Laptop Computers

Not worth it with a low res screen. Having had a 13.3 with that resolution screen, and now having a 15.6" 1080 screen, it's absurd how much better the new one is. I almost can't stand to use my old laptop now.

Lenovo Yoga 2 is s'posed to be 3200*1800 on a 13,3'
http://shop.lenovo.com/us/en/laptops...ga/yoga-2-pro/

Come on Apple Air, or non-lenovo pc makers - make it happen

bho_sl said:

by the way, using it for work on the road (mainly excel, outlook, web browsing) and travel (watching 720p TV/movies). would be nice to play some games (ffxiv, league) at low/med settings but not critical. battery life important.

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just returned the book 9 plus. screen was way too dim (250 nits, average laptop is 300-350 nowadays), which is probably why battery life was so good. But if youre using it for travel outdoors/gaming youd probably be looking for a brighter screen.

qHD+ 3200 resolution is still new, and most apps don't scale well yet. I'm gonna let the manufacturers battle it out for awhile and hope for some windows updates to handle 3200x1800 res. At the moment i'm drooling over asus zenbook infinity and hope they dont screw em up somehow.

3200*1800 may be stretching it a bit, but being stuck with 1366*720 in 2013 blows - at least give me 1080p on a 13.3'. Innovate, pronto

Izo_sl said:

3200*1800 may be stretching it a bit, but being stuck with 1366*720 in 2013 blows - at least give me 1080p on a 13.3'. Innovate, pronto

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Ya screen res is dependent on how far you are from the screen. On a 13.3 you would have to be laying your cheek on the mousepad to benefit from that res. It does amaze me how hard it is to find fhd ips screens on laptops tho. It is such a huge difference.

You can do 200% DPI so it's a "smoother" 1600x900. Pretty much what Apple did with the retina gadgets.

I finally pulled the trigger on a device. Picked up a 2 month old MacBook Air (2013) from one of my friends who decided that he'd rather have a Pro w/ Retina screen when they come out. Picked it up fully loaded with the Haswell i7, 512gb hdd, 8gb memory and 3 year AppleCare for $1600. I don't think I would have ever paid full price for it, but cutting out tax (9.5% in WA) I essentially paid $1200 for the laptop alone.

So far I'm pretty impressed with the hardware. I'm still trying to figure out some of the random shit in OSX. 3 fingers just to take a screenshot? No home/end keys? No native way to right click -> create new -> text document? The last one is a huge "wtf?!?" considering so many people consider them "development friendly."

I'll be loading Parallels, and that should hopefully give me a bit more of an environment that I'm accustomed to. The Intel 5000 graphics is pretty monster. I can play XCom on high settings, WoW runs passably well with most everything turned up. Lightroom image processing is pretty boss so far compared to the Surface Pro that I had previously been using.

Mageling_sl said:

I finally pulled the trigger on a device. Picked up a 2 month old MacBook Air (2013) from one of my friends who decided that he'd rather have a Pro w/ Retina screen when they come out. Picked it up fully loaded with the Haswell i7, 512gb hdd, 8gb memory and 3 year AppleCare for $1600. I don't think I would have ever paid full price for it, but cutting out tax (9.5% in WA) I essentially paid $1200 for the laptop alone.

So far I'm pretty impressed with the hardware. I'm still trying to figure out some of the random shit in OSX. 3 fingers just to take a screenshot? No home/end keys? No native way to right click -> create new -> text document? The last one is a huge "wtf?!?" considering so many people consider them "development friendly."

I'll be loading Parallels, and that should hopefully give me a bit more of an environment that I'm accustomed to. The Intel 5000 graphics is pretty monster. I can play XCom on high settings, WoW runs passably well with most everything turned up. Lightroom image processing is pretty boss so far compared to the Surface Pro that I had previously been using.

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Mouse in system prefs should let you turn on 2nd click. If they release an Air with Retina i'll be definately getting it.

Mageling_sl said:

I finally pulled the trigger on a device. Picked up a 2 month old MacBook Air (2013) from one of my friends who decided that he'd rather have a Pro w/ Retina screen when they come out. Picked it up fully loaded with the Haswell i7, 512gb hdd, 8gb memory and 3 year AppleCare for $1600. I don't think I would have ever paid full price for it, but cutting out tax (9.5% in WA) I essentially paid $1200 for the laptop alone.

So far I'm pretty impressed with the hardware. I'm still trying to figure out some of the random shit in OSX. 3 fingers just to take a screenshot? No home/end keys? No native way to right click -> create new -> text document? The last one is a huge "wtf?!?" considering so many people consider them "development friendly."

I'll be loading Parallels, and that should hopefully give me a bit more of an environment that I'm accustomed to. The Intel 5000 graphics is pretty monster. I can play XCom on high settings, WoW runs passably well with most everything turned up. Lightroom image processing is pretty boss so far compared to the Surface Pro that I had previously been using.

Click to expand...

After using a MacBook Pro for 8 months, I'm returning it back to the guys at work and asking for a standard Windows 7 Laptop instead. I just can't get over the UI and (to me) how unintuitive it is - it's great for web surfing and basic tasks, but when I've got multiple programs open I find it harder work that just using a MS device. Can't explain it, but it just doesn't work for me.

And whilst I really like the touchpad and the gestures, it's also a pain in the backside as well, as sometimes my thumb will be hovering just over the pad and it'll take the gesture as a 3 fingered gesture and put in mission control or some other random screen. I've also noticed it randomly stops internet access - it's completely random, but I can be reading a website, click on a link and then sit there for 30 seconds whilst nothing happens. Going to other websites does the same thing, until the 30 seconds has past and then everything kicks into life. I've used my tablet when this happens and I had no issues at all on that. If I'm streaming a movie it can happen as well.

First I thought it was my internet itself - but it happens at work and the number of schools I look after all report the same thing with their suites of Mac's as well (and no proxies in place either) - again completely random it can be fine for a few days and then it occurs again. The guys at work have reinstalled OSX onto it, but there doesn't seem to be a fix for the issue I have and Apple won't return it as the fault can't be replicated.

I've had to cold boot it a few times as well - as some apps just seem to crash and then take over the screen. And I've only installed a MS Remote Access app, Citrix Receiver and Chrome. It's a nicely built machine, but it's become a very expensive thin-terminal for me now (oddly using Citrix and I have never had the internet freeze - only when browsing the web). But I find it too frustrating to use - though more than willing to accept that I'm just used to the way MS does things.

I'm looking for something fairly portable with a lot of power. Something that I can move without too much work and is about as fast as a mid top-end desk top. I just really want to move this between my couch and my bedroom; portability and power usage shouldn't be a concern.

Is there a laptop that can fit the bill? I just want Windows 7, TB HD, 256 or so SSD, 16 or 32gb of ram with a good processor and graphics card. How comparable are mobile i7's to desktop i7's? How good are top end laptop graphics cards? All of the mid range laptops that I've owned have suffered serious decreases in speed and quality after a year or two. Is there something on my side that I could do to prevent this? Macs never seem to have this problem, but they're not an option to me.

More of a curiosity, but is there an option that's not quite a laptop that could fit this bill? I'm thinking something like a mini box/monitor combo that I could move fairly easily.

My current laptop is a 2 year old i5 with 6gb of ram and it really struggles if I want to fire up multiple EQ boxes. I'd love something that could hum along with 4+ boxes open and not break a sweat.

Are there any laptops with native dual monitor functionality? I don't mean having the ability to attach a second montior, but one that actually has two screens mounted to the main laptop?

Sorry for all the random questions, but I'd love to find something with nearly the power of my desktop that has an element of mobility with it.

I believe you want something like this?

I've never heard of dual screens on a laptop, interesting feature for sure. It sounds like you want a desktop replacement with some portability. Might wait for the razer blade pro if youve got a mountain of cash to spare:
Amazon.com: Razer Blade Pro 17 Inch Gaming Laptop: Computers Accessories

Baek_sl said:

I believe you want something like this?

I've never heard of dual screens on a laptop, interesting feature for sure. It sounds like you want a desktop replacement with some portability. Might wait for the razer blade pro if youve got a mountain of cash to spare:
Amazon.com: Razer Blade Pro 17 Inch Gaming Laptop: Computers Accessories

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Haha. That is an excellent reference; one of my favorite episodes. I believe that Homer's car design was supposed to be for the every-man. What I'm looking for would be pretty high end. Not that cost isn't a concern, but spending $3k or more isn't entirely out of the question. I essentially want to get a little mobility and sacrifice a little speed. I don't really care if the end result is expensive, bulky, or a power hog; I just want to be able to fire something up on my couch that doesn't require me moving a power strip worth of cords to assemble.

No, you're not getting two monitors on one box. If you really want that kind of juice you're probably looking at going through someone like Sager or Alienware. They can make you nearly anything you want, including multiple drives, SLI, etc.

Keep in mind though that no matter how much you spend mobile GPUs just will not keep up. The current top of the heap (the 780m) is roughly equal to a 560 TI desktop card (+/- 5-10% depending on game/settings) and they will run you like ~$600 each. So while you can make a laptop run anything out right now relatively well (especially with SLI), in 18 months or so it's going to start dragging, and laptops aren't exactly known for their upgrade options.

Outside laptops you could look in to some of the smaller form factor cases or maybe even HTPC cases. There are a number of relatively small ones available that are designed to be shelf mounted or semi-portable and will still accommodate a full sized gpu.

If all you want is bedroom > living room portability (is that you Sam?!), I say you just build a beast of a PC, rack it in a closet or utility room someplace, mount 2 monitors in each room and feed them with HDMI through the walls! All the power of a real PC, and just take your wireless mouse/kb with you

New Google HP Chromebook 11 charges via Micro-USB(like Android phones)

Google Reveals HP Chromebook 11, A $279 Chrome OS Notebook That Charges Via Micro-USB | TechCrunch

I'm considering selling my Samsung Chromebook and getting this one. Trying to find some benchmark comparisons but it's too new.

Lenovo launching budget Android laptop

Lenovo leaks manual for budget Android laptop by accident | Business Tech - CNET News

Well it's disappointing to see the new Chromebook is exactly the same specs as my old one, I just need a small boost in performance. Does anyone know when the new ones come out with the upgraded CPU?

Any good sub $1000 gaming laptop deals? I'm not really sure what is reliable right now.

That is a hell of a fucking laptop for <$800. I don't even need a laptop and I almost buy it every time I look at it.