Levono to Offer Choice: AMD or Intel

[Keith]

Neither do I have them on my personal computers, fully OpenOffice now.
But places I work at and in school, it's still pretty much the
standard fare.

I still use Excel (the only M$ program that has a reason for living,
AFAIAC) but use FrameMaker for documentation. I do use OpenOffice(Linux)
at home.

heh, wrong person to talk to about AV equipment, as long as it makes
decent sound I don't know one from another My SO however have some
fangled plan for a music/movie room in our planned new place with
nothing but a big screen, 6 or 7 speakers (can't keep them straight)
and a couch. I'm more concerned about where the money's coming from
first

You might be a little concerned where your SO is coming from too. ;-)

My Son and his future bought us center and rear speakers, for Christmas.
(Note to self: gotta get the rears hooked up before he comes to visit.)
Nothing special, 27" CRT TV, Pioneer AV amp (black) and LiteOn DVDR
(damn silver!).

Well yes, however that laptop is little on the hairy side and doesn't do
much computation on weekends but makes for a great cushion

Hairy? ...and I thought pink and silver were bad. ;-)

 

[Del Cecchi]

I still use Excel (the only M$ program that has a reason for living,
AFAIAC) but use FrameMaker for documentation. I do use OpenOffice(Linux)
at home.




You might be a little concerned where your SO is coming from too. ;-)

My Son and his future bought us center and rear speakers, for Christmas.
(Note to self: gotta get the rears hooked up before he comes to visit.)
Nothing special, 27" CRT TV, Pioneer AV amp (black) and LiteOn DVDR
(damn silver!).





Hairy? ...and I thought pink and silver were bad. ;-)

I guess that the hairy laptop is a cat or possibly a small dog.

 

[Keith]

Keith wrote:
I guess that the hairy laptop is a cat or possibly a small dog.

I certainly hope L'Angel can do better than a small dog. Though, I do
have a coupla large cats, one was on my laptop for an hour tonight (the
other on the wife's).

 

[The little lost angel]

I guess that the hairy laptop is a cat or possibly a small dog.

lol, not really, that lap top belongs to a positively larger creature.
Although, now that I gave it more thought, in the sense of a "laptop"
being a portable computer that is placed on a lap top, I might
conceivably be considered the laptop in this context

 

[tony]

Don't really like the widescreen thing. Maybe it's good for viewing
movies but for work and school stuff, I tend to find I lack length
rather than breadth even on a normal screen. Maybe I'm just too used
to paper's portrait orientation.

The latest high-end wide-screens eclipse the others in resolution.
WUXGA: 1920 x 1200 pixels. That's not the whole story though. If you have
to scale up your font/icon sizes to keep things from being too small, then
you're just getting a little better quality of display rather than more content.
There should be a standard way of correlating this I think. I use 1600x1200
on my desktop 19" CRT with large fonts (scaled up to 120%) as else
everything is too small to point and click around on IMO. So I think for a
19" CRT, 1280x1024 is probably about all one needs and is optimum (though
non-power users seem to like even larger UI elements). I'd call this the
"usable resolution" or something. I really can't fathom using 1920x1600 on a
17" notebook. What size (actual, physical) would a WinXP menu height be
with standard size fonts (it's exactly 1/4" on my 19"/18" viewable CRT w/large
fonts)?

Tony

 

[tony]

I've heard people say that Thinkpads are the cadillac notebook. Are they?
And what makes them so? (Or what MADE them so, if they're going to
change under Lenovo). I've never used one long enough to determine
whether I like the button mousing device in the keyboard. Is that a key
feature that users like?

Tony

 

[George Macdonald]

I've heard people say that Thinkpads are the cadillac notebook. Are they?
And what makes them so? (Or what MADE them so, if they're going to
change under Lenovo). I've never used one long enough to determine
whether I like the button mousing device in the keyboard. Is that a key
feature that users like?

Yes I believe they are an even higher class than Cadillac in autos - that
saying is kinda passe now given Cadillac's current ranking... maybe Lexus
would be closer. The case is rugged without looking clunky -- as
already noted, tasteful -- the keyboard is in a class of its own as far as
feel, it takes a pounding and stands up and the whole system is reliable.
Toshiba used to be close ~10 years ago but they dropped the ball.

As for the trackpoint and touchpad, I don't think people use them often
enough to like or dislike -- with the mini-mice things, now they are rarely
use by many users -- but they are OK and they work right... no drifting
cursor or spontaneous non-user invoked clicks. It's also nice that they
cover a price range -- approx. $1500. - $3500. -- which fits a wide range
of budgets, without losing the essential usability and robustness.

 

[Keith]

Watch your attributions. I don't think I said that (rather was
being replied to).

The latest high-end wide-screens eclipse the others in resolution.
WUXGA: 1920 x 1200 pixels.

My five-year-old ThinkPad A21p was 15" UGXA (1600x1200) and I loved
it. FOr desk use I normally used the 20" CRT as the second monitor
but on the road I was fine with the built in display. When using
the internal keyboard I sit closer to the display so a the larger
display wasn't needed as much.

The A21p was replaced a few months ago by a T42p (1440x1050) on a
14" display. I don't like the display quite as much as the A21p,
but it's hooked to a 20" LCD display (1600x1200) in dual-display
mode (gotta get one for home . The only problem is there is a
black wall the mouse has to climb, going from the higher resolution
display to the lower.

That's not the whole story though. If you have
to scale up your font/icon sizes to keep things from being too small, then
you're just getting a little better quality of display rather than more content.

....and that's a bad thing? I can configure for more content or
better quality as needed. ...sounds like a winner to me!

There should be a standard way of correlating this I think. I use 1600x1200
on my desktop 19" CRT with large fonts (scaled up to 120%) as else
everything is too small to point and click around on IMO. So I think for a
19" CRT, 1280x1024 is probably about all one needs and is optimum (though
non-power users seem to like even larger UI elements). I'd call this the
"usable resolution" or something.

At home I use 1280x1024 on 19" CRTs. Remember, a 17"CRT is about
the same size as a 15" LCD.

I really can't fathom using 1920x1600 on a 17" notebook.

I had 1600x1200 on my 15" and now 1440x1050 on this 14" notebook.
It's fine.

What size (actual, physical) would a WinXP menu height be with standard size fonts
(it's exactly 1/4" on my 19"/18" viewable CRT w/large fonts)?

Menu height? What are you measuring? Large fonts? I use small
fonts on everything. You gotta be *blind* to need large fonts. ;-)

 

[Keith]

I've heard people say that Thinkpads are the cadillac notebook. Are they?

Nah, they're the Porsche. Cadillacs are for old geezers who wear
suspenders (no Felg, I don't wear suspenders!). ;-)

And what makes them so? (Or what MADE them so,

Built for business.

if they're going to change under Lenovo).

My bet is they will stay at the top. Lenovo already has a lower-end
line to compete with the also-rans. Only IBM could screw up
something like a ThinkPad (iSeries anyone?).

I've never used one long enough to determine
whether I like the button mousing device in the keyboard. Is that a key
feature that users like?

It's OK. I like it better than the touch pad (or whatever it's
called). This T42p has both. I shut the tough pad off (thumbs sit
right where it is and I get spurious mouse movement). OTOH, I
normally use a cordless infrared mouse.

 

[David Kanter]

Del, did you work on the iSeries stuff?

DK

 

[Del Cecchi]

Del, did you work on the iSeries stuff?

DK

Only since it was called System/38. And on System/36 (was in
military for S/34 and S/32).
And also 2501 and 1288 and some others.
Was this supposed to be email?

Why do you ask?

 

[The little lost angel]

Correction, *I* said the next part

I use 1600x1200 on my desktop 19" CRT with large fonts (scaled up to 120%) as else
everything is too small to point and click around on IMO. So I think for a
19" CRT, 1280x1024 is probably about all one needs and is optimum (though
non-power users seem to like even larger UI elements). I'd call this the
"usable resolution" or something. I really can't fathom using 1920x1600 on a
17" notebook. What size (actual, physical) would a WinXP menu height be
with standard size fonts (it's exactly 1/4" on my 19"/18" viewable CRT w/large
fonts)?

Hmm, I'm using 1280x1200 on a 17" LCD. On a 19" CRT, which would be
roughly 20"/21" LCD, at 1600x1200, I think the font sizes might
actually be bigger. 19230x1600 on a 17" LCD would be about 2/3 my
current size, pretty much still readable. Especially given that the
distance between me and my laptop screen is usually half of the
display between me and my home 17".

 

[The little lost angel]

I've heard people say that Thinkpads are the cadillac notebook. Are they?
And what makes them so? (Or what MADE them so, if they're going to
change under Lenovo). I've never used one long enough to determine
whether I like the button mousing device in the keyboard. Is that a key
feature that users like?

The "button mousing device" aka Trackpoint is the first thing I look
for on a laptop. Which is why I started with an IBM and never looked
back since the others either never have it or dropped it by now. It's
impossible to do any fine work on a trackpad and it's a PITA if you
constantly need to navigate cross entire screen.

While a mouse is an alternative, I don't want to do that. I'm
considered small~average size for an Asian so I'm probably the size of
a Caucasian 12yr old or something. Carrying a laptop is already a
burden, small as a mouse might be, I don't need another bulge in my
bag.

 

[tony]

Correction, *I* said the next part


Hmm, I'm using 1280x1200 on a 17" LCD. On a 19" CRT, which would be
roughly 20"/21" LCD, at 1600x1200, I think the font sizes might
actually be bigger. 19230x1600 on a 17" LCD would be about 2/3 my
current size, pretty much still readable.

Especially given that the
distance between me and my laptop screen is usually half of the
display between me and my home 17".

Ah yes, that is key. I forgot about that (I'm not a notebook PC user). So
indeed one can use a higher resolution on a notebook than on the same
size desktop screen. Seems like 1920x1200 would work for me then on
a widescreen notebook. Probably would be too small for a lot of non-power
users though. I'll have to stop by the Dell booth at the mall and check out
the widescreens if they have and WUXGA ones there. The last time I looked
at them I dismissed them as media machines rather than workhorses because
of the lack of vertical resolution.

Tony