<p>As the title says I'm wondering how to manage a laptop throughout the whole day. I intend to use my laptop for things like note taking and as a makeshift book. I actually have this crazy idea to save money by buying a book and taking a picture on the highest quality and resolution with my digital camera of each and every page and then just uploading it all to my laptop. Crazy yes? LMAO.</p>
<p>But my main concern is how are you going to make a battery survive the whole day for all your classes? Surely a battery isn't going to last long enough. And my classes are spread out so I have some classes at night too. I would like to avoid having to go back to my dorm room between each class to recharge the battery. How long does it take to recharge a battery anyways?</p>
<p>Should I get a good graphics card? I know the better they are the more power they suck. Would you really even have time to play games in college? I have choices between (Integrated) Intel Graphics Media Accelerator X4500, (Dedicated) 256MB Nvidia Geforce 9200M GS, and a 512MB Nvidia GeForce 9600M GT</p>
<p>I’ve taken laptops on business trips so the idea of using your laptop for the whole day is similar. My XPS 1330 will run over five hours on the standard battery. I would guess that it would do about 7 on the high-capacity battery. Some people carry an extra battery pack and swap it in. Between classes, you close the lid and it goes into sleep mode so you save power there.</p>
<p>Battery life is getting better and better with time and improved manufacturing processes.</p>
<p>Discrete graphics cards usually shorten battery life. If you want something light that will last long, then integrated graphics are the way to go. Dell is advertising notebooks that will run for up to 19 hours. My guess is that performance isn’t that good but some will trade performance for battery life.</p>
<p>At the moment, I think it best to avoid nVidia graphics cards until it is clear that their current failure problems are resolved. The company has not issued a clear statement on this issue yet. The PC makers haven’t either.</p>
<p>With all due respect sir, I absolutely REFUSE to believe that, unless ou can provide me with a link/article that backs that up! :)</p>
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<p>TC,
Does you college have power outlets around classes or in hallways, or the library? Maybe you can just plug-it into the wall socket after class or in the Library? From personal experience my 4000 mAh 6-cell battery lasts between 75-100 minutes TOPS depending on what I’m doing! </p>
<p>Perhaps you can invest in the 12-cell batteries–they advertise much longer battery life than the other “normal” ones!</p>
<p>I envy you..I really do. perhaps these “thinkpads” are better? I’m running Vista however, with wireless internet, and watching movies sometimes–these things kill battery VERY fast. lol</p>
<p>if you want a discrete card, you can buy an extra battery, get a high-capacity one (ie 8 or 12-cell) with the computer, or get a Macbook Pro.</p>
<p>i doubt you’ll be using your computer in ever class. it will also be on standby when your not using it. if you have a lunch break or something, you can just go somewhere with an outlet if you need to.</p>
<p>Why would you EVER take a picture of every single text book page and store it on your computer? One textbook could easily be 1000 pages. That would be so time consuming. Wouldn’t it just be better to see if you can find/purchase/download a pdf of the textbook?</p>
<p>The picture taking thing is IF I can’t download/torrent my textbook. Because honestly I seriously doubt you can find a torrent/download for every single book you need. After that my options are photo copying the pages but I like the picture taking option b/c I would never need my book only my laptop. I would never have to take books to class</p>
<p>I would say turn it off rather than leave it on standby. Although, it may depend on how long you’d leave it on, as I think it takes more power to turn it back on.</p>
<p>I dunno about you, but there are wall outlets in A LOT of places over here (including one in a bathroom handicapped stall, lol), so unless you have very little time between your classes, I don’t see why you couldn’t take your laptop to a nearby empty classroom or something and charge it while you do something else (homework, required reading, etc…).</p>
<p>Should I get a good graphics card? I know the better they are the more power they suck. Would you really even have time to play games in college? I have choices between (Integrated) Intel Graphics Media Accelerator X4500, (Dedicated) 256MB Nvidia Geforce 9200M GS, and a 512MB Nvidia GeForce 9600M GT</p>
<p>Right now Nvidia still has the more powerful cards in laptops.</p>
<p>The best ATI card is the 3650 for laptops at the current moment, but when the 4850 mobility comes out ATI should really be back on top for laptops</p>
<p>If you can have a desktop and a laptop, then for one ATI is still the best in the desktop with the 4870x2 and if you’re not going to need a storng graphics card in the laptop just get an integrated card to save money and get better battery life</p>
<p>In a desktop, it doesn’t matter as much if your graphics card fries as it is easy to replace. It’s a lot more expensive to replace the graphics circuitry on a laptop - it’s usually a motherboard replacement.</p>