I need a new laptop for school!

[Flur]

I love my Vaio. I have an SZ (13-inches, right around 4 lbs). It's considered an ultra-portable, but if I really had to tote it all the time I'd probably go for the TZ, which has an 11-inch screen and is under 3 lbs. They now come with an option for a flash memory drive, so they're super stable, and the screens are gorgeous - exactly what one would expect from Sony. They're a bit on the pricey side though - between 2-3k, although I haven't checked in a while so the prices may have dropped.

DH is a Mac guy, but I think my Vaio may have converted him. He wants the TZ as his next machine. I have to say when I replace this one I'll be going for another Vaio.

[Fujichants]

Since I am a Mac user, I say go for a Mac. They have the new airbook out, so that is pretty light for your commuting needs. They also have a bunch of other models to choose from (as you might already know from your research). I would get it from your campus computer store, or from the Apple store, because with you can get a 10 or 15% student discount on the laptop, and they have this back to school special (which they have every year) where they throw in a free iPod.

I never had any compatibility problems, except this one time when I had to make probability trees on Excel for my statistics class. For some reason the probability trees wouldn't show up or work.

[crazybikinchic]

I have a Gateway that I use for those precise things. I love it, it has not given me any problems. DH has a Tosheba (sp?) that also has been wonderful. We are looking to replace his because it has been around awhile and we were talking to the computer fixers at Best Buy and they said that HP is always in the shop. I would want to steer away from that.

[kie_fujo]

haha. not to throw a third option but i love my dell! and i got everything i wanted for cheaper than anyone else i looked at at the time. including a 2yr in home warranty (even against water damage or drops) which the others didn't include.

[Sheesh]

Make sure you check with the school to find out what software or special technical requirements they may have for connecting to their network.

And, +1 for taking advantage of the Educational Discount! In fact, I just saved several hundred dollars on my most recent Mac purchase, and am getting an iPod for free (after rebate) and a printer for free (after rebate).

[Grog]

No suggestion on models, but:

Do not buy the cheapest. Go one or two steps above. If you can afford the "professional" model, go for it.

Unfortunately, there seems to be quite a few "discounted" laptops out there that are discounted for a reason: a few of the parts may have "barely passed" quality control and thus have been sold for a really good price to the builder... do you get a really inexpensive laptop. Attractive, but risky.

And, no matter what: backup. Every day. Theft and crashes happen!

Happy shopping!

[ny biker]

A timely thread. I'm looking for a laptop too, although for me it's to replace a desktop because I'm tired of having a big computer in the living room of my 1BR condo.

This laptop review was in the Washington Post last week:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...081303480.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...190&s_pos=list

Also see www.cnet.com for all kinds of information and reviews.

My current pc is a dell so they keep sending me emails about the huge price cuts they're offering right now for back to school.

[ikkin]

MAC. Hands down. No contest.

Unless you want more issues, more viruses, more problems all around. Then, by all means, go with a PC.

[NbyNW]

Make sure you check with the school to find out what software or special technical requirements they may have for connecting to their network.

I've worked with both Macs and PCs in office environments. They're really not that different. And no system is without its weaknesses. It's even pretty easy to share files across platforms these days. Hopefully we can avoid turning this into a Mac vs. PC thread, since you can find plenty of those elsewhere on the web. Here's another consideration:

Check with your department if they have recommendations. You didn't say what you would be studying. In some fields, you may have specific software needs that might be available on one platform but not the other. In my field, for example, we did a lot of graphics using Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign, which are available for both Mac and PC, but we had one class where we were required to use AutoCAD, which is only available for Windows. I've heard that Windows emulators on Macs are pretty good these days, but I've had no reason to spend the $$.

I have a good friend who has a PhD in Physics and you would think they'd be all PC, but she tells me they were running Mathematica on eMacs.

Your department or university IT people might prefer one system over the other, and if you need to connect to your school's network, there may or may not be support for the non-favored system. Actually, I think these days most schools have both.

But if you're pretty tech savvy, or you have a friend who is, it probably won't matter.

Backwards compatibility is a problem for both Mac and PC platforms. I've seen this with both the new Office 2007 and with Adobe CS3. Pre-OSX, Macs had really nice backwards compatibility, but I guess that business model meant that people only replaced their computers every 5-7 years instead of every 2-4. I guess Apple decided they needed to sell more computers.

I think it comes down to personal preference and what you're willing to spend. For my personal use, I prefer Macs for a couple of reasons -- I'm pretty good at troubleshooting them from my office experience and when things go REALLY wrong, their customer service is excellent. On the rare occasion I've had to call their warranty service, I was able to talk to a real person within a reasonable amount of time, and they were really helpful. In fact, I'll be calling them tomorrow, since my MacBook is currently showing me a gray screen of death (there used to be a "sad Mac" face ).

Also when it was time to upgrade, I felt like I got decent trade-in value for my old machine. I'm not sure what people get for their old PC machines.

I started to subscribe to the .Mac service when I was in grad school and it was really nice to be able to upload things to my iDisk, leave my Powerbook in my locker at school, and be able to download my files and work when I got home. A 15" Book gets kind of heavy after a while, but for my graphics work I didn't want to go any smaller.

You can probably set up your own remote storage if you get a PC -- in fact, your university might provide you with some storage space. But there's just something really nice about the way it's set up in the Mac OS.

[Flur]

You can probably set up your own remote storage if you get a PC -- in fact, your university might provide you with some storage space. But there's just something really nice about the way it's set up in the Mac OS.

GoDaddy has Online File Folder. Super easy, works for both Macs and PCs. Once it's set up, it basically acts like a password protected network drive, only you can access it anywhere you have an internet connection, and on any machine. Love it.

[TrekTheKaty]

MAC! More expensive in the beginning, but my last powerbook lasted 6 years! When you call customer support, you get California--not India.

No compatibility issues:
No, "it's not our hardware, call Microsoft."
"It's not our software, call your manufacturer."
"It's not our computer, call your internet provider."

Free geek (tech) support at your local Mac store.

[ilima]

I would say Mac, because you can run Windows natively (I have a big memory hog of a program that runs better on my Mac than it ever did on my Dell). But if you want a cheap laptop for pretty much just word processing & surfing the web, Mac doesn't make the real cheap computers (Macs aren't more expensive than PCs if you compare them similarly spec'd).

If you want to do things like run stats, for example, a cheapie laptop is going to be out, so you might as well go Mac.

[smilingcat]

Asus Eee laptop.

I love this machine. And if cost is important its $300 for 2G model with 4G of solid state drive, 512 M byte of RAM. And if you need more storage space, you can add SD flash or USB hard drive. It also has WiFi, 3x USB, Ethernet (10/100), and VGA connector. Comes with either Linux or XP, open office, web browser... 2G screen is 800x640 at around 7" wide.

The model in the picture is the 900 and has 1G Ram with 20G of solid state disk. display is 1024x768. when connected to external VGA it goes up to 1600x1440. I have Linux, open office 2.0, TCL, RUBY...Also has 1.3Mpxiel web cam built in. see www.eeeuser.com for more detail. (if you decide on this model get the 20G of solid state disk and not the 12G or 16G)