Re: Subnotebook / Ultraportable / Table on the cheap?

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Date: Tue, 19 Jul 2005 21:43:08 GMT

kotj.mf wrote:
> The Tank, my fusty, creaky, heavy KDS Valiant, is rapidly approaching
> obsolesence for much of what I need to do with it these days. The
> battery's dead, and I don't feel like spending a hundred bucks on a new
> one when battery life pretty much sucked, anyway. I'm on my third AC
> adapter, and it's starting to bite the dust. I find myself upgrading the
> hard drive every six months, and they aint cheap. I even bought at used
> slimline CDRW on Ebay and dremeled down the bezel to get it to fit into
> my case.
>
> Basically, the marketing guys make fun of me at work, and it's a giant
> pain in the ass haul.
>
> I've got about $1200 to spend, and I'm going to put half of that towards
> a relatively sweet (for me) desktop system.
>
> I'd like to put the remainder toward a used sub-3lb notebook that I can
> actually carry around with me. Problem is, I don't really know where to
> start looking.
>
> After doing some initial poking around, it looks like the Actius MM10
> comes pretty close to my absolute minimum requirements. Unfortunately,
> you can't upgrade the memory or the disk, but for what I want it for, I
> think I can make it work, and they seem to go for 500-600 on Ebay.
>
> Here are my must haves:
> * Battery life: 3+ hours actual.
> * CPU: 800mhz or better. Doesn't matter whether it's a Transmeta or
> whatever; I'm not installing Gentoo.
> * Memory: 256MB or more. Preferrably upgradable.
> * HDD: 15GB or more. Gotta have an XP partition for work.
> * A PCMCIA slot. For my Xircom modem.
> * USB 2.0: Two or more ports. I've got external hard and CD drives out
> the wazoo.
> * Screen: I don't want one of those 1/3 size things like on the old
> Picturebooks. 1024 by, uh 600 or something would be fine.
>
>
> Would be nice:
> * USB-bootable.
> * Prism or Orinoco wifi. I've had no end of trouble with Realtek cards,
> and I'm still a little leery about the state of the Intel drivers for
> Linux.
> * Firewire: I don't really need it at the moment, but who knows?
> * Optical drive: At least a CD-RW. If it's just a CD/DVD-ROM, I'd almost
> rather do without the extra weight.
> * A serial port, so I don't have to keep track of any adapters.
>
> Anybody got any ideas? If I can at least get a list of models, it would
> be a big help. I know next to nothing about tablet PCs, but I figure
> it's a place to look for my specs, even if I expect to be using it in
> clamshell mode 99% of the time.
>
> Really, all I need is a tiny machine that's a couple/three years out of
> date, but as you can probably imagine, this kind of thing is kind of
> hard to track down on the web.
>
> Muchas gracias.

Dell Latitude C400: 1.0-1.4GHz PIIIm, 256-768MB RAM, 1024x768 12" XGA
panel, no internal drives save for the HD, one PCMCIA port, one USB port
(but you can use a hub, right?), less than 1" thick closed and weighs
less than 3lb. Did I say the battery lasts five hours plus with
speedstep on? Stunningly powerful machine for its spec, I use one
(1.4GHz) for LAN parties with a 40GB drive and 768MB RAM, and leave most
other machines (including some high-end desktops) standing.

Or, there's the Inspiron 4100: 1.0GHz PIIIm, up to 1GB RAM, 1400x1050
14.1" UXGA panel, 2x modular bays for batteries, one takes auxilliary
drives too (HD, FDD, CDRW/DVDRW), 4500mAH battery lasts >3 hours with
speedstep on, two would give you a good 8. Two PCMCIA slots, one USB.
Not quite subnote, but for its size, a powerful little beast. Still less
than 7lb with two high-capacity batteries.

Both the above notebooks have internal ethernet, the Inspiron has a
miniPCI slot (I think the Latitude does as well, not had it open yet
(very unusual for me, but it has been that good a machine from the getgo
that I've not needed to).

For power, can't go wrong with a Latitude C840. Mine has 1GB RAM, 2.0
P4m, 1600x1200 UXGA 15", DVD/CDRW, 40GB HD, modular bay, 3 batteries,
baymounted FDD, DVD/CDRW, 2 usb ports, 2 PCMCIA ports, ethernet, modem,
and minipci wireless. Weighs like 8lb but it's a powerhouse of a laptop.
I've yet to see one better out of the box.

HTH

-- 
Cheers,					http://www.dotware.co.uk
Jim			  http://www.dotware-entertainment.co.uk
Are more people violently opposed to wearing fur than leather because 
it's easier to harass rich women than motorcycle gangs?

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