Laptop for college?

[RedskinsFan318]

Sony Vaio - they do break a lot. They are very nice/overpriced. If you require repair, most of the time, the whole laptop needs to be sent in for service - downtime can be two weeks.

Now I can only talked based on my own experience, but I'm the only person I know that has owned a Sony Vaio and it's still running strong going on 3 years. I know tons of people with Dells and it seems they run into all sorts of problems. To me at least, it seems the Dell cases are made cheap. My buddy owns one and the hinge on his monitor is real loose and his mouse left-click button is so overly sensitive. Then again, I treat my computer better than everyone I know, so maybe that's it.

[buenosdiaz]

That's one of the ones I'm considering. They have a huge selection of different warranties which I really like.

yeah dude seriously i wouldnt recommend anything else but a thinkpad...the last PC (notebook or desktop) i was happy with, before my thinkpad, was an IBM i had back in the day that ran on like windows 95 haha

dont get a dell! and def dont get an HP or the other big name stuff at Best Buy..

Thinkpads will last forever lol seriously they will..and they arent as bulky as they used to be and they are pretty customizable and given your budget you should be able to get a pretty sick thinkpad

with that said im switching over to a mac when i start up school again lol

[redskins0756]

yeah dude seriously i wouldnt recommend anything else but a thinkpad...the last PC (notebook or desktop) i was happy with, before my thinkpad, was an IBM i had back in the day that ran on like windows 95 haha

dont get a dell! and def dont get an HP or the other big name stuff at Best Buy..

Thinkpads will last forever lol seriously they will..and they arent as bulky as they used to be and they are pretty customizable and given your budget you should be able to get a pretty sick thinkpad

with that said im switching over to a mac when i start up school again lol

I would go Mac in a heartbeat but as a business major I'm a little weary of doing the whole Parallels/Bootcamp thing when I've never done it before. I haven't owned a Mac (I don't imagine it to be a HUGE learning curve as it is directed to more novice computer users) but I just feel the reliability and performance is there unlike other computers. But I do need to run Vista Ultimate and I just don't know if 320GB of HDD space is enough. I know that I could do the whole external HDD deal or swap out the HDD but is the hassle worth OSX?

Still leaning toward a Sony Vaio although I will take a trip down to Tysons Mall to try out both the Macbook and the Vaio soon at their respective stores. Also I will look into a Dell and see what they offer, although from experience I just don't know if I can buy another Dell.

As far as a Thinkpad that's another possibility. My main gripe with the Thinkpad is that the screen seems very low quality. My sister has one and even with brightness turned all the way up and tuning some of the settings, it just doesn't output a very good picture. Maybe they've fixed that problem with newer versions but that is one of the things holding me back from getting one.

[Pwyl]

You'll find that Dell is practically 2 companies. On the business side their build quality and support is top notch. On the home side their build quality is shoddy and CS is (or at least was) outsourced to India.

You can't go wrong with a Dell latitude series. I ran the D610 at work, compiling code and hosting a local SQL server for the last 3 years without a hiccup, and they just upgraded me to the D630.

[RabidFan]

"Easy ways" that also include voiding your warranty? I could buy a Mac laptop HDD online and have it installed by Microcenter or the Apple store, but they charge an inordinate amount of money to install. Just wondering also if your experience with Vaio laptops is related to the FW series specifically or older models?

That's one of the ones I'm considering. They have a huge selection of different warranties which I really like.

Someone already pointed out that the HP's right now are not as good because they will break down quite a bit. I'm looking for reliability and performance which from that makes me question their reliability. Also I've tried out a few of my friends' HP laptops made recently and their performance has been pretty underwhelming in my opinion.

I hear you and i hope my luck continues...just saying those are way older gen laptops....and the 9000 is like $500 so you could use the rest in Vegas at the tables and the Spearmint Rhino.....priorities. :laugh: