Cheap computers

[T22 4me]

Z60T specs are as follows:1.73 g pentium M,80 gig hdd,512 mb ram,wireless 802.11 b/g,DVD+R Double Layer/DVD +/- RW drive
XP Pro,and it supports Wireless WAN via Verizon Wireless Broadband Access.............1999.99

T43 specs:1.73 g processor,60 g hdd,512ram,DVD/CDRW,XP Pro,Wireless 802.11 b/g...................1549.99

Both also have the finger print reader and Spill resistant keyboard

[bhtooefr]

*points at the Wireless WAN*

Yep, that's why it costs so much more.

FWIW, Verizon charges a nice chunk of change for their PC Card version of the WWAN card... AFTER discounts. This is going to have no discounts.

[jdhurst]

Inasmuch as the card may be proprietary to the ISP in your area, it strikes me as a truly dumb option to install unless specifically ordered. I cannot use it, but I do have a Sony Ericcson card. ... JD Hurst

[GomJabbar]

Wireless WAN via Verizon Wireless Broadband Access is fairly widespread in the US. I was looking for a nationwide coverage map, but the best I came up with is a list of cities covered.

BroadbandAccess Coverage Area

Below is a nationwide coverage map on their National Access plan. AFAIK, the BroadbandAccess (400-700 Kbps) drops back to National Access (60-80 Kbps) where Broadband coverage is unavailable.

National Access coverage map.

[Navck]

I'd take an R series ANY day over those weird "KiddyMate" (Or Earthmate, something) laptops + Weird Lattitudes worn so badly, that at least they've lost most of their paint job from just being used.

PS - My school plans to upgrade to Windows XP Pro, get 40GB harddrives, and keep the 64MB of ram in their Optiplexs (SUDICIDE ACTION HERE. YOU DONT UPGRADE FROM WIN 2k TO XP WITH NO RAM CHANGE! I wonder if the tech guy actually KNOWS what hes doing?)

[bhtooefr]

We've got a whole fleet of 128MB systems.

Heck, when they ordered new system batch #3 a couple years ago, they specced the things out with 128MB. And they fscking CAME with XP.

At least new system batch numbers #4 (staff PCs) and #5 (lotsa student PCs) have 512MB RAM...

We're currently figuring out the cost of upgrading the 128MB systems to 256, though, to get reasonable performance out of them.

Anyway, that's another topic for another thread in another forum.

Did I mention that the R50e seriously undercuts the Inspiron 2200? I think the I2200 MIGHT have upgraded to the 910GML, which has a GMA900 instead of the even more sucky Extremely Crappy Graphics 2 in the 855GME used in the R50e, but otherwise, the R50e is a better laptop.

[dsvochak]

The last two posts are interesting. Isn't "reasonable performance" a function of the combination of hardware, OS, and applications you're trying to run?

I agree with Navck that I wouldn't want to run XP Pro on a 64mb system. If I understand the post correctly, I wouldn't really want to try W2K with 64mb either. As I recall though, Win98 and 64mb wasn't bad.

128mb and XP for normal office style tasks (WP, Accounting, etc.) isn't too bad. If you're doing something heavy duty, of course, more memory is preferred. Before I'd say it was ok to upgrade all the 128mb machines to 256mb, I'd want to know what they were currently being used for, what the likely future uses were, etc. If some of them were basically high tech typewriters, the question becomes "How fast can you type?"

As we all know, bad things happen (including performance that isn't "reasonable") when one tries to push a system past what it's capable of doing. I wonder whether this might account for some of the complaints in the T4x forum.

[bhtooefr]

With 128MB RAM, they swap even just running MS Office. You'll fill up the buffer pretty quickly.

[dsvochak]

With 128MB RAM, they swap even just running MS Office.

I guess that's another reason to be glad I'm using Lotus SmartSuite & WP Office

[GomJabbar]

With 128MB RAM, they swap even just running MS Office.

I guess that's another reason to be glad I'm using Lotus SmartSuite & WP Office

I use WP Office myself!