Looking for a good laptop.

Zoomer

Anyone have a suggestion as to a laptop I should buy? I'm looking for one mainly for work, walking around and plugging into console ports, switches, etc. Nothing flashy. Any suggestions?

dynamik

You might want to read through this: http://www.techexams.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=32582

That site Schluep posted ( http://xoticpc.com ) is great. You can get a much more modest machine than I did.

Oh, and if you want to buy a used 12.1" Dell 700m, let me know

Schluep

If you post a little more detail we may be able to help you more. The suggestions I gave in that other thread were based on the price range and needs of the OP. You look like you are looking for somethin much less costly. If you can give a little more detail as to what price range you are looking for or what else it may be used for perhaps some more specific suggestions could be made.

vCole

The Dell Vostro line is pretty cheap with decent specs. Since you're not using it for anything major, maybe a Compaq with lower specs? or an Acer??

iowatech

The dell latitude D830's still have the old console ports on them. Makes for hooking up to routers / switches less annoying. And the laptops are fairly cheap considering what you get.

hypnotoad

$10 USB to serial adapter for the win!

http://search.ebay.com/search/search.dll?from=R40&_trksid=m37&satitle=usb+serial&category0=

brad-

dynamik wrote:

You might want to read through this: http://www.techexams.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=32582

That site Schluep posted ( http://xoticpc.com ) is great. You can get a much more modest machine than I did.

Oh, and if you want to buy a used 12.1" Dell 700m, let me know

Interesting that for 4GB of Ram to be seen, it requires the 64 bit version. Wierd that they didnt fix that from XP.

Daniel333

EEE PC?

http://eeepc.asus.com/global/

dynamik

brad- wrote:

Interesting that for 4GB of Ram to be seen, it requires the 64 bit version. Wierd that they didnt fix that from XP.

What do you mean? 32-bit OSes max-out at 4GB. The reason you don't see the full 4GB if you have it installed is because there are other things, such as your video card, that draw from that 4GB availability.

brad-

dynamik wrote:

brad- wrote:

Interesting that for 4GB of Ram to be seen, it requires the 64 bit version. Wierd that they didnt fix that from XP.

What do you mean? 32-bit OSes max-out at 4GB. The reason you don't see the full 4GB if you have it installed is because there are other things, such as your video card, that draw from that 4GB availability.

O i thought it was a limitation of XP in general...because I want to say I've seen more than that on server x32 OS's.

dynamik

Nah, it's a limitation of 32-bit CPUs. 2^32 = 4GB.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/64-bit#Memory_limitations

Tyrant1919

You sure it's a limitation on the CPU, I thought it was the OS. According to this:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/windowsserver/evaluate/features/compare.mspx

32 Bit 2003 Enterprise can have 64GB. I'm assuming it's something in the OS.

Man wish I could have 2TB of Ram....screw hard disks and flash based drives. I want 2TB of RAM!

dynamik

Microsoft wrote:

Windows XP Professional and Windows Server 2003 Memory Support. The maximum amount of memory that can be supported on Windows XP Professional and Windows Server 2003 is also 4 GB. However, Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition supports 32 GB of physical RAM and Windows Server 2003, Datacenter Edition supports 64 GB of physical RAM using the PAE feature.

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/server/PAE/PAEmem.mspx
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/server/PAE/pae_os.mspx
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_Address_Extension

PAE is a work-around for the limitation. I've heard it doesn't work that well, but it would be interesting to hear from someone that's used it themselves.

Microsoft wrote:

The key question is: how does the operating system solve this problem? The performance, functionality, simplicity of programming, and reliability of how these issues are handled will determine the usefulness of the large memory support.

Tyrant1919

I'd rather just go to 64 if I needed that much ram. You made it sound like it's impossible to do with 32 bit procs, it's possible, just takes a lame 'patch' to get it to work.

dynamik

Sorry

I was just speaking generally and trying to keep it simple

I suppose if you want to get technical, it is a limitation of the OS as well. It's just that the OS is designed for the CPU, so that seemed obvious.