Laptop for college?

[ekincam]

I haven't been to a traditional college full time in something like 5 years but now I'm going back to finish my BS. I've been going to school online and night class at satellite campus where instructors are sometimes addressed by their first names and teaching is not their primary occupation. My biology instructor works at a museum for example.

Back some 5 years ago, it was rare to see students with laptops around school. I sometimes visit a board frequented by the 14-20 crowd even though I don't fit this demographic and there are a lot of posts from the college bound about purchasing laptops for college... Now I am assuming that this is not a requirement right? I do most of my college work on my C2D equipped desktop and sometimes on my IBM T23.

Now what do college students actually do with these laptops that they "need" for school?

I had considered a T61 but after carrying around my T23 and some T4x at work, I feel that those still might be a bit too big weight wise. I think a 4lb light weight like Dell M1330 or ultalight weight like Lenovo T6x or Dell Latitude D430 would be better. But the thing is that the laptops I see people buying on other boards are more luggable than portable. The laptops they buy are things like 15" Inspirons and deals from Best Buy, Circuit City and the like. Now these things are inexpensive and have good specs, but at 6.5 to 7 lbs with the standard battery, that's not exactly the most portable or useful for work away from home so I am suspecting that these people use them mostly at home since battery life doesn't seem so great. I wouldn't want to lug a 7lb laptop in addition to notebooks and text books - that's for sure. If I have to carry the thing around, the biggest thing I'd want would be a non-wide screen T series.

At work I've handled everything from ultraportables, such as Dell D420 and D430, to 25lb portable servers encased in metal running Sun Sparc CPUs that have PSUs the size of one and a half red bricks...

I am really liking the specs of the Dell M1330, but a few things kill it for me. I don't like the glossy screen and lack of a trackpoint. The silver casing is ok, but I really like the conservative appearance of my IBM T23. I don't care for big manufacturer logos that Dell sometimes uses either.

The T6x looks good, but they weigh over 5lbs which I'm not sure I want to carry that much weight around. The X6x looks good too, but does not have, nor include provisions for, an internal optical (do I even need this?) I'd prefer not to have to take an external drive with me. However, the X6x is really light (~3lbs IIRC).

My wants:
Full size keyboard
Preferred matte screen - glossy are better for color rendition and blacks, but not good for when there is ambient light because of reflections
Preferred pointing device is Trackpoint - I don't care if there is no touch pad like my T23
Weight 4-5lbs ?? not certain about this yet
Conservative appearance


Any other input or suggestions? I'm not even sure if this is something I need to buy...

[hart22]

In my opinion based on the description of your situation and needs you probably don't need to purchase another laptop to finish up your BS. Students at the university here do on occasion bring their laptops to class to take notes, or to the library to work, but in reality it's not as great a boon to productivity as you might imagine. From my experience students will oftentimes e-mail, instant message, or play with facebook in the middle of a lecture if they have a laptop with them, and even when they are taking notes laptops tend to be distracting because of the constant "tap-tap-tap" of the keyboard in a quiet lecture hall. And unless you get a laptop with very good battery life you would need to find power outlets in lectures because a laptop might not last through a whole class day. And there are computers provided in the library should you need to study.

When incoming students purchase laptops for college they mainly buy it as a all-purpose machine that will be their primary and sole computer for college. It makes sense then to purchase a laptop, because you retain the option of bringing it to class and the library, and many desktop replacement models are very powerful. However if you already have a machine at home, plus a T23 laptop as well, then your computing needs should be well-satisfied. If your BS is in a very computer-intensive subject, perhaps involving programming or computer graphic design, and none of your classrooms have computers, then a new laptop would make sense. Otherwise it may be a extra expense, and one that wouldn't provide many major benefits at that.

[Aroc]

I'm finishing up my BS is CS now (then will move onto my MS in CS). I'm in the same boat as you (except I was out about 10 years).

Back 10-12 years ago I was one of the few students (I saw) to carry a notebook to class. I used it for notetaking, running my C/C++ compilier/IDE, and running a mathematics program called Mathematica. During my sophomore year we worked in teams for Chemical engineering and each team was given a notebook with departmental software on it (ChemCAD, Microcal Origin, MS Office, Mathematica, and some piping program I don't recall) due to a large unexpected Alumni donation. It helped when we were working in groups on homework and projects.

As for needing them in class today: Anecdotally, some students use notebook computers for notetaking. But most of the time I see when in the classrooms for nonproductive use (instant messaging, web surfing recreational websites, watching movies) which is sad, IMO. Just like 10 years ago, if your academic department really wants the students to need them, they will probably pad to budget to just issue them to you.

I carry my Dell Latitude D400 (under 4 lbs) around to my classes. I also have a D430, but still carry the D400 since it's good enough plus I wouldn't feel as sad if I lost/broke it. I use it alot just before and immediately following my computer science lectures to help demonstrate parts of the lecture or homework to struggling students. Sometimes I'd crack it open and fire up MS Word to work on part of a paper if I have time between classes and don't want to work from a lab or classroom computer. Also since I'm a commuter for evening classes, I usually arrive early enough (15-20 minutes) to sometimes get work done on the PC. But just as often, I re-read part of the text book or my handwritten notes (I no longer type out my notes anymore).

You will have about <1% need for an optical drive at class. Most everyone uses USB memory sticks now (they are the new floppy diskette) to exchange data (either that or you email files as attachments to others or to yourself). You usually aren't installing any software while you are in the lecture hall. Some classrooms have tables whereas most still have smaller desks. 15.4 inch and 17 inch behemoths and small desks do not mix, even though most students seem to buy laptops of these sizes for some odd reason (It must be the bigscreen symdrome after years of watching television, I suppose). A 13 or 14 inch 4:3 square isn't bad, but a 12 inch (widescreen or 4:3 square) is really ideal, IMO. Most of the students with 15 inch are larger screen tend to crowd around the few seats with power outlets. So I'd buy something that has good battery life and consider bringing a 2nd battery. I'm only attending 1-2 classes per night so a single battery is just fine for me with its 4-5 hour runtime.

I can't really say having a notebook computer is a need. But there are times when it is useful. I wouldn't necessarily run out an buy anything newer than your T23 just yet. Trust me, I don't you'll be at a disadvatage for not having that Dell Latitude D430 just yet. Like the other guy mentioned, having a notebook PC in class just isn't a boon to productivity. If I had to rank them (or even choose between them) I would take my BlackBerry over my notebook any day as far as productivity goes. It's not even a contest.

I hope some of this was helpful.

[Trekk69]

I love the ability to be able to write on the screen with my tablet, do you think you would enjoy that functionality?

[qviri]

Hmm, let's see if I can provide some input here.

I'm going into the third year of an engineering program at a university that is usually described as focused a bit more on technical learning than humanities. The following are my opinions, etc, keep the bias in mind.

Pretty much everyone at the university has their own computer. My school doesn’t require a computer in any of the programs that I know of. If you need to do computer work, you are able to do it on provided lab computers. The majority of students’ computers are primarily for personal use. People this age are used to having a computer to talk to friends, listen to music, watch movies, play games, etc. Not having to go to a lab to do schoolwork is certainly a bonus, of course.

The majority of these are laptop computers. Students view them as more convenient. They’re smaller (important for potentially small dorm rooms), offer adequate specs and performance, and the mobility of even 7 lb desktop replacements is still nice. The smaller laptops are more portable, but the larger laptops offer a better all-in-one package for music and video entertainment; it’s a question of what one wants. At my university in particular, a lot of students go home to Toronto (about 150 km away) often, and being able to bring the laptop with all your files, work, and friend contacts on it is useful. If you are doing group work, having a laptop to bring to a group meeting allows more flexibility in working location. Outlets aren’t available everywhere, but they’re not hard to find, minimising the impact of so-so battery life. People buying 15.4” laptops “for college” don’t usually intend to bring them to class every day; it’s more of a “I will be away from home [at college]: I need a computer.”

As for bringing laptops to class, to be blunt, in majority of the cases (though perhaps not the vast majority), the laptop ends up serving as a distraction or procrastination device. Having done this myself, I will not pass judgment, although I will say that people usually don’t do it to annoy others or because they actively hate the professor. Facebook and MSN are common to the point of universality, IMO. In engineering, I have also seen Starcraft and networked multi-player Tron on screen during lectures, and while in my opinion this is pushing it a bit, others could say the same about reading Thinkpads.com forums, which I have done. (It is perhaps interesting to note the stories of networked multi-player Mario Kart on Nintendo DSes; this isn’t solely a laptop problem.)

The question of practicality of using the laptop to take notes can be answered neatly as: it depends. I am speculating and generalizing here, but: in text/speech heavy classes (usually arts/humanities) I can see it being a handy ability. It’s worth noting that most people can type a lot faster than they can write, either on paper or on a tablet screen. Personally I don’t find the noise of the keystrokes as big of a problem as hart22 suggests, and I would suggest that most classes aren’t all that quiet so your typing won’t be machine gun round-loud. In CS, it could be handy for the notes on algorithms and the pseudo-code... but the minute the lecture includes a diagram, you’re much worse off. In engineering and science, it again isn’t very handy because you know there will be illustrations and diagrams involved in at least some of your courses.

Tablet usage encounters further issues because switching from keyboard input of text to pen input of graphs or illustrations is, IMO, awkward. Also, in my personal experience, the tablet digitisers do not have sufficient resolution and unless you draw really large (which in turn causes you to run out of screen quickly), you will lose out on some detail. I am also not a big fan of writing on a slick surface elevated something like 3-4 cm off the table surface; it doesn’t feel right. It was mostly these problems that made me stop using a Core Duo tablet and return to my X31 last school term.

Size wise, I have seen people with 15.4” laptops in class. 17” are not unheard of, but less common. Personally I wouldn’t bring anything larger than a small 14”, but not everyone has the same priorities.

I agree that an optical drive isn’t useful in the classroom. My personal use was of X series (which as you may now don’t have one), coupled with first a desktop computer and then a docking station at home, and this worked well. Most students’ laptops do end up having optical drives, but that has more to do with the screen size which dictates overall dimensions and the drive is provided because it can be.

I would second the recommendation for keeping your T23 right now. Your desktop computer at home will be enough for more serious use, and from your situation I am guessing you won’t be going home every 1-2 weeks so lack of mobility isn’t as big of a concern. A T23 with a well-maintained operating system is fast enough for most of the tasks you’d want to do in a lecture hall. Maybe consider topping up the RAM if yours is on the low side, and definitely get wifi if you don’t already have it (802.11b is enough). Go through a semester and see if that’s working out; if not, you’ll know from experience what more you want and what to look for.

Any further questions about us young’uns, feel free.

[ekincam]

That is some very good insight for computer use in schools. My friends all took desktop systems with CRTs to college because 15" LCDs ran over $600 at that time.

My T23 is sufficint for most needs. Currently I use the T23 at work to do school work, mostly Open Office, when I have down time. Only thing is that my T23 only has maybe 90-120 minutes of battery life with minimal activity, depending on if I use wi-fi or not, and at the lowest screen brightness. Battery life aside, weight is an issue at over 5lbs. I will likely be comuting by bus or bicycle.

My C2D system is more than capable of handling my computing needs since I'm hardly every able to use it to full capacity even with Folding at home running in the background. The computer I had previously was a Athlon Thunderbird and even that was well capable of compiling C++ code and such. Primary reason for the C2D was gaming.

I can see how the clicks from keyboards could be annoying. I type about 60WPM and I learned to type on a manual typewriter (I'm not that old...that's just what the school had. Even I thought they were ancient at that time.) The keyboard on my T23 is not nearly as loud as the Dell desktop keyboards at work or even the Logitech I use at home though. My boss did confiscate the metal encased IBM mechanical keyboard I found in our storage room...I wonder why. (I work in IT of sorts so we have all kinds of old stuff around. I opened a laptop a couple weeks ago and it booted to Windows 3.11.)

I think I'm going to wait until I actually start school in the fall before I make this decision since I'm not even certain what I'd use this computer for right now.

If weight is an issue, a used X41 seems attractive and not that much. However, the 1.8" HDDs are difficult to come by so I'm concerned what I'd do if I wanted something larger.

[qviri]

The battery can be replaced to bring your battery back up. You may not be able to get a brand new battery, but 80% of the original battery life is not unreasonable to expect.

Note that there are no official IBM upgrades to the X4* series hard drives that are larger than 60 GB.

If you find the keyboard noise to be the biggest distraction in the classroom, you should count yourself as lucky.

One note about something you've mentioned in the first post - the "full size" keyboard. I cannot speak for other manufacturers, but the main alphanumeric keys on the X series Thinkpads are virtually identical to those on larger laptops. I think they may be smaller by something like 5%, but it makes almost no difference at all. The control keys (tab, capslock, shift, backspace, \, enter) are smaller, but they are not difficult to get used to. Other than the X6* machines, the ctrl and alt are sized generously as well.

If you want to save weight, a X31/X40/X41, or equivalent from other manufacturers may be the way to go. You will get 3-3.5 lb with good performance and reaching four hours of battery life is not difficult. The X40/X41 are a bit lighter and thinner, but X31 gives you more hard drive choices.

Waiting until you get a bit of experience is probably the way to go, though; the prices will only go down anyway.

[ekincam]

I haven't been to an actual lecture where someone was typing notes into a laptop before so I don't know what that's like. I think I'll be sticking with ink and paper though. I was just saying that I tend to make a lot of noise when I type.

Yes, a full size keyboard is important to me, as is a well designed one. I tried a Mac Book of some sort and the keyboard was horrible. I kept hitting the space between the keys in the home row and bottom row rather than the keys in the bottom row so it sometimes did not register. The keyboard on the Mac Book is not like a regular keyboard. The keys are flat and spaced out like on a calculator rather than slightly concave and together

[lbraasch]

I'll preface that this topic has some really long responses, as well as really long first post, all of which i did not fully read. However, I think i got the jist of what you guys are talking about, and thus will provide input based on what i think you're discussing

I'm an engineering student at a major university. I've had a laptop all 4 years of my studies, and have to say that I couldn't dream of not having it.

Although it is entirely possible to go through college without a computer all together, it is all the more helpful to have your own, especially during finals week, when all the library computers are constantly occupied.

Having a laptop in lecture does act as a deterrent to paying attention, but also has its advantages. In a lot of my classes, the lecturers use powerpoint lectures. You have 3 options in these lectures. 1) download, printout, and take notes on the slides in front of you. 2) follow the ppt slides, and write notes in your notebook. 3) download slides, add comments in the comment box of ppt.

option 1 uses a lot of paper and ink. I do mean a lot. even with 4 slides to a page, some of my lectures are still 30 slides, and there are 3 lectures a week.

option 2 is hard to decern which note is to which lecture slide. Often lecturers skip through slides quickly, and there is no numbering to the slides visible to the student. thus, taking notes is generally useless

option 3 is the best of both worlds. you save paper/ink, and you still can comment on the individual slides.

Furthermore, in classes like history classes, where the ppt lectures are not always online, and you are expected to copy down the notes presented, it is far easier to type the notes than it is to hand write them. I myself can type far faster than I can write, and i can type for longer amounts of time w/o pain than i can hand write.

In my engineering classes, often we have to use programs such as Lab View Virtual Instruments, MatLab, Solidworks, Inventor, Pro-E, etc. Lectures have tutorials on how to use the programs. However, without a computer in front of you, allowing you use follow along step by step, the tutorial is hardly useful, as hand written notes are hard to follow later if you did not do the steps yourself.