Buying a Notebook

Basically, 1.7GHz Pentium-M is more efficient, but not *quite* as powerful as a 3.2GHz P4 - although you will make up for that with battery life.

I would not go for an Alienware, the Sentia is absolutely revolting, and the Area-51m is not a 'notebook' - a portable computer perhaps? Alienware just rip you off, if you really want that area-51m, go for a Sager 5680 or the clevo alternative and kit it out with a whole bunch of extras for the amount you save.

Consider other manufacturers, don't let Alienware swindle your money

RaPTuRe

Who's General Failure and why's he reading my disk?

Ok, well even with two batteries, the area-51m won't give you much over an hour between outlets. On the other hand, my first choice would be the Dell Inspiron 8600. Pentium-M 1.7GHz, 15.4" WUXGA (1920x1200) LCD Panel, ATI Mobility Radeon 9600 Pro 128MB, two batteries, as much RAM as you like and a 7200rpm 60GB Hard Drive.

It will (does) perform like a beaut, and you'll get more than 7hours between recharges. Not to mention, phenomenal performance in games and applications, and the faster HDD will make more of a difference than the Area 51's faster CPU.

RaPTuRe

Who's General Failure and why's he reading my disk?

You don't need to spend that much to get a laptop that does what you want it to do. But if you want the best there is, get an IBM ThinkPad R50p. Here's the link: <A HREF="http://www-132.ibm.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?productId=8672722&storeId=1&langId=-1&catalogId=-840" target="_new">http://www-132.ibm.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?productId=8672722&storeId=1&langId=-1&catalogId=-840</A>. The graphics on the R50p are the ATI 9600 (M10) chip with extra drivers for engineering software.

Trust Me.
Get the Dell Inspiron 8600
I love mine, amazing.
Slightly plasticky, but its Awesome.

Love the Widescreen, 128 MB Radeon is a killer card
7200rpm drive is really fast and quite

hope you make the right decision

cheers



Opel Superboss, now that was a car!

For bang for the buck, you might want to check out the eMachines M6805 at Best Buy or Circuit City. Right now, it's $1549 - $100 eMachines rebate and $150 BB/CC rebate! Plus tax, course.

Here are the stats: AMD 64-M, 512MB RAM, 60GB HD, ATI Radeon 9600 64MB video card, 15.4 widescreen monitor, 7.5 lbs, 6-in-1 media card reader, DVD/CDRW drive, wifiG, etc. Reports on other forums say it screams with video games.

I don't have one yet, but am close to scoring one.

Here are a link you can check out where people are talking about them:

http://forums.amd.com/index.php?showtopic=6266

Here's a link to eMachine's site:

http://www.emachines.com/products/ [...] ines_M6805

bro i would seriously check out WINBOOK.... they make mint laptops... my office has over 3.... for around 4 yrs now not one damn problem.

Prices are mint and they give you nice stuff... very thin also...

i myself like the DELL XPS laptops........ i think of my laptop as a portable DESKTOP........ i don't want a shitty little notebook, i want a small ANIMAL to carry around..lol.......

2800 for a MINT setup.. Dell XPS... 3.4ghz, 1gb mem..lol that's sick for a laptop..it'll probley run faster then my main setup

getting it very shortly.

Asus A7N8X Deluxe
80gb Maxtor
200gb WD 8mb cache..
Lian-Li PC-60
LiteOn 52X/LiteOn 811s DVD-RW
AMD XP2800+
LeadTek GF4Ti4200 128mb
Hitachi CML174
1GB Corsair XMS PC3200