Need advice on getting a computer

[StormFeather]

StormFeather, I take it you have studied the monetary differences between resigning and being made redundant? Not only in terms of redundancy pay but also unemployment benefit / jobseekers allowance etc?

Take a lot of advice before deciding.

Looks like I won't have much choice - there is no option for voluntary redundancy, and my role maybe being changed in an 'interim arrangement' as a supportive precursor to an all-out reorganisation. That interim arrangement is likely to lead to me having to resign. Ho hum - we'll just have to see what happens

What I've learnt from experience (knowing people with laptops and fixing the laptops), and a recent study

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The short of it:

Asus are brilliant.
Toshiba is a good, cheaper option.

Never even contemplate thinking about going to the shop to look at an Acer or HP/Compaq.

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Laptop-Reliability Study Highlights the Most Sturdy Laptop Makers

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EDIT: I'll throw my hat in beside Ursa's and repeat - ALWAYS BACK UP YOUR DATA.

External hard drives can be bought for pennies, and save so much hassle should your laptop die. £80 can net you a Western Digital or Seagate 1TB external.

Ahem. As a long-time user of Toshiba, I can safely say I have had no overheating and I cannot even recall the last bluescreen I had.

Here's another one who says no to HP/Compaq!

And my Toshibe - the P200 - has a numeric keypad and full-sized keyboard! (And dedicated graphics card for games, if I play any - which I don't, not any more).

Toshiba Satellite P200 Images - Laptop & Notebook computers

Oh, and certain Toshiba laptops have BEAUTIFUL sound quality, too - something other makes lack, with their tinny sound and speakers located on the front of the laptop rather than the top. If you want to play music, look for a laptop that says "high quality sound". Mine has Harman/Kardon HD speakers built in.

Thanks for the info guys!

Through work, I've had a variety of laptops, and the universal favourite amongst myself and my colleagues was the Toshiba. We are currently using HP's, on which no love has been lost, but by far our worst experience was with Fujitsu devices.

I had also forgotten that I have a resource in my nephew, our family 'geek'. He's been buying old computers at boot fairs from about the age of 10, and rebuilding them. He's now doing something to do with computers at uni (time goes so quickly!)

He has promised that if I give him a budget, he'll get me a top draw, second hand, device - that way I'll get more for my money, and he'll be able to increase the spec(? - he's the geek, not me!)

When I have an idea of what I want to spend, I'll see what he says, and post it here to see if passes muster

 

[Vertigo]

Can I just add my recommendation on backing up. I come across too many people who think it will never happen to them and sooner or later it does. Whenever you are connected in your office or whatever, have your back up drive connected and your backup running on a schedule. Then you won't forget or get into the "oh I'll do it tomorrow" syndrome. When I'm travelling I carry my (second) back up drive with me and back up every day religiously.

Another suggestion; I don't know that many people who do this but I find it makes life so much easier and everyone I know who does agrees. Get your 'geek' nephew to partition the hard drive. Keep all software on the C: drive, keep all data on the D: drive. Don't use the MS My Computer defaults - they will end up in an unholy mess before long. Once you have your software set up the way you like it. Get something like Ghost and make an 'image'. When you back up you just back up the whole of the D: data drive. It's simple and easy.

Last time I had a hard drive death (my poor laptop takes a lot abuse and is getting old) it literally took me an hour (after buying the new drive) and I was back up to speed again. Contrast that with my friend who lost all of the photos the first three years of his baby's life when his laptop was stolen. He will never get them back again.

Of course all the other advice on here has been, as ever, excellent. I've just added my two-penny worth on backing up because in my experience most people I know do go out and get anti-virus stuff and all that security software but still don't seem to think it necessary to back up. These things will fail, get stolen etc. so protect yourself.

 

[Karn Maeshalanadae]

That's actually very good advice, Vert. I do have a backup flash drive of my important files from my laptop-writing pieces and my pictures-but god damn it, I left my stuff in Portland and those people can lose more stuff by accident than most people can on purpose. I still don't know where that flash drive is, and it makes me !


So I would indeed follow Vert's advice and get a good drive to back your stuff up to. Flash drives are great because they're so portable and easy to use for the average user. Larger portable hard drives might not be.

 

[Ursa major]

As I've mentioned elsewhere, I copy my data to a USB stick and then copy that to another computer (a desktop of mine that I keep at my mother's house a few miles away).

As Karn has said, it isn't only computer/HD failure that can lead to data loss.

 

[Vertigo]

Flash drives are great because they're so portable and easy to use for the average user. Larger portable hard drives might not be.

portable HDs are really great now - in the UK you can pick up a 500G USB for around £50-£70. Takes all its power from the USB port (don't advise having connected all the time as it will drain your battery quicker) and it's only the same sort of size as an average wallet.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

At the other end of the scale... well, I'll simply say NEVER get an HP (HP also do Compaq laptops, which you shouldn't buy either) or Acer laptop.

I'm surprised by that. Perhaps I've just been lucky, but I had a HP laptop, and didn't have the problems you describe (HDD or battery).

The only issue I had was that the DVD drive was moody, and would only eject if I bought it dinner first. And the touch panel on top of the keyboard (for media controls) stopped working after a couple of years, but other than that, it didn't give me any major problems in nearly four years of ownership. I was happy enough with my experience, in fact, that I recently bought my dad an HP, too.

The only time I'd needed to take my old laptop in for repairs was because the display stopped working. But that happened after I dropped it (didn't realise that the carry case was unzipped), so can't blame HP for that.

And dead batteries seem to be a common issue. My dad had it with his Acer several years ago, I did with a (pre-HP) Compaq a long time ago, my brother with his Dell, and my friend recently with his MacBook Pro. I wouldn't be surprised if Asus battery dies after a few years as well. Same thing with mobile phones; after a few years, the battery life goes to hell.

I'm starting to think it's a deliberate flaw manufacturers work in to encourage you to buy a new machine every few years...

 

[Vertigo]

And dead batteries seem to be a common issue. My dad had it with his Acer several years ago, I did with a (pre-HP) Compaq a long time ago, my brother with his Dell, and my friend recently with his MacBook Pro. I wouldn't be surprised if Asus battery dies after a few years as well. Same thing with mobile phones; after a few years, the battery life goes to hell.

I'm starting to think it's a deliberate flaw manufacturers work in to encourage you to buy a new machine every few years...

Batteries dying is a common issue with any laptop. I used to manage about 150 instructors who all used laptops of various sizes and makes and I have had about 5 myself in the last 20 years. In all cases batteries eventually failing is common and a natural chemical conclusion for them. Moderately common (again with all makes) is a battery suddenly stopping working completely for no apparent reason. Runs for about 30 seconds and then stops, recharge and same again. I was once given a techie explanation for this but have long since forgotten - just remember it being described as an inherent problem with L-ion battereis.

I have purchased replacement batteries from manufacturers and cheap equivalents. Always found the cheap ones nearly as good as originals (slightly less life usually). Also I now always buy a second battery when I buy the laptop (generally much cheaper than a later replacement).

 

[Deathpool]

I use Dell though I don't have a laptop. Like others have said make sure you back. I've lost months of work before and it's not fun. Most computers I've seen in the stores have very good ram, but not very decent processors so I like to buy from the dell website that way I can customize it.

 

[StormFeather]

Right, am currently looking in the sales at the following: Acer Aspire 5742Z 15.6 inch Notebook

Any thoughts? for £379.99 is it a good deal?

 

[Deathpool]

What I've learnt from experience (knowing people with laptops and fixing the laptops), and a recent study

The most reliable laptop you can buy is an Asus laptop. They don't come cheaply, and they're a brand few people will have heard of for laptops (they used to be quite a geeky brand - people who built computers would know about them, for example. I swear by my Asus motherboard!) but one most people should know for their Eee PC line of netbooks. Their products are generally quite expensive, but the build quality is superb - I've never had someone come to me with an Asus laptop that needed fixing.

In the study, Asus came top for laptop reliability with Toshiba a close second. Whilst not fantastically pretty, they're decent laptops - Toshiba is about the only manufacturer I know who seems to have a habit of squeezing full-sized keyboards into their laptops (Dell do it on some of their bigger ones, too). Whilst I've never know someone with a Toshiba laptop to have major problems, I do get a lot of people asking me why theirs bluescreens regularly. Toshiba's have a habit of overheating if they're in a bad environment. Easily fixed with a couple of things lifting the back of the laptop off a flat surface (so it's at an angle). Even better is to buy laptop fans - a little unit that sits under the battery blowing cool air around. They quite often come with USB hubs built in.

At the other end of the scale... well, I'll simply say NEVER get an HP (HP also do Compaq laptops, which you shouldn't buy either) or Acer laptop. Whilst some people have no problems, those laptops are like gold dust. Everyone I know with Acer and HP/Compaq laptops have had problems - eight times out of ten their HDD has died a slow, painful death (in which case they end up shelling out £80 for a new one, and however much they fancy on pints of Coke for me when I retrieve their data... a process which I find takes from a few hours if the HDD is empty or only somewhat dead, to nearly a week if the HDD was full or properly broken). The other two out of ten cases are bad batteries - the laptop simply won't work with the battery. I'm not sure if it's a problem with the laptop or simply the batteries Acer and HP supply, but the owner has to buy a new battery or sacrifice the portable part of their portable computer.

---

The short of it:

Asus are brilliant.
Toshiba is a good, cheaper option.

Never even contemplate thinking about going to the shop to look at an Acer or HP/Compaq.

---

Laptop-Reliability Study Highlights the Most Sturdy Laptop Makers

---

EDIT: I'll throw my hat in beside Ursa's and repeat - ALWAYS BACK UP YOUR DATA.

External hard drives can be bought for pennies, and save so much hassle should your laptop die. £80 can net you a Western Digital or Seagate 1TB external.

I wouldn't buy HP either. I buy dell. I did a comparison and Dell offers faster processors, more ram, and higher end graphics cards for their Precison Workstations, and Blader Servers than HP. I've checked other companies and Dell's more up to date on the comptuers I specified. These computers aren't for the everyday people though because they're specialized. Dell has improved Inspirons by quite a bit. They're laptops I believe are probably decent too. If I have a problem I just fix it myself. These computers I mentioned are more powerful than the game systems. These type of systems are a step below a super computer.

 

[TheEndIsNigh]

Lenny: Thanks for the info. I often get asked which is the best to buy as I 'get involved' with computers and people think that means I know everything there is to know. Sadly not the case. I just buy the cheapest desktops when I feel the need to upgrade. I'm probably a few years out of date with performance but if all you do is sit and type code all day (intermingled with the occasional open window PC drop test) it's best to get them cheap and cheerful.

External backup drives are OK - if you've got the time. For a Laptop they're essential.

For Desktops I have exchangeable hard drive cassettes. I do a full drive copy so that should the inevitable happen all I need to do is buy a new PC or whatever and then just boot from the backup cassette. Interim backups are done and every so often the big drive copy. Following the drive copy I boot from the backup to make sure it's good.

Of late I'm using the Windows Briefcase feature to keep my PC at home up to date so I can work at home. I find this is a real boon. OK you loose older versions but I can always go to the real backups if I need to recover those.

While we're on the topic of versions, do you use a version control package or know of a good one?

 

[Lenny]

Version control for source code, I imagine?

Which platform? I think Linux has it cooked in, so unless you want something with a pretty GUI, you're sorted there.

I'm running Windows and I use a program called TortoiseSVN: tortoisesvn.tigris.org.

These days, I have a local repository (which I have synced with Dropbox, just so I can access it wherever) that I work from, but last years group project for my degree, we had it saved on an external server.

TortoiseSVN has quite a nice GUI, it's free and pretty simple to set up. I don't think it deals well with versions of strange file types, like .doc, but any code, and standard files like .html and .txt, are versioned without a hitch. Oh, and it integrates well with some IDEs (I use Eclipse, and I know a few people who got it working with JDeveloper and NetBeans).

I'm not sure about Mac. There'll probably be something similar floating around.

There are a few web-based solutions around - GitHub and Sourceforge have some form of versioning, though it might cost you, and I think Google Code does as well (which, obviously, will be free).

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As for backups, I must admit that I'm yet to put anything in place. Sure, I've got all of my dissertation work synced on Dropbox, but nothing else is.

Having said that, I'm in the process of buying more hard drives, some of which I'll put into caddies so I can set up my own backup system - currently I have, internally, a 1TB drive for media, my 160gb SSD, which is my boot drive, and four more drives (2x250gb and 2x160gb) for files. I'm going to replace the 1TB with a 2TB, buy a second 2TB to backup the internal one, use the 1TB to backup my files, and buy something like a 500gb to make regular clones of my boot drive (weekly or biweekly and I'll keep the most recent three).

I keep meaning to rent a server somewhere that I can use as off-site backup, but I never seem to get round to it.