Laptop compatability (US and Europe)

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Hi,
i'm getting a laptop when i'm in the US in a few days and just wanted to check were there any compatibility issues i need to worry about when i bring it back to ireland.
I'm most concerned about the DVD/CD drive.
Are they not US version DVD/cd rom drives in the states which means they won't play PAL version. Is there some way around this???
Any other info would be helpfull also.
thanks
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sceptre

A notebook (or desktop) DVD drive doesn't know anything about PAL or NTSC. Doesn't know and doesn't care.

It does know about region encoding though and does care about that. Ditto Windows. If you flash your drive firmware you may be able to make it region free but even if you don't do that you've up to five changes before anything locks on you.

The only thing you should be concerned about is the power adaptor. The ntoebook itself uses whatever voltage (19, 24, whatever) but the on a US laptop the adaptor will be expecting 110V rather than the 220 we use here. You'll need to get a US to UK converter or a European (UK/Ireland really due to the different plug) adaptor instead. You don't need to be concerned about anything else.

Tom Dunne

sceptre wrote:

The only thing you should be concerned about is the power adaptor. The ntoebook itself uses whatever voltage (19, 24, whatever) but the on a US laptop the adaptor will be expecting 110V rather than the 220 we use here. You'll need to get a US to UK converter or a European (UK/Ireland really due to the different plug) adaptor instead.

Actually Sceptre, this shouldn't really be an issue either. If it is a new laptop, it would be quite unusual for it not to come without a dual voltage power supply. What this means is that all you have to do is change the plug, much cheaper/easier than a power convertor.

To make sure, check the "brick" part of the power supply. It should have written on it somewhere details on the power - look for "input: 110-220V" or something along those lines.

I doubt you'll have any problems. I have a Compaq SLT/286 laptop, made in 1989, and even that has a universal mains transformer, it clearly states 120-240V, 50/60Hz.

Just for the laugh:
Its a 12MHz 80286, 1.6MB RAM, 42MB hard disk, 256kb graphics, 2400bps modem, b/w LCD, MS-DOS 4.01/Windows 3.00a.
Still working perfectly, even the battery works! I'm not using it as my main lappy though, lol.

sceptre

tom dunne wrote:

Actually Sceptre, this shouldn't really be an issue either. If it is a new laptop, it would be quite unusual for it not to come without a dual voltage power supply.

Ah, glad to be corrected tom. Looking at my own laptop, it's the same as you've mentioned (blind boy here never noticed).

Capt'n Midnight

Key board is different, can be annoying if you swap between machines a lot , little stickers on the few different keys or get used to it - or get an external keyboard.

Gilgamesh

also you will probably have problems with warranty issues.
Alot of companies have 'International Warranty' written on the laptops, but this means if there is a problem, and they don't have compatible parts for the US models in the EU, they will ship your laptop to the US to be repaired, which can take forever and a day, but other than that, I think that everything was mentioned.
about the Keyboard thing, it will only bother you if you don't touch Type.

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Thanks for the help chaps..... much apperciated.
Not sure i understand the following though????

"A notebook (or desktop) DVD drive doesn't know anything about PAL or NTSC. Doesn't know and doesn't care.

It does know about region encoding though and does care about that. Ditto Windows. If you flash your drive firmware you may be able to make it region free but even if you don't do that you've up to five changes before anything locks on you."
What do you mean by 5 changes???


One more thing, is there any laptop in particular i should hold in preferance to others. Planning on getting an Dell Inspiron 8600 ...fully loaded as it seems to be great value, but am kinda wondering should i go for something a bit more reputable eg sony Vaio??? Basically this is my first laptop and i'm getting the impression that Dells are a bit iffy??

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Tom Dunne

subbed wrote:

Thanks for the help chaps..... much apperciated.
Not sure i understand the following though????

"A notebook (or desktop) DVD drive doesn't know anything about PAL or NTSC. Doesn't know and doesn't care.

It does know about region encoding though and does care about that.

If you think about it, a DVD drive is just that - a disk drive to a PC or laptop. It reads data from it in binary 1's and 0's. It's the software running under Windows that decides what to do with the 1's and 0's. The software pulls the data off the DVD and throws it onto the display. Have you ever heard of a PC or laptop screen that is NTSC or PAL? No. PAL and NTSC refer to the TV standard, they are not really a concern when buying a laptop.

I think you may be confusing the region coding and the TV standard. Region coding is set by the DVD disc manufacturer so the US discs can't be played in a European DVD player. It is generally a different kettle of fish to PAL/NTSC. As Sceptre said, you can actually switch between your laptop DVD drive playing US or European discs up to 5 times, I believe there are hacks out there that can remove this limitation.

Bottom line is, I am typing this on a US purchased laptop and I have no problems with either playing DVD's or using the laptop on my European TV (though I had some minor trouble with the S-video out - do a search, lots of posts). Laptops were made to travel, so they are very compatible with a lot of worldwide TV/DVD standards.

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sound man tom.

themole

one thign you may lookinto is getting an extended warranty.

i got a toshiba from the us and paid and extra $200, to extend the 1 year US warranty to a 3 year international warranty. worth the money, considering the mother board costs around 500, plus fitting.

a laptop is one of those fair cases where an extended warranty may actually be worth it.

dawballz

Just to back up what was said earlier, I bought an acer ferrari from the states before xmas and it works perfectly. All you have to do is get an adapter for the plug which is 2 pin(it cost me 8 euro). You could also just cut off the end of the 2pin american one and attatch an irish plug to it.
Also about the keys, since I have my keyb set up to irish(or british?) some o the keys are a bit messed.. e.g I have no backslash key. I just have to use charmap whenever i want it. Also I cannot find the hash key. Otherwise thelaptop is running fine.
I flashed my firmware to try make it region free but it didn't work and had to revert back to SLAVE firmware, but it doesn`t cause me any problems now
(except that it's not region free)