Red hot laptops

By
19 March 2003 03:10 PM
Tags: c640, t30, 5200, travelmate, acer, latitude, powerbook, thinkpad


Sample scenario

Red hot laptops
Introduction
1. Acer Travelmate 650
2. Apple PowerBook G4
3. Dell Latitude C640
4. IBM ThinkPad T30
5. Toshiba Satellite 5200
Benchmark results
Specifications
Sample scenario
About RMIT

Company: Cuff Enterprises. This company wants to provide highend notebooks for its top executives and IT managers.

Approximate budget: $7000 per notebook.

Requires: Five notebooks with at least 256MB memory, 14in or larger screens, at least 30GB hard disk, Windows 2000 installed.

Concerns: Notebooks should inspire warmandfuzzy feelings of loyalty in employees, and envy in their friends and colleagues. Performance and connectability are also important factors.

Best Solution: The Toshiba Satellite 5200 stands out as a clear winner here. It’s a fresh new notebook with some great new features that none of the other notebooks would dream of having. Things like the DVD-RAM/DVD-R drive and the Cpad are great new features that will inspire envy in your colleagues. This notebook is also extremely fast, it has a large screen, a variety of connectors, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth, and it also has a long-lasting battery to top all that off.

We also decided to give the Apple PowerBook a mention. The PowerBook is full of class but watch out for the new 17in display PowerBook.

What to look for when buying a notebook:

  • CPU speed: Mobile P4 CPUs run up to 2.4GHz. The fastest mobile AMD Athlon XP Processor available now is the 2200+.
  • Displays: 14.1in seems to be the standard size display for these notebooks. Check to see that the display is well protected and not flimsy. Also check the native resolution.
  • Weight and portability: Desktop replacement notebooks are quite heavy but are feature packed and things like CD/DVD-ROM drives. The tradeoff depends on how you will use the unit.
  • Connectors: Check to see what connectors the notebook has. What connectors are important to you? IEEE 1394? S-Video? SD Slot?
  • Networking: Look at notebooks that have Bluetooth integrated as well as 802.11b.
  • 3D performance: Look for nVidia- and ATI-based graphics accelerators with at least 16MB of on board video memory. 32MB is recommended.

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