best pentium M laptop

pentajigga · Post by **pentajigga** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 1:40 pm

looking at the sony vaio fs series...

any others compete .. looks do matter to me to an extent.. so no clunker and no brand ive never heard of unless its way cool.... thnx

will 4200rpmHD really kill me with using live4?

any decent film editing program on PC side to compete with final cut pro?

elemental · Post by **elemental** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 1:53 pm

I wouldnt go for Sony, had a bad experience with one their laptops, tho it was a P4 desktop processor in a laptop, so had bad overheating probs.

pentajigga · Post by **pentajigga** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 1:55 pm

actually this asus w5a looks hot!

http://usa.asus.com/products/notebook/w ... erview.htm

robin · Post by **robin** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 2:25 pm

pentajigga wrote:actually this asus w5a looks hot!

http://usa.asus.com/products/notebook/w ... erview.htm

nice, but 768MB max memory?!?

ytsek · Post by **ytsek** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 3:24 pm

I use one of these:
http://www-131.ibm.com/webapp/wcs/store ... &langId=-1

Beware, no firewire. But it has a fingerprint scanner.

brainray · Post by **brainray** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 3:39 pm

elemental wrote:I wouldnt go for Sony, had a bad experience with one their laptops, tho it was a P4 desktop processor in a laptop, so had bad overheating probs.

Well, the original poster asked for expiriences with an Pentium-M, which usually doesn't have a heat problem. Pentium-4 cpu's are not built for laptops.

I can recommend a Sony Vaio very much. I have a A215M wich is rather cheap. After being a Mac user for more than 10 years, I have to say that this is by far the most performant and quiet laptop I ever owned. Much better than the Ti and Al Powerbooks that make a lots of noise.

Also, I didn't have grounding problems yet, but just as long as no external hd is attached.

Many friends (musicians and djs) recommended to get a Sony, and IMHO this was good advice.

Best

Ray

pilcrow · Post by **pilcrow** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 6:21 pm

I have to second ytsek's recommendation. I drive an IBM T42. It's an M processor. Max 2GB RAM. 5400 RPM hard drive. It's a sexy little black beast. I love the no-nonsense black-on-black aesthetic of the thinkpad. Lean, mean, no frills (but who wants a frilly laptop?).

True, there's no FireWire. And this caveat: I'm just a piddler with Live. I don't perform out, but just stay in the house and noodle around on it for short bursts of personal bliss. But the T42 handles Live very well for me. Skip the fingerprint reader, unless you're with the CIA or something.

I bought my son a Compaq Presario for HS graduation last year. It's already crapped out on him. We're gonna pay to have the hard-drive copied, and then I'm buying him a T42. No more HP nonsense in this house!

Big Green running on Big Blue--great combination.

-pilcrow, a True Believer

zion15 · Post by **zion15** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 6:33 pm

about the only brand i've seriously heard little or no complaints about seems to be IBM. their laptops seem to be pretty expensive but they're well built. one thing however: the company that built laptops for IBM has now bought their whole laptop line and have apparently either launched or are launching new models soon - i've no idea how good and reliable they are.

sony vaios seem to perform well (and some of them look really cool) but a few of my friends who've owned vaios have had problems with them (having to send their computers to warranty repair, getting them back, having to send them back again) - then again, i'm not saying that they suck and i know lots of musicians who've gone for vaio and loved them.

then there will be the intel powerbooks if you have a year or two of waiting time and then some to wait the initial problems are ironed out...

rikhyray · Post by **rikhyray** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 7:04 pm

I am Vaio user, carefull only high end are worth it. The FS series might be shit for music, because of shared graphic memory.
After seeing and trying to bend ASUS I do believe that they build Vaios and IBMs. Very similar, have elegance of IBM but that does not really matter, they are as solid and the price is 40% less. Since I do music with notebook for living price is not the main factor, I actually liked the ASUS better then any other notebook, also the design. If you compare the prices you get 0.4 processor power -say for what you pay for 1.6 Sony you get 2.0 ASUS, and it comes from same factory anyway.
What is better then Sony and IBM ? Look, 4USBs,l ocation of inputs, outputs and the PCMCIA.

pentajigga · Post by **pentajigga** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 7:10 pm

asus does look better and better to me.
where do i get deals on this baby?

keep your comments coming.

btw how does shared memory affect performance?

subterFUSE · Post by **subterFUSE** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 7:10 pm

M-Tech.

http://www.mtechlaptops.com

You won't find anyone higher-end for less $$$

FaX-01 · Post by **FaX-01** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 9:26 pm

Also for Video Editing on PC you're really going to have to for VEGAS .
Which is a Sony software package.
I know a few people in Sydney doing DVD production work who swear by it with almost religious ferver though.

donnydonny · Post by **donnydonny** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 10:13 pm

rikhyray wrote:I am Vaio user, carefull only high end are worth it. The FS series might be shit for music, because of shared graphic memory.
After seeing and trying to bend ASUS I do believe that they build Vaios and IBMs. Very similar, have elegance of IBM but that does not really matter, they are as solid and the price is 40% less. Since I do music with notebook for living price is not the main factor, I actually liked the ASUS better then any other notebook, also the design. If you compare the prices you get 0.4 processor power -say for what you pay for 1.6 Sony you get 2.0 ASUS, and it comes from same factory anyway.
What is better then Sony and IBM ? Look, 4USBs,l ocation of inputs, outputs and the PCMCIA.

i'm planning to get a Vaio in the next month, but i've noticed that a lot of people are saying that Vaio's suck because of the shared memory, but there IS an option to just choose between an NVidia 6200 w/ Turbocache and a plain integrated graphics card. i thought it would just be the turbocache that shares memeory... but do both?

anonymouse · Post by **anonymouse** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 10:28 pm

Dell Precision Laptops. You can't get a better machine.

IBM's form factor is disgusting and poor value. Sony is pretty but fragile. Toshiba worth a look, but overpriced.

Paul Jay · Post by **Paul Jay** » Tue Jul 26, 2005 11:15 pm

Also check out high end Acer's, very stable, light and very cool designs...