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xcountryrower · #1 Post by **xcountryrower** » Wed Mar 02, 2005 9:37 pm

I'm goin to college next year for engineering. The specs for the laptop are up the wazoo, but i want something that doesn't weigh a ton. The T43's have just come out and im wondering exactly how long it will be before IBM allows you to "customize" them. Will they be outfitted with ATI's X700 or anything faster than the X300? And would it be better to buy cheap memory and a cheap HD and then buy from someplace like Newegg and upgrade myself? Thanks for the help. Go easy.

JHEM · #2 Post by **JHEM** » Wed Mar 02, 2005 9:48 pm

I can't think of any specs "up the wazoo" the school could have established that couldn't be met with a T40 or similar laptop, care to share them?

I run AutoCAD 2003 on my 1.5GHz T40 with 1.5MB RAM without any problems, as so several other members of the Forums with similar (or lesser) machines.

Regards,

James

lfeagan · #3 Post by **lfeagan** » Wed Mar 02, 2005 11:45 pm

Ditto, and make sure to check out your state's higher educational discounts. They are generally quite nice. If you want a high-powered portable notebook, you are basically talking about a 14.1" 1400x1050 T42/T43 model. If you want to go all out, there is always the T42p/T43p. And, lastly, wait as long as you can. The T50 might be out if you are talking about buying in 8 months.

dfumento · #4 Post by **dfumento** » Thu Mar 03, 2005 1:07 am

Your individual school might have special discounts with IBM, so check into that.

Also, no point in buying a T42p or T43p unless you need the OpenGL grapihcs support. See FAQ in my signature which tells which applications need OpngGL.

I use dual-boot with Linux so I wanted an 80GB hard drive. I got the 23739XU which I love.

Don't spend extra money getting faster CPU. It isn't worth it.

You do have to decide whether you want 14" SXGA or 15" UXGA.

thinkpadhk · #5 Post by **thinkpadhk** » Thu Mar 03, 2005 1:48 am

Yeah... don't go buckwild with the hardware thinking that you're gonna need some serious computing power for engineering school. Most average notebooks are far sufficient for anything you're gonna encounter in school or in the workforce.

Don't get me wrong, you will use tools that will require serious power, but you won't be able to afford those anyway (I'm talkin $100,000 yearly licenses etc.). Those tools will be made available to you in your school's computer clusters etc. Anything you can afford and run on your laptop, will not require anything too special.

In my own experience as an EE major, the most hardware intensive programs are probably MATLAB, and any circuit simulator (any of the SPICE variants). Even still, I was doing fine with my clunky desktop - a 700Mhz AMD Duron with 256MB of RAM.

dvorak · #6 Post by **dvorak** » Thu Mar 03, 2005 5:57 am

If you buy the -p version you'll simply get 64MB more of RAM on your videocard, other than that it's the same.
For example, if you want to play HL2 with high-textures, you'll need 128MB :)
Performance is equal, it's the same card, only a different name and different drivers (which you can change yourself of course).

I've got a T42 and am happy with the electronic hardware.
I'll suggest you save money and buy a T42 series one, add some accessories perhaps, then next year, if you've advanced in your financial situation and need a faster machine, look towards the upcoming laptops with dual-core processor.

lfeagan · #7 Post by **lfeagan** » Thu Mar 03, 2005 8:43 am

Yes, I would definitely say Matlab is a great thing to know. I use Matlab quiter literally every single day. As a note, the student version is available from Mathworks for around $100, but it does require that you have the CD in the drive to run it. So, that is a definite reason to get something with a built-in optical drive. Pretty much any type of engineer should at minimum be familiar with Matlab. The Student version conveniently comes with Simulink and the Symbolic Toolkit (which is the Maple kernel).

I would agree that you should not go crazy and spend lots of money on a notebook. In the course of your college career, you should at least consider the fact that you might get a new notebook after three years. This could happen for a variety of reasons. I just mention it as something to consider as a reason to perhaps not spend as much now, and to save your money while planning for a possible future purchase. Matlab will not be able to take advantage of any fancy video cards (I can attest to this as I have a T42p), and in fact uses Java for much of its graphics. I have been pushing it to its limits recently and had it "blow up" and give me all sorts of Java errors when it died.

Guess I made it mad at me. (Yeah, I had like 10 figures, each with 4x16 subplots, each plot with like hugely varying scales and a few hundred points, and each point was generated by the SVD of some not too small matrices. <"Wonderingly"> I wonder why that could be a problem....

LOL)

dfumento · #8 Post by **dfumento** » Thu Mar 03, 2005 11:19 am

dvorak wrote:If you buy the -p version you'll simply get 64MB more of RAM on your videocard, other than that it's the same.
For example, if you want to play HL2 with high-textures, you'll need 128MB
Performance is equal, it's the same card, only a different name and different drivers (which you can change yourself of course).

Please read my preceding post OpenGL graphics support is also a feature of the T42p, T43p. See the FAQ in my signature for which software needs OpenGL.

"Also, no point in buying a T42p or T43p unless you need the OpenGL grapihcs support. See FAQ in my signature which tells which applications need OpngGL. "

Solidworks and Pro Engineer are two other very expensive programs that have very inexpensive student rates. There are probably others.

lfeagan · #9 Post by **lfeagan** » Thu Mar 03, 2005 1:29 pm

Oh yeah, Solidworks and Pro/Engineer do actually benefit from special drivers on the T42p/T43p. But unless you are a M.E. you won't care particularly. I do love Solidworks though. It is one of my favorite programs.

JHEM · #10 Post by **JHEM** » Thu Mar 03, 2005 1:35 pm

I'd still like to hear from the OP what these daunting specs are that the school requires.

I'd almost wager that the school specs a P4 processor and doesn't even consider PentiumM!

Regards,

James

dfumento · #11 Post by **dfumento** » Thu Mar 03, 2005 1:37 pm

There are about certified 30 programs which use the OpenGL. From the FAQ listed in my signature is this link which lists the certified ones.

http://www.ati.com/products/workstation/certified.html

JHEM · #12 Post by **JHEM** » Thu Mar 03, 2005 1:44 pm

JHEM wrote:I'd still like to hear from the OP what these daunting specs are that the school requires.

Never mind, found it: http://www.eng.vt.edu/odlc/computing/compreq.shtml

Seems pretty "plain vanilla" if you ask me!

Regards,

James

xcountryrower · #13 Post by **xcountryrower** » Thu Mar 03, 2005 5:10 pm

The school is Virginia Tech, and the link to LAST years requirement is here: http://www.eng.vt.edu/odlc/computing/compreq.shtml

Also there is a bundle that we gotta purchase that has ACAD and all that great stuff.

How is the FireGL T2 that the T42p has. How would it work when it comes to HL2, Farcry, or Doom3? Thanks

And they do mention a Pentium M

BTW, wazoo in both performance and pricing in my eyes is really not that high considering that just six months ago I had a P3 w/ dial-up still.

fbrdphreak · #14 Post by **fbrdphreak** » Sat Mar 05, 2005 9:08 pm

From a current EE/CPE student, you REALLY don't need anything special in a notebook. If you want to take it with you, the biggest thing is portability.
I'm a senior finishing my third year doing both Electrical & Computer Engineering. I bought my 15" T42 last August and while it has been great, I made two great errors:
(1) 15" screen: it is a little cumbersome in classes, esp with the small desks. I got the 15" figuring I would want the bigger screen for when this is my primary PC away from my desktop. The bigger screen is nice for that reason, but 90% of the time I'm using it around campus; thus the smaller screen is a big plus.
(2) 6-cell battery: YOU NEED THE 9-CELL BATTERY PERIOD. The 6-cell sucks @$$, it gets close to 4 hours brand new but that will quickly drop. The 9-cell doesn't stick out very far from what I've seen and it will definitely be worth it for the battery life.

In regards to the video card, unless you know you're going to be doing 3D Modeling, you don't need the FireGLT2. It does give you better gaming performance, but I doubt it is worth the extra money. Either way you'll have to drop the resolution down. I guess it all depends if you plan to game a lot on it.

Either way, good luck with engineering & I hope you enjoy your Thinkpad.

xcountryrower · #15 Post by **xcountryrower** » Sun Mar 06, 2005 3:28 pm

frbdphreak, you're following me around. get away

fbrdphreak · #16 Post by **fbrdphreak** » Sun Mar 06, 2005 3:38 pm

He he, I've been here longer than you

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