Re: Options for lightweight laptops

From: Dances With Crows (danSPANceswitTRAPhcrows_at_usa.net)
Date: 10/09/03 

Date: 9 Oct 2003 20:20:24 GMT

On 9 Oct 2003 10:27:41 -0700, Matthew Harelick staggered into the Black
Sun and said:
> I would like to buy a lightweight laptop but I do not want to invest
> in [Centrino] technology that is not mostly linux compatible.
>
> What are other good options that are :
> 1. Linux compatible. 2. Lightweight. 3. Full featured.

How lightweight is "lightweight"? What's your upper bound for laptop
weight, in pounds (or kg, if you're not 'Murrican.)? EXPN "full
featured". You want high battery life, excellent gaming, IEEE1394
ports, built-in 802.11b, floppy drive, big screen, what? You want a
laptop with built-in Yak Shaver 3000, you gotta say so.

Also, pages like http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~andrewb/x31.html
show that lots of stuff on these Centrino-based laptops works reasonably
well with recent kernels. Built-in 802.11b may not work, but who cares
when Orinoco Gold PCMCIA cards are ~$60?

> 4. Commonly available. 5. From a good vendor.

"Commonly available"? Um, you order the machine online, UPFedEx
delivers it. I've never seen a laptop I'd consider buying in a
CompUselessA or Worst Buy or even the local computer parts store; they
mostly sell HPCompaq/Sony garbage that looks good and is designed to
suck money from the clueless.

"From a good vendor"? All vendors suck. Buy a machine that's built
well (this excludes many Sony Vaios) and you won't have to deal with
vendor service for a while. All my laptops have been IBM (and
refurbished), and I've only had 1 mechanical problem since early 2000.
IBM keyboards rock, they have Trackpoints, most models work well with
Linux, they're built pretty solidly, and semi-detailed field circus
manuals with IBM part numbers are available on IBM's website. If I were
looking for a light laptop, I'd check the X31, but my A22p will last
another year. HTH, 

-- 
Matt G|There is no Darkness in Eternity/But only Light too dim for us to see
Brainbench MVP for Linux Admin /    mail: TRAP + SPAN don't belong
http://www.brainbench.com     /  "He is a rhythmic movement of the
-----------------------------/    penguins, is Tux." --MegaHAL

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