Anyone recommend a very portable laptop?

iwb

I am trying to spec a new laptop for a friend. He has a budget of €2k. It must be very portable but hopefully with the optical drive built in. It seems that all the Sonys of this description are over the budget. I was warned away from Acer which have great value for money. Apparently they don't have good tech support.
He isn't a power user, so he would probably scrape by with a Centrino running a 1.1GHz processor or above. 40GB hard drive, 512MB ram. Perferably with bluetooth built in also.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

maxheadroom

Have a look at this thread :http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=202422

I decided to go for the Sony, am now waiting on delivery. The samsung x05 might be just the thing for your mate (roughly €1,780 plus delivery from dabs / insight etc). Pentium M 725 (1.6Ghz), DVD±RW, 512MB ram, 60GB HDD, 14.1" XGA screen. Weight 2kg. No bluetooth, but you could buy a usb dongle?

iwb

Thanks for the link and info. Which Sony did you go for and how much was it?

uberwolf

apple powerbook 12" - or would that be too much of a paradigm shift or even the brand new iBooks

Scruff

what ever you do dont get a dell inspiron 9100. i got one at work, and its not so much a brick as a slab. if i'd paid attention to the dimensions instead of just the spec i might have gone for something different but it'll be able to play half life 2

maxheadroom

iwb wrote:

Thanks for the link and info. Which Sony did you go for and how much was it?

Vaio VGN-S2XP. Roughly €2400 fom the UK. The specs are linked from the other thread. If you try to buy it here it'll cost €2799 :rolleyes:

iwb

This Gent isn't too computer savvy so I don't think more confusion would suit him. Unfortunately all the world is PC, including his home unit and others in the office, so although it is probably a superior solution overall, it is probably too much of a paradigm shift.

iwb

That Sony looks incredible but unfortunately is a bit too expensive. Around 2k is the limit.

cousin_borat

Dell D400
it's one of the few decent laptops available from Dell, nice small machine

sceptre

Scruff wrote:

what ever you do dont get a dell inspiron 9100. i got one at work, and its not so much a brick as a slab.

What is it, 4 kilos without the screen or something?

I'd love an X300 myself in under a year but I doubt budget will stretch to it. Ad it doesn't have the optical drive built in so it probably wouldn't suit iwb's friend. Probably D400 for me then (it's only 400-odd grammes heavier). Or Samsung have some nice light machines.

maxheadroom

sceptre wrote:

What is it, 4 kilos without the screen or something?

I'd love an X300 myself in under a year but I doubt budget will stretch to it. Ad it doesn't have the optical drive built in so it probably wouldn't suit iwb's friend. Probably D400 for me then (it's only 400-odd grammes heavier). Or Samsung have some nice light machines.

`

AFAIK, Dell X300 = Samsung Q25

The D400 doesn't have an optical drive built in, and is quite expensive for what you get. The Samsung X05 is a fantastic deal once you don't mind intel integrated graphics

sceptre

maxheadroom wrote:

AFAIK, Dell X300 = Samsung Q25

I believe you're right with the model number there. The X300 is definitely a rebadged Samsung.

Cassiel

Toshiba Portege. Optical drive not built in but its a shade over 1kg and has an A4 size footprint-ish
http://www.laptopshop.co.uk/toshiba-portege_r100_213m5-laptop-2-n2.htm

pencil

I Just got an ACEr 2023WMLI from www.elara.ie cost 1550euro.

I have it a week & so far I'm very happy with it - it is VERY portable and has everything you would need as standard. All around a very nice laptop.

[font size="1"]My one issue with is that I'm having probles flashing the DVD play to multi-region. There is no fireware upgrade - if I can't get it up a fireware upgrade I am going to be very p!ssed of as half my DVD collect is from the US. If this isn't flashable - I'm going to become very anti ACER & will warn everyone away from them - to be continued.[/font]