better features than Windows based computers. Not sure which way we'd go yet.

We have a big screen tv, so that might be kinda fun, to hook it up to that and look at sparklies haha!

gotta get back to work before the kids tear the place down.

 

[minousbijoux]

We have apple products too and have gone through more chargers than I can count. What bothers me is that they know they break, but don't seem to be making them any better. Each time, even though its covered by our warranty, I have to make an appointment at the Genius bar, bring in the laptop and then hang around until they're ready to "make sure it isn't my computer." Oh, just give me a new one already!

Other than that, we all love our Mac laptops.

 

[OneFifty]

I am also an apple convert. I had a Dell before, but I do love my MacBook Pro. I've never had any problems with my charger. My husband has had to replace one, but his laptop is a six year old MacBook.

You can also find Microsoft Office products at really cheap prices. Every company I have worked for offered them through a program to employees for $10-$20. You can only buy so many licenses so people don't buy a bunch an resell.

I second hooking your computer up to your TV. I have done that and it is pretty cool.

 

[TC1987]

I bought secondhand so I could have both, lol. Used desktop computers don't sell for much. I don't see these deals now, but back in Jul/Aug, people were dumping used desktop boxes on ebay. I got a HP 8200 Elite SFF i5 3.3GHz Sandy Bridge. It only had 2GB RAM (it cost me only $40 or so to buy 8GB RAM) and a 80GB hard drive (I moved my larger hard drive from my P4 computer to this i5.) But the HP box itself only cost $275 delivered, with mouse and keyboard. It had a Windows 7 Pro COA, so I downloaded the Win7 Pro ISO free from Digital River (Google for Digital River Windows 7 iso), burned that to DVD, and installed that for an OS. I activated it with the key on the COA sticker. I downloaded all the HP utilities and drivers free from HP's site. The only problem I encountered was that there was no driver in Win7 for the Ethernet controller in the HP computer. Could not use ethernet to get to the Internet. That was solved by using my wireless USB adapter to get on the Internet (the USB wireless adapter came with a driver disk.) I already owned antivirus and Office 2007 and Office 2010 academic versions that allow installation on more than one PC. So I just installed those on the HP machine. It has built-in video and an old-style VGA port to connect to my old-style VGA monitor, so all is good. I liked it so well that a bought a second one for my parents. Both of these HP boxes are only 1 year old, too. If you just want a business computer for office work and Internet, check out some used desktops.

Laptops: I don't have any recommendations. An i3 processor would probably do. An i5 is ideal for me, personally. I think i7 is overkill and too hard on batteries, and also lots of companies had problems with the i7s overheating. I bought a used 1st generation i3 laptop and a more netbook-size used first generation i5 laptop with a touch screen (both are Toshiba Satellite.) I paid $250 for the i3 and about $460 for the i5. They both came with Windows 7 Home Premium.

So, I spent about $1050 total and I got 2 decent portables and a desktop PC, with operating system Windows 7. Not the fastest. but certainly faster than a 2004-2005 socket 478 3.2GHz single core P4.

There are new Intel CPUs scheduled to be released in maybe 2Q 2013. I can't remember the specifics. Ivy Bridge was panned as just a refinement of Sandy Bridge, and the new stuff in 2013 is totally new. Haswell is the name. (August was the last time I looked at what's coming up.)

Anything you buy new will have Windows 8. I am not too impressed with it. I think it runs faster than Win7, but it's "too different" unless you use a classic menu, or you install Classic Shell on it. All of the new interface is worthless and cumbersome unless you have a touch screen.

I've seen some new i5 laptops, not touch screen, going for around $500 lately. At the time I got my used i5, the beat price I could get on an i5 was $650 - $675. Ivy Bridge sales just didn't take off. And the new stuff is coming out soon. Drive a hard bargain.

 

[TC1987]

(edited to remove WSJ blog link...)
Surprise: Intel CEO is retiring.

There is a good Haslow explanation at PCWorld called Inside Intel's Haswell CPU: Better performance, all-day battery, 9/13/12
claims 20x improvement in efficiency vs. the current Ivy Bridge.

 

[GemFever]

I'm not a comp person, so I'll just put in a quick pitch for my laptop to balance the Mac suggestions: a Sony VAIO with a matte screen. It is kind of big for a laptop, has an elongated screen and keyboard (to fit the numbers keys on the side... i think they have a specific name, but I don't know it). At first it took a bit of getting used to the bigger elongated screen, but now I love it. I can have two documents open side by side and have the text be large enough to work with comfortably. The matte screen is beautiful, easy on the eyes, helps with glare (no reflections). Oh, and last but not least, it's the comp James Bond uses in Skyfall

 

[zoebartlett]

I know nothing about computers but I do know I love love love my macbook pro. We have 3 apple macbook laptops- my dh just bought the third and I wish I could remember what he said was different about the one he just got. Something about the hard drive being one piece? I am sure I messed that up but he is in meetings all day so cannot tell you the correct info right now except that we both love the macbook pro. I know it is the workhorse of the apple laptops (according to the genius guys at apple) and I who am computer incompetent really loves it! I've had mine for 3 plus years so far.

Good luck and happy computer shopping!


ETA: Only thing I hate about apple is that you can only use their products with their stuff. So the charger I am using is apple (and expensive) and they need replacement too often. I think I am on my 3rd charger now. That pisses me off but because I do love their laptops I deal with it. I own nothing else apple for that reason.

My husband and I were *just* talking about this last night. He'll never own a Mac for that reason. Macs are fine but I can't justify the price. We both have Sony Vaios and we really like them. I think both are about 3-4 years old. My husband built his through Vaio directly and we got mine at Best Buy. My husband is the computer person in the family so I'll ask him when he get home what he'd recommend looking for in a laptop.

This might sound nit-picky, but I like computers where the keys aren't attached. It's too easy for me to make mistakes when I type, and having a bit of space between keys seems to help. Like I said though, I'm nit-picky. I think Macs are built this way, too.

 

[TC1987]

some additional info

For laptops, a discussion on another forum liked Asus (they build their own), and Lenovo ThinkPads (the business class models that are based on the old IBM Thinkpad.) I'm happy with my Toshibas, but I bought for value, not features. Toshiba is known for making good basic laptops that are not the hottest performers, but are priced well and usually are durable enough to last the 2-3 years that most buyers want out of one.

Many companies don't actually make their own laptops. XoticPC has an article called "Who Really Makes Laptops and What is behind the name of a laptop?" And here's another one: Real Laptop Manufacturers at mopo dot ca. (You can Google and find those easily.)

For a laptop, I prefer an Intel CPU to an AMD. The AMD CPUs have tended to run hotter, and laptops have notoriously weak cooling systems. Some of the Toshibas that have AMD CPUs have problems with solder joints breaking from heat. I've only owned one laptop that had an AMD CPU, a Toshiba L505D-S6947, and it ran hot plus had a very short battery life compared to the Toshibas with the Core2 Duo.

I usually build my own desktop PC. But since I know new hardware is being rolled out in 2013, I bought those used HP 8200 desktops to use in the interim.

 

[rubybeth]

I know nothing about computers but I do know I love love love my macbook pro. We have 3 apple macbook laptops- my dh just bought the third and I wish I could remember what he said was different about the one he just got. Something about the hard drive being one piece? I am sure I messed that up but he is in meetings all day so cannot tell you the correct info right now except that we both love the macbook pro.

Missy - I think what you're referring to is that the latest apples have only hard drives. There's no place to insert a disk or floppy ( ) drive. The assumption is that the material you used to use that drive for can now be downloaded from the internet.

I am fairly certain that Missy's husband likes the solid state hard drive. That means the hard drive doesn't have moving parts, vs. a Serial ATA drive, which does have moving parts.

We recently upgrade my old MacBook to a MacBook Pro, and it's been great. My dad helped me with the specifics, but we went with the smallest, cheapest version and got AppleCare, and have been very pleased. It is soooo much faster than my old laptop from 2008, it's insane. I am and always have been an Apple person, though, and we have iPods and an iPad and everything works well together. If you are seriously just looking for a laptop to store photos and do web stuff, though, there are probably cheaper options. I just like that I don't have to worry about getting a virus, and my software practically updates itself.