PCA Forums

Prefer AMD64 but I'll listen to Intel stuff as well.

Looking for good value in the $800-1000range. don't 3D game either. HAS to have capability to plug in car lighter. good battery life would be nice. don't need dvdrw, just dvdrom

What's a Centrino by the way? and are their good or bad Intel chips? I know the Celerons suck but what about the others?

dime bag d

centrinos are the intel mobile chips - they are energy efficient and pretty fast - depending on your needs and how much time you have on your hands, some pretty good deals on dell laptops with centrinos (and the celeron version) can be found it just really varies week by week...I have an inspiron 8600 with a 1.5 ghz centrino and a 9600 pro that can do just about anything - you have to check the coupons and the refurn site - there is always a big thread on the dell deals over at anandtech....people were finding some decent ones last week in the 5-600 dollar range

I have a Dell 600m with a 1.6 centino , it's plenty fast , and like wvjohn said , very energy efficient . Battery last a really long time

I Love my Dell Inspiron 5150. Heavier than the 600m but it can be used as a workstation replacement. Monstrous 4 hour battery life.

Avoid Celerons - mobile versions are terribly under-powered. Spend the extra on a P4. Also spend the extra on a 5400 or 7200 RPM drive - do not settle for anything slower.

The 5150 has a decent enough 3D chip that I can play Day of Defeat and Counterstrike on it (all I every play).

big dell coupons coming out for lappies on wednesday...$750 off like last year....sub-$600 lappies! keep an eye out for them!

glad there will be another round of big coupons..that's how i got my 8600..need to replace the one my wife has.....hp k6-2 500 mhz.....starting to show its age ..probably get her a 600m cause it's lite and good battery

Where would one "get" one of these "big coupons"?

Inquiring minds.......etc. :

DBD...you have a PM w/ the info!

Thanks for all the tips and 411.

I bought Billygoat's Dell lappy in the FS/FT forum. Perfect for what I need.

Centrino is actually a combination of the Pentium M, a certain intel chipset, the number escapes me at the moment, and the Intel wireless network component, either the ipw2100 or ipw2200. I would suggest avoinding a P4 if you can afford a Pentium mobile. You may also be able to get an Athlon 64 in a cheap laptop, but your not going to get that from Dell and I can't recomend anyone that puts AMD cpu's in laptops. The reason I didn't really look into the Athlon 64 for my laptop was the fact that I couldn't find anythin with the A64 and a good video card (think nvidia 5600 go or whatever, ATI's linux drivers leave a lot to be desired) under $2,000.

Despite all that I got a Sony Vaio vgn-s360 it does have an ATI video card but its a 9700. It was much cheaper than any of the A64 laptops that had anything better than the VIA graphics. This is also the second Vaio laptop I've owned and so far I have had no problems with either of them. If you can find a cheap Sony that would be my recomendation.