[SWLUG] Re: More on Laptops

[Gareth Bowker]

On Thu, 2004-11-18 at 17:43 +0000, Rhys Sage wrote:
> Ok, so Sony's aren't reliable.

I'll chip in too, my last laptop was a Sony. This time it's not. There's
a reason for that :)

> As far as ethics and Dell go, I'm more concerned with
> getting a laptop that does what I want at a price that
> I'm willing to pay than with hugging trees, saving
> Brazilian newts or feeding Armenian peasants.

I'm not quite sure I understand this remark. Making computers isn't the
most environmentally-friendly of processes, but still, I'd not heard
that Dell were any worse than other companies. Have you got any URLs to
back this up? Given their environmental statement (at
http://www.dell.com/environment/ ) and the fact google doesn't show
anything major against Dell, could you explain a bit more?

> I've tried to get out of Dell, how long the bigger
> battery lasts in the Inspirion 1000 and 1100. Thus far
> I've had no answers from Dell. Does anybody here know?

A quick google (for dell inspiron 1000 battery life) pulls up this
snippet:

        Running on a 14.8V, 4,400mAh (65WHr) lithium-ion battery, it
        lasted just over two and a half hours
        
However you seem to be able to use two batteries, so you can double
that.

For the 1100 comes this snippet:

        With its powerful 14.8V, 6,450mAh battery, the Inspiron 1100 had
        little trouble clobbering the competition in battery life. The
        Inspiron 1100's four-hour score is the longest battery life
        we've seen in a Celeron-based system, and it even bested a
        couple of Pentium M systems
        
So the 1100 looks much better. If you can use two batteries on this
(I've not investigated whether that's possible, mind you) then that'd
put you close to your 8-hour target quite admirably.

Google, as always, really does know everything :)

> I'm intending to use this laptop, not play with it so
> I need to decide whether to go for a small laptop or a
> cheaper Dell. Thus I'm only looking at brand new
> laptops. It'll be used exclusively for word
> processing, networking, photo editing/storage/CD
> creation (if I go for a big laptop) and possibly
> internet too. I need a laptop with a long battery
> life. 2 hours is far too little. 8 hours is about
> right. 

Given those requirements, it sounds like any laptop with decent linux
support will do you. For those tasks any semi-modern laptop should cope
admirably. The only thing I'd say is make sure you get one with enough
RAM if you're doing a lot with photos as they can take a lot of RAM when
loaded into RAM. 

Also, I assume you mean a laptop with a large hard drive when you say a
big laptop, not one with a 17" display! The bigger (physically) the
display, the more current it needs to light, so the shorter the battery
life. That said, larger laptops often have larger batteries to
compensate. Swings, roundabouts.

Gareth