Uni laptop help???

[Joe2003]

Hey

Im doing computer science at uni this year, and im looking for a laptop. At the moment I was looking the apple laptops, I was thinking about one of the 12 inch powerbooks, or an ibook. They look so cool, there not huge wedges of black plastic that weight a ton, and there not running ms. The main problem I see is that it would disadvantage me, not knowing if there going to spring some ms application study on me.

So I was also looking at the alienware laptops or the viaos. They would run ms so I wouldnt have any problems, and I could dual boot them with linux.
What are the aleinwares like, are they any good??? I know the viaos and the apples are good, having used them before.

Any recomendations??

thanks
Joe

 

[alanuofm]

what is your budget with this laptop? alienware tends to be very expensive. havent heard much about the sony vaios. i am doing computer engineering at u of m and our programs are done in gcc in linux redhat. they advise us that if we work with a mac to check the code on a pc before submitting because sometimes some of the code isnt standardized. i do not know how your school works for sure but thats how i have done it so far.

i currently own an inspiron 9100 and an inspiron 600m. both laptops are great. the 9100 is very bulky and i learned from experience that desktop processors do not make the best laptops for battery life. i suggest a pentium M.

 

[Joe2003]

My budget is about £1000, dont know what that is in dollars, my grandad left me money when he died and I thought I might as well spend it on something useful.

At the moment Im using fedora core 1 on my desktop, all I use it for is writing in c.

Are the alienware any good, I wanted to run linux on it, maybe dual boot with ms (if my course doesnt require ms then its coming straigt off), do you know if the alienware's support linux??? I think Im going to leave apple alone for a while. The reason im look at these two manufactures is mainly because I can get very large student discounts through my uni.

 

[alanuofm]

My budget is about £1000, dont know what that is in dollars, my grandad left me money when he died and I thought I might as well spend it on something useful.

At the moment Im using fedora core 1 on my desktop, all I use it for is writing in c.

Are the alienware any good, I wanted to run linux on it, maybe dual boot with ms (if my course doesnt require ms then its coming straigt off), do you know if the alienware's support linux??? I think Im going to leave apple alone for a while. The reason im look at these two manufactures is mainly because I can get very large student discounts through my uni.

you just have to create a partition and install linux on it. you should be able to dual boot. i have xp and red hat on my inspiron 9100 right now.

 

[Lax]

My budget is about £1000, dont know what that is in dollars, my grandad left me money when he died and I thought I might as well spend it on something useful.

eMachines have always been #1 on my list followed by Asus, Acer, dell's and compaq's (now HP). You can find a used eMachine 6811 for ~1000$US. Vaio's are probably at -5 on my list.

Are the alienware any good

Overpriced IMO

I wanted to run linux on it, maybe dual boot with ms (if my course doesnt require ms then its coming straigt off), do you know if the alienware's support linux???

"Anything" can run linux.

 

[Joe2003]

Why dont you like the vaios??

"Anything" can run linux.

I know, but I thought that some of the dsplays on the newer laptops were not suported by linux, basically no x, which isnt a major problem.

 

[alanuofm]

Why dont you like the vaios??



I know, but I thought that some of the dsplays on the newer laptops were not suported by linux, basically no x, which isnt a major problem.

nope it will display with its native drivers. your drivers might not be on the list and in that case you will have to install your own.

 

[Joe2003]

I have decided on the hp nc6220, looks fairly boring but the spec is really good, 128mb graphics card, 533hz bus and 1.8ghz, its 14 inch and I can get it with it origanal 512mb of ram + 1gb extra for just an extra 50 pounds. Havent read anything bad about them yet.