Laptop Definition and 284 Threads

I'm hoping to study mechanical engineering in the fall. Does anyone have recommendations as to what specs for a laptop I need minimum, and recommended? I know I could never afford anything that runs CAD programmes, so is there any other reason I should need a high spec laptop? (I've been looking...

Should I get a MAC or Windows laptop? Why is it that so many academics use MACs? Or what is it that makes MACs superior to a Windows notebook? Couldn't you just get a MAC and dual boot with Windows? Could you do the same with Windows?

I'm wondering what some of you think, say you're doing an Engineering degree or something related, or anything else for that matter...and you have other siblings who also go to university while there is only one computer in the house, would having a personal laptop or computer for yourself be...

Hello, I want to hook my laptop up so it can run through a different moniter/keyboard/mouse. Can that be achieved using a laptop docking station? Or is a docking station just ment to have a separate keyboard, but still use the laptop screen? I hope I am clear about what I am after here...

Just a couple of weeks ago, my laptop started making a very loud roaring noise and experienced a severe slowdown in performance (programs and windows open very slowly) at the same time. It takes a couple minutes after booting up for the noise to begin, but once it starts it is continuous. At...

http://www.nextenergynews.com/news1/next-energy-news-betavoltaic-10.1.html I cam across this article. It is horribly written from a scientific standpoint and lacks some necessary information on how the device works. But the basics are... Tritium is the beta source, porous silicon matrix...

10 days ago I bought a brand new HP note book (HP 530 notebook core duo processor) and I'm still unable to install Windows XP SP2 on its hard disk. I know that I bought the cheapest HP notebook with core duo processor, but didn’t expect to not work. When I try to install Windows XP I always...

I hope somebody can help me understand what is going wrong. I have a Gateway laptop with an ac power supply rated for up to 4.7 amps. I have an inverter rated for 4500 watts and 4.2 amps that I bought from Sam’s Club. It was made by Black and Decker. When I plug my laptop into the inverter I pop...

The touchpad on my HP laptop is totally nonfunctional and I have to use an external mouse which is very inconvenient. I was just wondering if somebody could direct me to a helpful site explaining how to do such a thing. Also, I would like to add a dedicated video card to this laptop since it...

Hey everyone, I really need some help now with choosing a laptop for the upcoming school year. This fall I will be a Computer Science student, and so it's important I choose a computer that will be most "appropriate." The problem is, I'm being told different things by different people...

Hello, I will be attending university next year to study engineering and I need a laptop that will help me in my studies. I just have a few questions about what type to get because I have no idea and I thought the professional engineers or students still studying engineering could help provide...

Hi alls Just last week, my laptop Dell C400's battery was down. The battery led blinks all the time. I do not want to buy a new one right now, may be after several months, I will buy a new laptop because this one is rather old (3 years or so). Of course I can use the pc with its adapter on...

Hi, whenever i play sound using the laptop speakers i get a buzzing noise which gets louder with louder sounds. It sounds like a motor (but i couldn't hear anything loose rattling about) anyway when i plugged in some speakers the sound was fine and when i took them out the buzzing was still...

I never bought one, or had one.So I know nothing about what's good and how much it cost. I need to buy one, not now, but soon(in a month or 2).Don't care a lot of much expect for I want the Disk to be more then 120Gb, and more then 1Gb of ram.As for The rest of the features, well I don't care...

Hi people, I am totally crap with computers and I have tried numerous times to install a LaTeX program onto my computer and each time it doesn't seem to work, for whatever reason. There always seems to be extra files to download and I am totally lost as to what I actually need. Could...

Yeah yeah yeah -- don't give me the ol' go to Linux -- this isn't my personal computer! Anyway... I am looking at laptops for someone at work, and I am noticing the standard sites have many laptops still offer XP as the OS. Is there a reason for this, and should I be pushing harder for...

hi, the attached image is from the back of my laptop. i'm trying to figure out how much watts it consumes per hour. i know that power is current multiplied by volts. so its 90.09 watts = 4.62 amps * 19.5 volts. is this the watts per hour? thanks, mark

1.) Let's say you have some sort of sensor, say, a light sensor that can be connected to a circuit. How do you get a typical laptop to read this information? Would you just hook up some device to the circuit that changes voltages to numerical data and transmits this to your computer via...

I am planning on purchasing a new laptop. Now that I'm in grad school for engineering, I need something with very high processing speeds and good graphics. The programs I plan to run are: ProE, Fluent, NASTRAN/PATRAN (finite element), a Robotics simulation program, CAD, Inventor 11, MATLAB...

Ok, I already have a laptop, but I want a smaller one. The one I have is a Dell Inspirion with a 14.1 inch screen. I'm looking for one that's like 13.3 or even better one that is 12.1 inches. I want a small laptop. The weight of my laptop is just too much. It hovers close to 7 pounds. I...

My laptop recently killed itself. A friend of a friend installed a new hard drive, but I'm having problems. It seems that some of the programs that originally came with the computer aren't installed and apparently I need them for other things to work properly, like video stuff so my scrolling...

im building a computer and i wanted to improve the processing power, besides using a dual core processor, how could i put several processors in a computer. could i have for example 4 outlets for processors on the motherboard and only use 2 or 3 and i have a laptop that can only take 256mb...

I need a laptop Criteria: Thin and light as possible (<= 1" thick, < 4 lbs) NO need for optical drive (i don't want the option where you could remove an optical drive, i need a laptop where they take into consideration not putting an optical drive in its design which I think makes for a...

I need to get a laptop in addition to my desktop computer for doing presentations/demos and general academic use--carrying it around all day every day in a backpack while cycling/walking a few miles. I'm still undecided. I am torn between a model from Sony's TX series--unfortunately I do not...

I want to get a laptop, and that's what you're going to help me with. :-p First, I'm not interested in used laptops merely because I like warranties, and the computer shops around here have some (short warranties) but I doubt they would back them up. So, in the end, you lose if something...

Did anyone have a Laptop and acutally use it while studying EE? Maybe you had a laptop because you thought you needed it or maybe you had some money and bought it, although you didn't need it. Please, could you tell me is it needed or worthwhile to have a Laptop while being a student in EE...

Hi, I am trying a choose a good laptop to buy. But I am having a problem choosing the right processor. I have seen a couple of names like Athlon 64, Athlon XP, Pentium 4M, Pentium M, Turino, Celeron, Sempron etc. I don't know much about processors, so I have no idea which one of these are...

I need to clean my laptop screen but I am not sure what to use. Any recommendations? thanks.

I am having trouble w/my laptop. When I put in a cd & try to open it the message comes up saying that the d drive is inaccessable & not ready. I have turned off the computer & tried everything I know & nothing helps. Any suggestions? Thank you.

My laptop is having serious issues. Audio is skipping (more depending on what I am running) and it is taking longer to load things and to start up (an excessive time to start up). I had this problem before and did I system restart, and that fixed it. A day or so later the problem returned...

Hello, My dvd player just bombed out on me and I am deciding whether or not to buy a new dvd player or to set up my laptop to be able to play dvds on my tv. I have a Sony KD32FS130 32" FD Trinitron WEGA Television for your reference. The problem is that my dell notebook only has...

uhh, i am in need of some major help right now. what kind of processor should i be looking for on my laptop? should i be looking at pentium M's or centrin duo/solo? please share your experiences it needs to be fast AND have longer battery life. PLEASE HELP!

"Universal" laptop power supply? My father had an extra laptop lying around that despite being old and having had it's monitor separate from it's chassis was in perfect working order. Or such was the case several months ago - I dusted it off today and it refused to start. I got out my...

I want a cheap laptop to collect data with. Cheap like, $500.00 or less. Has anyone bought a computer from Ebay? Is it worth the risk? Does anyone want to sell me their laptop, or give me it for free? :biggrin:

Hopefully I'll be getting a laptop for my 18th (v. soon!) and I need advice! I've been looking at macbooks and they're so pretty...but how difficult would it be to switch from microsoft to OSX in terms of learning to use it? Can anyone advise me as to which would be the best for a student...

I've recently purchased a laptop from ebay, it's in pretty good condition and runs great. However, I think that it's 2002 model and was wondering on how long will it continue to function without giving me any problems? Should I try to resell it, or is it worth the keep?

I've recently purchased a laptop from ebay, it's in pretty good condition and runs great. However, I think that it's 2002 model and was wondering on how long will it continue to function without giving me any problems? Should I try to resell it, or is it worth the keep?

Hello. I'm in the market for a new laptop for university. Games aren't really a top priority, and I'm mainly interested in a well built machine that will handle word processing, web surfing, instant messenging, movies, music, and so on for about 4.5 years. In addition, I'll be taking...

Anyone know of a way of quietening the keys on a laptop? When I type on my Dell 4150, each key sort of rattles. It attracts the attention of people nearby. This is not a software "beep" - I am talking about the physical rattling of the keypess. Yesyesyes, I'll head off the obvious answers...

I'm a high school senior and I'm going to be going off for college. My problem is, I'm not sure what type of laptop I want to purchase for college. I thought of no better place to ask than here (where the computer geniouses linger.) I ask all of you because I, personally, can't see through...

i am looking for a laptop computer for college. i am majoring in space physics at embry-riddle.now concidering it must also be economical. i thought i'd ask the ones who would know, you. which one should i get?

Hey, I need some help in picking a new laptop. I am an aero major, so I will be doing MATLAB, some Python, solidworks, excel, that sort of thing. and music, lots of music! I am currently between the dell inspiron 6000 and the hypersonic aviator MX6. I am not sure which to choose...

Well I recently just tore apart an old laptop and salvaged the monitor (still good) Now I am pretty sure it is nearly impossible (for me right now) to turn it into a useful desktop monitor but does anyone know of any other cool projects/ideas to do with it? thanks

Well it is second hand from E Bay, It is so cool being able to sit by the fire and be on the internet, It is a Dell Latitude and cost me 103 quid, not sure if that is good or not but it was the cheapest i could find.

My laptop doesn't have a windows key? What's going on here! Is there some sort of reason IBM doesn't have a windows key? I was tryen to use the start menu and I keep clicking and I'm all "is it freezing up already?" and then i realized i was hitting the Ctrl button and that...

Is it better to leave the laptop closed up when I'm done using it or to leave it on and open?

http://www-131.ibm.com/content/home/store_LNV_PublicUSA/en_US/sale/sale_SOTS05_t43.html They got a sale going :) I want a t43 I guess :) The one thing I'm wondering though is it if will allow me to hook up to my tv to watch movies from my laptop. I'm also confused as to why its 5.12lb but...

my laptop fell on its power inlet with the charger plug in it and I think that something might have been broken. whatever is supposed to be at the back of the inlet, or at the end of the charger is what i think broke. My assumption is that it is the ground pin. how should I go about fixing this...

So i need a laptop! buuuuuut i don't know what kind i should get (or more realistically, ask for for christmas :P). Since I am going ot ask for it as a christmas gift (something odd about your parents asking for a christmas list when you're practically allowed to buy alchohol...), I don't want...

5-10 GHz Clockspeed processor (Possibly IBM cell) (possible 2 proscessors) 4-10 GB Ram 1-2 TeraByte Hard Drive Space Double layer Blue Ray writer High Definition TV in (coax,rca,s-video,component,fiber audio) Two TV Outs simultatiniously (same formats as video in) Tablet Wi Fi (SUPER...