<p>i am planning to major in petroleum engineering at texas a&m university. what laptops would be good? i'd like to keep the price around $1,000 and something from dell if possible because of the school discount. if not, thats okay too, im open to suggestions. I would also like to be able to play a few games like counterstrike and half life on it.</p>
<p>One of the two current editors of the Endlessscholar.com (used to be thestudenttabletpc.com website) is a graduate of the petroleum engineering program at UT-Austin. She used a Tablet PC for four years and is now employed in her field. You should read her bio and look at the site’s forums to get an idea of how a Tablet PC could help you in petroleum engineering. The other current editor lives in Scotland and has degrees in Medieval History and archeology. Previous editors at the site now work at Boeing and Google.</p>
<p>See: [Endless</a> Scholar About the Authors](<a href=“http://endlessscholar.com/about_us]Endless”>http://endlessscholar.com/about_us)</p>
<p>Tablet PCs aren’t the greatest for gaming. And playing Counterstrike and half life isn’t going to help you get a job in petroleum engineering. I’m guessing that there’s lots of math, drawing and diagramming in your field. Tablet PCs are great for these kinds of notetaking.</p>
<p>actually this tablet</p>
<p>[HP®</a> Official Store — Buy an HP Pavilion tx2500 and tx2500z series notebook PC from HP](<a href=“http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/computer_can_series.do?storeName=computer_store&category=notebooks&a1=Category&v1=Mobility&series_name=tx2500z_series]HP®”>http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/computer_can_series.do?storeName=computer_store&category=notebooks&a1=Category&v1=Mobility&series_name=tx2500z_series)</p>
<p>would be able to hande counter strike and half life easily</p>
<p>The one suggestion I’ll make is to get as much RAM as you can. Size of the hard drive is not nearly as important as the amount of RAM you have.</p>
<p>Yeah a tablet would be nice for petroleum engineering. It would help you draw on your wel logs, charts/diagrams. I am a petroleum engineering major and I wish I would have bought a tablet. Although, every tablet I looked at didn’t have the gpu my engineering college was looking for. They wanted 256mb, I haven’t seen a tablet with that yet.</p>
<p>I sure as hell play half life 2 though, lol. 126 fps, lol.</p>
<p>Engineering majors should only consider a tablet PC. </p>
<p>You can write on the surface of the screen - a feature that makes taking notes in chemistry, physics, etc much easier.</p>
<p>How do you type a right triangle? You know what I mean?</p>
<p>I’m an engineer and I don’t use a tablet. </p>
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<p>You don’t, you use pencil/pen and paper, with a straight edge if you have the time. </p>
<p>I’ve gone through all of those classes (chem, orgo, physics, engineering, etc) and so far, I’ve only seen two people use tablets. While I admit it’s nice to be able to electronically record everything, it’s not really necessary to have a tablet for engineering.</p>
<p>If you are an instructor, then I can see a need for it since teachers often want to be able to save what they draw on the board so that students can download it later.</p>
<p>what kind of laptops do you engineers use? i really like the lenovo thinkpad t500</p>
<p>You can use any kind of laptop, however check with the school to see whether they have special requirements or recommendations in terms of hardware to support the various engineering software packages like Matlab, LabVIEW, etc.</p>
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<p>He didn’t ask what kind of pen and paper he should buy.</p>
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<p>He also didn’t ask what kind of computer he should buy to be able to draw right triangles on a computer. There are some things that you need a computer for and some things that you can do very well without a computer. Sometimes, the tried and proven method can still be the best one. </p>
<p>Your general assertion that engineering requires a tablet is not very accurate as many engineering schools make no specific recommendations to that effect and indeed, many engineering students don’t use them. By limiting the OP to just tablets, you’ve effectively cut his/her choices down to just a few laptops and very limited configurations if the OP wants to stay within his budget. </p>
<p>Generations of engineers have gone through schools without one and they still drew their triangles just fine.</p>
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Um… I didn’t say engineering requires a tablet. I said Engineering majors should only CONSIDER a tablet. As in, when looking for a laptop only looking for a tablet. I couldn’t understand why you were so aggressive about this, now I do. </p>
<p>If he’s going to buy a laptop I’m not going to tell him, “Go buy any laptop because you can use paper for areas you can’t use the laptop.” No way! I’m going to let him know there are products that can meet or exceed his needs.</p>
<p>EDIT: To answer the remark about limiting his choices - </p>
<p>[I</a> have a hard time imagining you need more than this](<a href=“http://cgi.ebay.com/HP-TX2000Z-2-4GH-4GB-250GB-12-1-TOUCH-SCREEN-TABLET-PC_W0QQitemZ390017781237QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLaptops_Nov05?hash=item390017781237&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=66%3A2|65%3A15|39%3A1|240%3A1318]I”>http://cgi.ebay.com/HP-TX2000Z-2-4GH-4GB-250GB-12-1-TOUCH-SCREEN-TABLET-PC_W0QQitemZ390017781237QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLaptops_Nov05?hash=item390017781237&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=66%3A2|65%3A15|39%3A1|240%3A1318)</p>
<p>Since he is buying a laptop, saying that he should only consider a tablet is functionally equivalent to saying that one is required since the statement excludes all other laptops from consideration. </p>
<p>As for why I’m so aggressive about this, I’m not. It’s nothing personal about you. It’s jus that, as an engineer myself, I think the OP needs to know the realities in engineering schools, or at least have some differing opinions. After all, that’s why he asked. </p>
<p>As for using paper, you make it sound like it’s an inferior method. It’s not. It’s merely an alternative that isn’t as expensive. Personally, I actually prefer to use paper as it’s much more convenient for scratch work, laying them out on a table for analysis, etc etc. </p>
<p>Of course, a tablet would “meet or exceed his needs” but one needs to consider it in the context of his requirements. If I’m going to commute to work, of course a Mercedes is going to meet or exceed my needs, but so would a Toyota Camry, for about half the price. Does the camry have a rearview camera? I doubt it. Does it have adaptive cruise? Probably not. Does it get me from point A to point B in a reasonably efficient way? Yes. So why shell out for a Mercedes, particularly if I’m on a budget? I’m not telling the OP to go buy any laptop, I’m saying to go buy the one with the best value that is within his budget. Obviously it’ll lack some functions as no laptop is perfect, but don’t get hung up on it being a tablet as that’s very limiting constraint. </p>
<p>As for the ebay laptop, I would hesitate to buy such a laptop as a primary computer in college for several reasons:</p>
<p>1) It’s a tx2000z, which means it’s a discontinued model</p>
<p>2) It’s a refurbished model with only a 90 day warranty. Considering HP’s build quality, I would probably not buy anything from them unless it has a 3 year warranty</p>
<p>3) It has nVidia GeForce Go 6150 graphics, which probably would not give the best performance when playing games as the OP has indicated he wanted to do (I know CS and such games doesn’t require that much performance, but I’m assuming the OP might want to play other games in the future that do)</p>
<p>4) I’m rather ambivalent about getting such big ticket items from ebay because of the inability of the buyer to return the item. I have ordered an HP tablet before, the tx1000z. Brand new from the factory, I found the thing to be so poorly built that I had no choice but to return it. In that case I was glad I had the option</p>
<p>5) The processor is the last generation’s processor</p>
<p>For all of the reasons above, I would not recommend buying that laptop. As for not needing more than that, I wouldn’t be so sure. Engineering software such as Matlab or even LabVIEW can be pretty demanding. Without know exactly how the OP will use his computer, I can’t say much beyond that. </p>
<p>Also, when I say limiting the OP’s choice, I mean exactly that, there aren’t that many laptops at the price point of an HP tx2500z. Actually, I can’t think of any besides the HP except maybe a Lenovo X61t if you can catch a very good deal. Gateway has one starting at $1080 but it doesn’t have a discrete GPU. So in specifying that he should only consider a tablet, you’ve basically limited him to one to two brands and models. That’s a pretty limited choice.</p>
<p>thanks for the help guys, i really appreciate it. since tablets are more expensive, i think im just going to go with a thinkpad. thanks for everything!</p>