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Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/24/2011 2:37:02 PM

AW1Steve

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From: Mordor Illlinois
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Before I start looking for a new laptop (my current is a five year old Sharp), I was hoping that some of our knowledgable Tech Junkies might be able to suggest features or brands that I should look for. I intend to use this mostly for travel, and especially for WITP AE while I'm on the road. Should I rely on WIFI, hotel hook ups, or a Card from a cell phone (mobile for our non-American brethern) provider. Any features you find indispensable? Any traps to look out for?

Help me Obi-wan! I'm a geezer! (both in life and current tech).

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/24/2011 2:48:11 PM

jeffk3510

Posts: 4132
Joined: 12/3/2007
From: Kansas
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quote:

ORIGINAL: AW1Steve

Before I start looking for a new laptop (my current is a five year old Sharp), I was hoping that some of our knowledgable Tech Junkies might be able to suggest features or brands that I should look for. I intend to use this mostly for travel, and especially for WITP AE while I'm on the road. Should I rely on WIFI, hotel hook ups, or a Card from a cell phone (mobile for our non-American brethern) provider. Any features you find indispensable? Any traps to look out for?

Help me Obi-wan! I'm a geezer! (both in life and current tech).

I am sure you can get a sweet deal on this now a days.

Attachment (1)

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/24/2011 3:24:47 PM

Misconduct

Posts: 1864
Joined: 2/18/2009
From: Cape Canaveral, Florida
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quote:

ORIGINAL: jeffk3510

quote:

ORIGINAL: AW1Steve

Before I start looking for a new laptop (my current is a five year old Sharp), I was hoping that some of our knowledgable Tech Junkies might be able to suggest features or brands that I should look for. I intend to use this mostly for travel, and especially for WITP AE while I'm on the road. Should I rely on WIFI, hotel hook ups, or a Card from a cell phone (mobile for our non-American brethern) provider. Any features you find indispensable? Any traps to look out for?

Help me Obi-wan! I'm a geezer! (both in life and current tech).

I am sure you can get a sweet deal on this now a days.

oooooo computer porn, I like! bet that sweet baby has tons of kilobytes of memory!

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/24/2011 3:37:25 PM

USSAmerica

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From: Graham, NC, USA
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quote:

ORIGINAL: AW1Steve

Before I start looking for a new laptop (my current is a five year old Sharp), I was hoping that some of our knowledgable Tech Junkies might be able to suggest features or brands that I should look for. I intend to use this mostly for travel, and especially for WITP AE while I'm on the road. Should I rely on WIFI, hotel hook ups, or a Card from a cell phone (mobile for our non-American brethern) provider. Any features you find indispensable? Any traps to look out for?

Help me Obi-wan! I'm a geezer! (both in life and current tech).

Steve, I'm partial to Lenovo ThinkPads. Your biggest feature to look for is a fast processor and good amount of RAM. If you're using an OS newer than 32 bit XP, then you can make use of more than 3 Gig of RAM. I've done quite a bit of travelling with hockey over the last few years, and I've managed to find WiFi connections almost everywhere. I wouldn't spend the extra $$ for a connection provided by a cell provider unless I was using it for business and spending lots of time away from hotels, coffee shops, etc.

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"Good times will set you free" - Jimmy Buffett

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/24/2011 4:00:50 PM

beppi

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Joined: 3/11/2004
From: Austria
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quote:

ORIGINAL: AW1Steve

Before I start looking for a new laptop (my current is a five year old Sharp), I was hoping that some of our knowledgable Tech Junkies might be able to suggest features or brands that I should look for. I intend to use this mostly for travel, and especially for WITP AE while I'm on the road. Should I rely on WIFI, hotel hook ups, or a Card from a cell phone (mobile for our non-American brethern) provider. Any features you find indispensable? Any traps to look out for?

Help me Obi-wan! I'm a geezer! (both in life and current tech).

I am playing mostly on my Dell Latitidue E4300 (around 1,5 years old) and it is more than enough to run WITP. It is a business notebook of my company so it is more expensive than a common notebook.

First thing you should think about is size of the display. Larger display, better to watch videos but heavier. Smaller display, more compact notebook.

Second thing you should consider is the time which can the notebook run with the rechargeable. Here it depends again, if you want lot of power (big core I7, lost of ram, multiple disks, good graphic card) this time usually is low. For comfort (you wanna play during travel or outside) this should not be underestimated.

Display depends how you like it, glossy or not. I do not like glossy ones as if you use the notebook in the sun is not optimal. Do not pick a notebook with a to small display and a to high resolution. That might look cool but if you play WITP:AE in 1920x1080 on a 15" display it is hard to see something. My current display hast 1280x800 which is well suited for WITP:AE on a 15" display.

Rest of the hardware is not really important for WITP:AE. Usual specs, some dual core, at least 2 gigs of ram (>3 gig require 64bit), a suitable hard drive (SSD is optimal but more expensive) usable graphic card (not needed for WITP but usable for other games.

For internet connection it depends. As i am from Europe where the roaming between countries is very high (you can easily surf for a few 1000 �) i always use open wifi (starbucks, mcdonald), non free ones (sometimes for a � or two you get a day wifi) or from the hotel. In my home country i mostly rely on my Iphone and tethering.

< Message edited by beppi -- 3/24/2011 5:33:01 PM >

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/24/2011 4:07:37 PM

Misconduct

Posts: 1864
Joined: 2/18/2009
From: Cape Canaveral, Florida
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quote:

ORIGINAL: AW1Steve

Before I start looking for a new laptop (my current is a five year old Sharp), I was hoping that some of our knowledgable Tech Junkies might be able to suggest features or brands that I should look for. I intend to use this mostly for travel, and especially for WITP AE while I'm on the road. Should I rely on WIFI, hotel hook ups, or a Card from a cell phone (mobile for our non-American brethern) provider. Any features you find indispensable? Any traps to look out for?

Help me Obi-wan! I'm a geezer! (both in life and current tech).

Yeah I got trapped in the laptop I got now, I would not buy anything Gateway again. Basically this was a $1750 laptop reduced to $999, its got blazing power (more then enough to replace a desktop) with a major flaw design which is the entire laptop is over-voltage which means it basically is to powerful for its own design, instead of lowering the voltage, they basically threw them on sale and didn't tell anyone. Once I figured out what I needed to do, I basically had to cut the laptops power by half just so it wouldn't overheat everything, Im talking the GPU, Video card and Harddrive were all above crash levels.

Sadly I once adored Gateway as I have a few desktops I bought back in the early 90s and they still run to this day (remember the old 486's?) I still have one running a small BBS with a Dot matrix printer (no joke).

About the laptop, I would highly suggest you cater to your needs. For example, I just about always buy a gaming laptop just because I need the power to play AE or watch a movie, but I also need the speed to do video editing which is because I have digital cameras throughout my boat and I record videos of people fishing so I can give
them a copy at the end of the day, so usually a desktop replacement works for me.

Most laptops generally come with a few gigs of ram, you want to max that out right away, if your choice comes with 2 gigs (Make sure its either 32bit or 64bit first!) Max it to 3/4 gigs accordingly. I always buy my Ram the same day I buy the laptop just so I can get it in there and be done with it.

Video Cards are tricky mainly because most are after market garbage, you have to research the video card on the laptop so you can get a better understanding of how well it will work for AE/other things. My laptop has a Nvidia GeForce 9800M GTS which was at the time the biggest videocard you could throw into a laptop, I am able to play AE and do video editing at the same time if I wish. Then again you might not want that kind of power or price tag either, so basically research the card and see how it stacks to others.

Finally Resolution was a big key for me, my laptop runs generally 1900x1200 and thats farking huge for a 17 inch laptop. Most generally are 1600x1200 or smaller, however I wanted that extra size for movies and gaming.
You know theres a huge difference in AE when you play on 1024x768 or something like my dad has a 30 inch moniter, 15 inch monitors should be big enough to give you a decent resolution, not sure exactly how big, but make sure you arn't getting some crappy net book like I did, mines suppose to do 1024x768 however it won't go past 800x600 so I can't get AE to run on it again.

Far as brands are concerned, its basically what you can afford, I mean If my laptop blew up right now I'd probably order from http://www.cyberpowerpc.com/

Cyberpowered has a few good designs, their tech support isn't the greatest, however the prices fairly makes up for it.

< Message edited by Misconduct -- 3/24/2011 4:25:44 PM >

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/24/2011 5:30:15 PM

JWE

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quote:

ORIGINAL: AW1Steve
Before I start looking for a new laptop (my current is a five year old Sharp), I was hoping that some of our knowledgable Tech Junkies might be able to suggest features or brands that I should look for. I intend to use this mostly for travel, and especially for WITP AE while I'm on the road. Should I rely on WIFI, hotel hook ups, or a Card from a cell phone (mobile for our non-American brethern) provider. Any features you find indispensable? Any traps to look out for?

Help me Obi-wan! I'm a geezer! (both in life and current tech).

Hi Steve,

My biz-roady laptop is a Toshiba P25-S520. About $850, these days. AE is installed and runs very well under XP Pro. It was my out-of-town development machine as well. I've never been annoyed at any load/run/display times, or anything. So you can certainly find something for a killobuck that does the deed nicely. If you have a choice, go with more memory.

Rely on WIFI (802.11); that's what the hotels and cafe's all have. Buy an Ethernet cable and that will allow for hotel hookups or anything else in case the WIFI network is roached. And that's about it.

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/24/2011 8:33:25 PM

AW1Steve

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From: Mordor Illlinois
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Thanks for the tips guys, I really appreciate them!

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/24/2011 8:44:48 PM

jeffk3510

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From: Kansas
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You bet

< Message edited by jeffk3510 -- 3/24/2011 8:46:02 PM >

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/25/2011 3:53:51 AM

PaxMondo

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Alienware.

http://www.alienware.com/main.aspx

3D displays in a laptop.

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/25/2011 4:17:29 AM

Misconduct

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From: Cape Canaveral, Florida
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quote:

ORIGINAL: PaxMondo

Alienware.

http://www.alienware.com/main.aspx

3D displays in a laptop.�

Nice price tag to go along it, which one of you is rich enough? hey Uncle can I borrow some chee$e?

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/25/2011 4:31:23 AM

PaxMondo

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Oh yeah, serious price tag. Till that winning lotto ticket falls into my lap, i gotta keep building my own...

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/25/2011 5:32:26 AM

harrmonica

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From: home of the celts!
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i'm going to second the thinkpad suggestion. if you are only doing witp or the ilk, the newest intel integrated graphics with an i5 will do. i recently bought an x201 with an i3 and i can handle some fps games and pretty much anything that matrix puts out. its only a 12.1 inch and at first i thought it would be too small, but i got used to it quickly and i get a ton of battery life out of it. for what the op wants to achieve suggesting an alienware or something with a high end gpu is overkill in my opinion. intel integrated graphics have come a long way. do a search on youtube for intel gma 4500 and see what it can do. the integrated graphics will also net you longer battery life. hope this helps.

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/26/2011 6:28:50 PM

AW1Steve

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Thanks for the advice guys.

I wound up getting a pretty good deal on a 15" Toshiba from the AF Exchange. I maxed the memory , followed all of your advice (by and large) and will start loading the game this week (MIKE! I may need the "easy button"!).

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/26/2011 11:57:34 PM

JWE

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Cool. Sounds like you got it wired. Just fyi, I got a Linksys WPC54G plug-in PCMCIA card. Been using it for years, and never had a burp. Works in hotels and Corporate nets from Cali to Boston, to D.C., to Edwards, to Eglin, to Ft Irwin. 802.11g compliant. $30.00 maybe ??

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/27/2011 3:42:35 PM

AW1Steve

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quote:

ORIGINAL: JWE

Cool. Sounds like you got it wired. Just fyi, I got a Linksys WPC54G plug-in PCMCIA card. Been using it for years, and never had a burp. Works in hotels and Corporate nets from Cali to Boston, to D.C., to Edwards, to Eglin, to Ft Irwin. 802.11g compliant. $30.00 maybe ??

Thanks for the tip. I see Amazon had it for $9.00. My laptop has widi. Would you recommend the PCMCIA card in addition to what's already wired in?

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/27/2011 4:24:05 PM

USSAmerica

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Nah, Steve. If your laptop already has wireless, you don't need an additional plug in adapter to provide it. It would probably be quite hard to find a new laptop these days that does not have wifi built in.

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/27/2011 4:28:54 PM

rockmedic109

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If you are going to play with the computer in your lap, get a laptop deck. I've got one that folds up and has an extension for a mouse.

Resting the laptop on your lap is a good way to cover vents and cause it to overheat. Gat a mouse. They have small travel mice with a roll up cord. Trying to play AE using just the touchpad will drive you insane.

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/27/2011 4:43:06 PM

AW1Steve

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I've got both. Excellent points!

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/27/2011 5:16:50 PM

JWE

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quote:

ORIGINAL: USS America
Nah, Steve.� If your laptop already has wireless, you don't need an additional plug in adapter to provide it.� It would probably be quite hard to find a new laptop these days that does not have wifi built in. �

Yepper, what Mike said. I'm just an old-timer who uses his old-timey stuff 'cause I'm used to it and it works. Have a Linksys network that all the guys could hook into and just kept the laptop adapter - plug and play, so what the hey. But no, I trashed my 8-track a long time ago

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/27/2011 8:42:23 PM

chesmart

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If I where in you I would wait a month or two as most laptops are being revamped with the new intel sandy bridge chipsets and performance wise on a laptop is nearly twice of the old I-7s price wise they are the same. One more thing check that you have USB 3 so you can future proof it.

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/28/2011 12:41:29 AM

USSAmerica

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Steve is not in the market for cutting edge. No I7 processors, Sandy Bridge chipsets or USB 3 ports in his future.

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"Good times will set you free" - Jimmy Buffett

"They need more rum punch" - Me

Artwork by The Amazing Dixie

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/28/2011 1:09:29 AM

Chickenboy

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From: San Antonio, TX
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quote:

ORIGINAL: AW1Steve

Thanks for the advice guys. I wound up getting a pretty good deal on a 15" Toshiba from the AF Exchange. I maxed the memory , followed all of your advice (by and large) and will start loading the game this week (MIKE! I may need the "easy button"!).

Steve-what'd that run you? After scraping by on a cripplingly slow and balky netbook over Christmas break and trying to make the bloody thing run OK for me during my most recent trip to DC, I'm done with it. I'm in the market too-my requirements are pretty standard-like yours were.

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/28/2011 1:56:37 AM

AW1Steve

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Chickenboy

quote:

ORIGINAL: AW1Steve

Thanks for the advice guys. I wound up getting a pretty good deal on a 15" Toshiba from the AF Exchange. I maxed the memory , followed all of your advice (by and large) and will start loading the game this week (MIKE! I may need the "easy button"!).

Steve-what'd that run you? After scraping by on a cripplingly slow and balky netbook over Christmas break and trying to make the bloody thing run OK for me during my most recent trip to DC, I'm done with it. I'm in the market too-my requirements are pretty standard-like yours were.

Apx $650 (less a $50.00 rebate) plus another $150 to max out memory. However, full disclosure....I purchased it through Army-Air Force Exchange services. Best buy wasn't that much more though.

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RE: Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop? - 3/28/2011 5:38:31 AM

Kubel

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Good thread. I'm in the market for a "disposable" laptop so to speak. Something inexpensive so that if it craps out I won't be too upset. If anyone has been to Kandahar I would like to know more about their thoughts on a laptop and what to get. Basicly I won't be doing any Play By Email

games, and just want to load a few Matrix titles to keep me occupied during down time. The major issue is dust I have been told.

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Suggestions for a WITP AE travel laptop?