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Jerry Rehert helpfully observed:
>I never heard of a ProSTar. I'd recommend a NAME-BRAND laptop (Toshiba,
IBM,
>Dell, Compaq). I know people who bought no name laptops and when they went
>for service, the company was nowhere to be found. Name Brand laptops I'd
>expect to have more consistent components, more reliable warranties and
>better chance to have the bugs worked out of them. I've consistently
bought
>Toshiba and have been very satisfied.
Thus far, I have experience with only two of the above, but enough to make
some
comments.
If you go for a Compaq, be sure to buy the Armada series, not a Presario. I
didn't
know any better and bought a Presario. As a physical object, it's nicely
designed,
convenient to use, and well supplied with features. The proprietary add-ons
to
Windows are buggy as they could be and still work at all. Not that anything
will
refuse to load and run, alas. Instead, you get stuck with arbitrary
freezes, more
than the usual number of problems with Internet Explorer, functions that
work one
day and disappear the next, and so on. (In short, it's just like Windows,
but more
so!) I've had mine for just over a year now and am getting close to
re-installing
the software yet again. This will be the fourth time, and I've heard of
people who
had to do it that often in the first six weeks. (No doubt I'm lucky in that
the laptop
is not my only machine.) Problem being that in this one (it varies from one
version
to the next) the installation CD does not permit any changes in the
installed package.
You always have to install exactly the same software configuration that
didn't work
last time. On the most recent rework, I installed Windows and the
associated
joined-at-the-hip junk, installed Word, and had the machine freeze solid
before
getting to use it for anything practical.
Oh, yeah. Also had to have the keyboard and touchpad replaced, at the cost
of three weeks or so without it.
I have not used the Armada laptops, but have talked with a tech who
maintains
a fleet of them for a major company in this area. He says they no longer
use the
Presarios because of all the trouble they had, but have never had a problem
with
the Armadas. Several other folks have echoed his report.
As for the Dell, it seems to be a nice machine, but on the model I used
while on a
trip last week the touchpad was not adequately recessed, so it was almost
impossible to use the machine without accidentally shifting the cursor
somewhere
it wasn't supposed to be. Bad enough in Word. Using Excel was next to
impossible.
No doubt you'd adapt to it eventually, but who'd want to bother? In photos
of the
current Dell line, it appears that the touchpad is recessed a little farther
into the
surface, but I'd want to use one of them before buying it.
What led me to the Compaq was the feature set, and especially that I didn't
have
to fiddle around swapping out the CD-ROM and floppy drive; everything is
built
in (save the Zip drive I hung on it) and available whenever you want it.
Some other
laptops require you to switch them as needed. The IBMs I've seen do this.
Still,
the next laptop I buy is likely to be an IBM. Maybe a Toshiba, depending on
the
feature sets available next time I go shopping.
One thing for sure: I'll put a lot more research into picking the next one
than just
going to the local store and picking up whatever looks good.
Hope that's enough help to justify having to wade through it all.
Owen Davies
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