OT... new laptop day

[masterbuilt]

I invested in a new Toshiba Satellite laptop with a Quad-Core processor, 4 gigs of RAM, and 640 gig hard drive. That should keep my publishing needs satisfied for a while. My year-old laptop got passed to my wife. Now she can pitch the Compaq and use the DELL and her MacBook Pro. She'll probably have the hard drive full in a month. :}

[Opa John]

Congratulations, Mickey. Sounds great. Don't know how fast your last computer was, but I bought a new computer just a few months ago. Went from 1 gig of ram to 4 gigs. Couldn't believe how much faster it was. And a bigger hard drive than I'll ever need.

 

This new one was about half the cost of my very first computer. It was an IBM, back in '91. It came with DOS 4.0, (no windows), 16 megs of ram and a 45 meg hard drive. Got it for less than $1000! Whoo-Hoo!! Such a deal! I loaded DOS 5 on it, and a compression program called "Stacker" that gave me a virtual hard drive of close to 100 megs!! I was "state of the art"!

 

Oh the times they are a-changin'.

[masterbuilt]

In the early 1990s I had an IBM Thinkpad that was pen-based. It was a laptop with a touch-screen that folded down over the keyboard facing upward and I used the stylus to enter data. I was a technical writer and hard-core techno-weenie at the time. That laptop was a $7000 machine 486-DX/33 with 24 megs of RAM. It had a 340 meg hard drive, too, very advanced for the time. Lots of techs waited a long time to get one of those machines. They were back-ordered for a year. I was one of the lucky guys that got one. Funny, I'd never pay that money today. This new machine was just under $600 out the door.

[Opa John]

I still have an old IBM Think Pad. It's about 15 years old now and still works like a champ. I'm not really sure about the specs on it, but I remember the hard drive is less than 500 megs. It's not worth anything, so I just keep it around for when my main computer gets "huffed" just for email and getting on the forum with. Slower than molasses, but better than nothing in a pinch. The last time I used it I was still using a dial-up modem connection. Not even sure I could use it now since I went with a DSL line some time ago. I was one of those "dial-up hanger ons" for the longest time. I had Juno Patinum as an ISP and was getting it for $5/month. I was "shamed" into getting a DSL line by the rest of the family. (my kids, mostly).

[Samilyn]

 

I invested in a new Toshiba Satellite laptop with a Quad-Core processor, 4 gigs of RAM, and 640 gig hard drive. That should keep my publishing needs satisfied for a while. My year-old laptop got handed passed to my wife. Now she can pitch the Compaq and use the DELL and her MacBook Pro. She'll probably have the hard drive full in a month. :}

 

 

Congrats! Hubby has Toshiba and he loves it. I'm still using my high-mileage-yet-apparently-bulletproof Vaio.

 

As for filling up a HDD, get her a Fantom Drives Green Drive external HDD. A 2 terabyte one is only around $100. I have one to stash my drive-space-hogging movies, music, vids, etc on.

[masterbuilt]

 

Congrats! Hubby has Toshiba and he loves it. I'm still using my high-mileage-yet-apparently-bulletproof Vaio. As for filling up a HDD, get her a Fantom Drives Green Drive external HDD. A 2 terabyte one is only around $100. I have one to stash my drive-space-hogging movies, music, vids, etc on.

 

 

Sami, thanks for the tip on that one. I will look into that drive at the local Micro Center.

[Samilyn]

 

Sami, thanks for the tip on that one. I will look into that drive at the local Micro Center.

 

 

You're quite welcome, m'dear.

 

If your local tech center doesn't have these, you can get 'em online at Amazon or Tiger Direct and a few other places. (I got mine at Tiger)

 

Happy to say, mine is pretty quick on USB - no hangups or issues when watching movies or listening to music - and they come with a eSATA option too, which is screaming fast.