<p>I buying a laptop for college next year and am wondering if anyone has opinions as to which would be the best. I'll be an engineering student if that should have any effect on the kind of computer i'll get. I want a really portable one thats not bulky or heavy so i can take it to classes easily. Cant be too expensive. Not much of a game player so I dont need some super fast computer, just need it for school, internet, etc. Also what do you think of tablets</p>
<p>I know I'll probably be smacked into oblivion for saying this, but oh sweet lord I love my 15" Powerbook... I turned to the "dark side" about a year and a half ago, and it physically pains me to have to send it in for service when I drop it and make it explode or something. I was a PC gal through and through, and was amazingly hesitant to switch at first, but really, all I use my notebook for anyhow are internet, e-mail, solitaire, Snood, and word processing, and it's worked out fabulously. I'm hooked.</p>
<p>The only reason having a Powerbook works for me is because I also have a desktop PC, and I just install all my PC-specific proprietary civil/structural engineering and general engineering software on that, and keep all the nasty non-commercial written-by-grad-students software grossness on that computer, so as to not gunk up my laptop. I could even probably do without the PC entirely, since there are always going to be computer labs in academic settings, and they'll pretty much have all the software you'd ever think to use in an engineering situation.</p>
<p>I've just this semester begun taking notes on my laptop, and it's worked out really well... I just take notes in the notebook layout of Word (my brother uses Omnigraffle on his 12" Powerbook to take his own sophomore engineering notes for all his classes) and we both draw diagrams in a neat little app called FlySketch, then transfer the diagrams over to the Word/Omnigraffle documents later on. Both the courses I'm taking this semester are based upon pre-published powerpoint presentations, so I'll generally have that open as well.</p>
<p>wrprice has a tablet PC... I'll pass the word along for him to chime in. Macs seem to make him physically ill, too, so you can get the other side of that coin from him. =)</p>
<p>A few kids in my math classes have tablets...seems to work out well for them, because they can cross link equations and such with ease.</p>
<p>I prefer graph pads, though :).</p>
<p>Engineering students use specialized software that's licensed in the computer labs, so it doesn't matter what you get for your personal use. The Dell Inspiron laptops are pretty good, and they have a model to suit whichever need you want. The cheapest two are the B120, which has a 14.1" screen and weighs 6.4 lb, and the B130, which has a 15.4" screen and weighs 6.7 lb. The 710m is ultralight at 4.1 lb and has a 12.1" screen. The two 15.4" widescreens models are the E1505 (6.2 lb) and the 6000 (6.7 lb), and there are two other desktop-replacement models as well. I would recommend getting the biggest screen you feel comfortable with, or getting an external monitor/LCD for your desk.</p>
<p>Id say go with an IBM/lenovo thinkpad. They have a great professional look, and a built as strong as can be.</p>
<p>I would recommend not buy anything without first checking with the computer store of the college to which you will be attending. Many colleges have special deals with particular makers that get you a system for less than what you would pay retail and then also there are persons on-site at the college or nearby for warranty service.</p>
<p>many of those schools also have very old stock of laptops</p>
<p>Well, at any rate, whether you buy them from the school's computer store or not, be sure to see whether or not whatever computer you end up going with has an academic discount. You may actually have to be enrolled and have a student ID in order to get the discount, so it might be worth it to wait 'til you get to school to place the order. </p>
<p>Or not. It's just something to be aware of.</p>
<p>In some cases, the academic discount from the school won't matter much. For example, if you buy a laptop and get a 5% discount at the bookstore but the tax is 8%...it's not as cheap as just getting it tax free off the internet from the manufacturer.</p>
<p>Im looking at the Dell latitude, sony vaio, toshiba. has anyone heard about the panasonic toughbook. Also the new intel Macs, powerbooks, seem nice but too expensive.</p>
<p>call IBm ask for student discount. There ya go.</p>
<p>The tablets seem really convenient for taking notes on your computer in math classes where the notes are in equations or diagrams. What would be the advantage to getting a regular notebook.</p>
<p>any opinions on toughbook vs. thinkpad?</p>
<p>any opinions on toughbook vs. thinkpad? price isn't really an issue, so i will not be basing my decision on that</p>
<p>What about the sharp M4000, looks pretty cool. I guess its the most popular in Japan</p>
<p>Many schools do sell computers at a very cheap price. Some are brand new too. Even the local state college where I live offers a great deal on Gateway laptops. I think they only offer one model though. </p>
<p>Yes, an engineering college will have computer labs. Any college will. The point of owning your own is having it and using it whenever you want. True most students don't need high performance unless they're gaming, but engineers may differ. Depending on what you'll go into, some CAD work can get pretty heavy (usually not a sweat for desktops though).</p>
<p>Also, find out if you want a tablet or not. It'll cost like $600 more but you may enjoy the benefits. Finding what you want is most important. Getting a bigger laptop generally means more power and more screen but it usually also means heavier and less battery life.</p>
<p>I'm a computer salesman so if you have more specific questions I can try to answer them.</p>
<p>I used a Toshiba Portege 3500 tablet PC for my last two years in school... I absolutely loved it, and now they have even better models out there.</p>
<p>I never worked well with plain-paper notebooks... I liked to write with pen because it showed up better than pencil, but that meant I had a lot of scratch-outs. Then, of course, I had to remember which notebooks to bring on a particular day because I had different ones for each subject. Finally... it was always a chore to go back and look for things I had written down; call it a lack of organizational skills.</p>
<p>Pretty much all of these problems were solved by the tablet: write in digital ink on the screen in your own handwriting. You can drag-and-drop notes and diagrams and such if you need to make room for them elsewhere... you can even draw a diagram and then scale it down to take less room.</p>
<p>We all know how much of a pain it is to try and TYPE equations into a document, but with a model that has a convertable keyboard, you can have the best of both worlds -- write when you want to write, type when you want to type.</p>
<p>Best of all, you can <em>search</em> your <em>handwritten</em> notes! Amazing.</p>
<p>These things only run Windows XP Tablet Edition, so Mac people like my friend aibarr will be S.O.L., but if you can stand to have a Windows machine, that tablet is something I <em>highly</em> recommend -- I only wish I had it from the beginning of my higher education.</p>
<p>(As I was trying to say yesterday before the system ate my message, do still check out the academic discounts... a lot of companies actually have online academic discounts, so you get the sales tax break <em>and</em> the academic discount, which is really nice.)</p>
<p>IBM period. best support. no propierty devices, fast, and has duo core now, and doesnt load your computer with a load of crap (preinstalled software etc like sony, hp, toshiba)...however hp business notebooks are good too NOT the home ones. screw dell, their fans get hot, and have problems with them. engineering students should get ibms/lenovo.</p>
<p>Get what ever has the best tech support.
I love my dell, only for the fact of I can walk into IT say OOPS, and it gets fixed.
Tech support for me is one of those big deals, the guts of the thing are pretty much the same, its the oh crap i broke it help thats not.</p>