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Teacher Laptop recommendations-Which one should you get?
07/14/07
Christopher Dawson from zdnet wrote a post about teacher laptops. I'm not convinced of the value of such a post; he might as well as written, "Time for some new plumber laptops" since I don't know why a teacher would require anything different from anybody else. I do, however, have some laptop opinions.
First, let's deal with his objections:
I know what I don’t want:
* Glossy screens are the work of the devil. They smudge, glare and otherwise drive me nuts. Business-oriented models tend to have them as options, although they are becoming increasingly common as standard features.
Questionable theology aside, he's right. Unless you're watching a DVD in pitch black, get a matte screen. If my Dell came with one, I would have taken that option.
* 17? screens. I love my giant screen and use it for small presentations, multitasking, etc., and it allows me to have a numeric keypad on my full-sized keyboard. The weight of a 17? laptop, however, is unacceptable for the majority of users, especially since most of us move around the building and take our computers home every night. Besides, 19? LCDs are so cheap now that a second monitor attached to a smaller laptop would be much more useful
I agree for the most part. I couldn't imagine lugging a 17 incher (OK, I could imagine, but it's a figure of speech). I have a 15.4" and am thinking about a 14." It makes a big difference.
* Glossy finishes: we teachers tend to be pretty hard on our equipment. The glossy finishes that companies like HP and Apple think are super spiffy just end up scratched and smudged
This is a dumb consideration. Besides, why would teachers be harder on their equipment than anybody else?
* Eraser head pointing devices. I finally have most of my users convinced that they can use a trackpad instead of a mouse. Eraser heads (at least without the option of a trackpad in addition) would drive them to drink.
This sentence makes no sense. Did they not know the eraser head was there or did they know and not use it? Except for the Lenovo and some tiny notebooks, I didn't know computers still came with those things. And, if a teacher doesn't know how to use a trackpad, I must assume that they're not the sharpest pencil in the box.
* Apples: my users (with about 2 exceptions) would form an angry mob and lynch me.
Many of my Army buddies had Apples and I have to admit, I did occasionally suffer from Mac envy. I can see how forcing somebody to learn a new operating system would upset somebody, however.
OK, whenever somebody asks my advice on laptops, I give them the following:
Unless you play games or edit video, almost any laptop you buy will be fine as long as it has 1GB of memory. Given that, consider the following:
1. You may want the Bluetooth feature especially with everything from phones to PDAs and headphones sporting that technology. With my Dell, I listen to music with my Bluetooth headphones and tether my phone to my laptop to connect to the internet.
2. Cardreaders are nice. Be sure the laptop takes your particular media (secure digital, memory stick, etc.)
3. If you have lots of music or video on your computer, purchase hard drive space accordingly, with 80GB being pretty good.
4. Don't worry too much about processors unless you know what a core or a cache is. Right now, Intel is on top, though.
5. Widescreen is the way to go. Only businesses that don't want their employees watching movies buy 4:3 screens.
6. Make sure the trackpad has the ability to scroll. I love that.
7. Buy a DVD recorder. You'll use it- trust me. Stay away from the expensive HD-DVD or Blu-Ray drives unless you're very rich (notice paypal button on sidebar) or have some special need.
7. If you do play games, MAKE SURE you get a notebook with a discrete graphics card. In other words, the laptops with the best 3D capabilities have a separate part for video processing, usually from nVidia or ATI. It also helps to "experience" the worthless Vista Aero. The worst laptops for video have video built onto the motherboard (integrated video). How will you know? Either ask the most bepimpled guy at Best Buy or look on the front. If it says nothing about video, assume the worst (Intel GMA 3000, 3100, or 3500 are the top integrated video chips right now). If it says ATI or Nvidia something, you're probably in luck.
Except for it being a little thick and the aforementioned glossy screen, I like my Dell.
One of my friends bought this one and liked it:
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