Well, the good thing is that, just for my students, the video quality doesn’t have to be something you’d pay good money to go and see. This thread has been very useful in so many ways!
Do you carry a bag / backpack or do you prefer to hand carry? With a backpack a bigger 15" or even 17" notebook is not a big deal to carry. However, if you hand carry, 13" or smaller is the way to go.
How big is the classroom? If it’s larger than a small classroom, you’ll have to rely on an external screen or projector and your screen size won’t matter, so you should go as small and light as possible.
Is this going to be your only computer and do you do anything specialized like Photoshop? If so, I would recommend against an iPad. That said, I did go about a week and a half once with only an iPad, and it was more than workable given the portability.
There are some scenarios that are really nice with the iPad, particularly whiteboarding, document annotation, and ability to pass the device around like it’s a piece of paper. I carry mine all the time in a little felt sleeve. Most of the time people don’t even suspect I have a computer which is great because I don’t mention it unless it’s needed. It has come in particularly handy for coffee table collaboration with up to about 5 or 6 people for looking at sites, whiteboarding ideas, etc.
When do you need to make your decision? If you want, you can mess with my iPad to see if it will work for you.
Wow, what a sweet offer! I don’t actually HAVE to have it until Aug. 1, but I’d like to quite using this one ASAP because it drives me nutts.
I think I may go and visit the school tomorrow and find out about tv or projector options soon. If there’s nothing at all available, I may go with something bigger, but I’m pretty tempted by the smallness and easy carry of the eee things. I just wonder if the keypad will seem awkwardly small for a while? I guess I could get used to it.
Wow, what a sweet offer! I don’t actually HAVE to have it until Aug. 1, but I’d like to quite using this one ASAP because it drives me nutts.
I think I may go and visit the school tomorrow and find out about tv or projector options soon. If there’s nothing at all available, I may go with something bigger, but I’m pretty tempted by the smallness and easy carry of the eee things. I just wonder if the keypad will seem awkwardly small for a while? I guess I could get used to it.[/quote]
I got one of these, I got the extra-long battery, it’s good for like 6 hours, which should be enough for anyone.
The keyboard is a tad bigger than the Asus eee, as is the display (which is of briliant quality, by the way).
I can type forever on it with my great bloody paws, it shouldn’t be too hard for you.
The only things to consider are, it’s a wee bit on the heavy side, you definitely won’t forget you’re carrying it, AND, and this is important to remember, there’s no readable/writable media, so if you need to input/install or output something on a CD, you have to find an external drive connectable by USB, or find a way to get it onto a flash drive.
Wow, what a sweet offer! I don’t actually HAVE to have it until Aug. 1, but I’d like to quite using this one ASAP because it drives me nutts.
I think I may go and visit the school tomorrow and find out about tv or projector options soon. If there’s nothing at all available, I may go with something bigger, but I’m pretty tempted by the smallness and easy carry of the eee things. I just wonder if the keypad will seem awkwardly small for a while? I guess I could get used to it.[/quote]
I got one of these, I got the extra-long battery, it’s good for like 6 hours, which should be enough for anyone.
The keyboard is a tad bigger than the Asus eee, as is the display (which is of briliant quality, by the way).
I can type forever on it with my great bloody paws, it shouldn’t be too hard for you.
The only things to consider are, it’s a wee bit on the heavy side, you definitely won’t forget you’re carrying it, AND, and this is important to remember, there’s no readable/writable media, so if you need to input/install or output something on a CD, you have to find an external drive connectable by USB, or find a way to get it onto a flash drive.[/quote]
That looks nice. 
You can get some really good deal on ViewSonic’s CULV notebooks at the moment, they’re just under 20k and they offer much more functionality than a netbook.
The two models currently on sale is this one viewsonic.com.tw/products/viewbook/pro/ both which seems to be selling for the same price. Both models weigh about 1.45 and 1.6kg respectively, although the second model can be fitted with an optical drive or a secondary battery. The battery life is in all honesty not as good as a netbook, but you should still get some six hours of of them.
For 20k you should get the SU7300 processor, 2GB of RAM or more and a 320GB hard drive.
Have you decided on an optimal screen size yet?
I think the new Dell Inspirons are all right for the price. Take Inspiron 13R, for instance. For $24,800 you get a high-definition 13" laptop with an Intel Core i3 processor (it’s one of the newer processors), 320GB 7200rpm (i.e., “typical” desktop speed instead of 5400rpm, which is slower but more often found in laptops) hard drive, and a graphics card. It does not come with a DVD drive though, so I am not sure if that is a dealbreaker.
Yeah, TheLostSwede us one of those guys I’m scared to talk to in a computer store! hehe. I can’t understand most of his post, but I like the links! Those computers he linked to are beautiful–the fingerprint recognition is particularly impressive. And I have no doubt that they are a STEAL at that price. But I think they are likely much more than I need.
I mean, I don’t want to be made fun of because my computer is so poor, but I don’t want a computer that I’m never going to really use, either.
This is a little like when I went shopping for a cell phone for my mom. I had a very hard time convincing anyone that I WANTED a phone withOUT a camera or video recorder, or any applications. I wanted a phone that was a phone and not much else. Because my mom can barely use it as it is.
I’m not my mom, thank the Good Lord, but I don’t do anything so amazing with my computer that I need fingerprint recognition to keep people from peeking. I think I’m going to go look at the asus eee things today. Thanks guys, I’ll let you know how it goes.
I wonder why “Netbooks” like ASUS eee keep getting mentioned - isn’t one of the reasons why they are so cheap and have such a long battery life the lowly slowly Intel Atom processors (some even still single core) and their chipsets, that these netbooks are mostly built around? That, plus small and often slow hard disks.
I would suggest heeding what TheLostSwede suggests and get “normal” notebook. With your statement above, I really fear a netbook would get on your nerves quite easily.
Anyway, if you want a fast, responsive feeling, these would be the general suggestions (most important first):
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enough RAM (3-4GB - oh, and get a 32bit Windows, with the 64bit versions you still have problems that you can simply avoid with 32bit, even though only with 64bit you can use more than ~3.5GB effectively)
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fast hard disk. If you don’t need too much space (20-40GB?), maybe even a good, newest generation SSD “solid state disk” could be affordable: one of these new, pretty fast “chips only, no moving parts” hard disks can potentially improve user experience a lot
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If the budget permits, try getting one of these processors that turn up the speed when necessary (like loading a program) and possible (like only one of the many cores is necessary for that). Intel Core i5 and Core i7 that would be, or the newest AMD processors with Turbo Core (no laptops with those yet I guess, though - too new)
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keep the operating system tidy. Don’t have thousands of small programs running, even if the manufacturer put them there. Try to disable whatever you don’t need.
If you were looking for a PC I could give you some advice from my business experience which brands and models to go for… unfortunately, for notebooks in my experience everything you buy is risky. Of course buying a “big brand”, and maybe even their “corporate / business” models will give you a slightly higher chance of a trouble-free laptop life… but with today’s engineering mentalities everywhere I ever looked in the notebook business, chances are any notebook you grab will have it’s problems. I just hope you are lucky and happen to chose one where the issues won’t affect you.
Give it a giood try before buying, and insist on one with a “dual core” CPU and enough (> 2 GB) RAM. You know, in computer technology nothing is for free. There IS a reason it is so much cheaper than a “normal” Laptop 
Basically, intel Atom = Pentium 1 processor technology made using less electrical power (think 1993+ computers) and run a little faster
Those gadgets like fingerprint thingy or webcam and whatever are just a few dollars… don’t worry you won’t use them, you won’t have wasted much money. An especially fast graphics chip would be wasted money, though, for example.
Okay, Olm, I’ll look at the computers TheLostSwede suggests, to. Can you tell me a shop to head to that might have both options available? And that might be in Kaohsiung?
Acer makes a line of portable and flexible notebooks which can do everything you need without slowing down and be portable. They come in a variety of sizes so you can choose the one which suits best. For daily use, I’d recommend the 13" model, or, if you need use CD/DVDs on your computer regularly, the 14".
http://www.acer.com/timelinex/eng/
check those out while you’re in the shops!
Sorry, I only would know where to go in Taipei… but is there any area in Kaohsiung known for computer stores? Or just have a first look online, or in a 3C store?
The closest to the “perfect” notebook for your description (eg. no-frills business notebook with fast components and 2-4GB RAM) I could find on Taiwan’s search.buy.yahoo.com.tw would be for example the MSI P600 series, around 25K NT$. But based on what you posted so far I guess you will probably go for a slower, cheaper one
I really wanted to talk myself into a eee but I couldn’t reconcile the screen size, keyboard size, and poor video playback. I found the 13" form factor to have much better optioins. There was one brand that made a 12.1" that was great on screen and keyboard but there was some critical feature that was unavailable that made it a dealbreaker. I ended up getting a Toshiba Satellite T135. It performs very well, I only wish it was a bit smaller and lighter, but that’s the trade off… With that said, now that I have a smartphone, I don’t really see the need for the netbook and carry my laptop much less frequently.
Housecat,
If you are like me and just want something that does what you want without giving you issues, stay away from the MSI. I hate to say that because our friend works for the company, but my notebook has given me nothing but trouble and I have to take it in for the third time in several months. (Wireless not working properly, screen not working, to mention two main issues.)
olm, her budget is pretty tight, hence why I suggested the ViewSonic machines, as they’re quite affordable for what you get.
housecat, not to worry about them being super powerful and being a waste of money, as from what you’ve said you’re going to use your computer for, they’re just right. In fact, they’re actually quite “slow” for a modern notebook, but not netbook slow.
The other option if you want to spend a bit less is to get one of these gohappy.com.tw/shopping/Brow … id=1059345 it’s not as powerful as the ViewSonic’s but it’s better than a netbook, yet doesn’t really cost any more, has almost as as good battery life and is just as light, albeit it’s slightly larger at 11.6-inches, but this also means you can fit more on the screen as it has 1366x768 resolution rather than 1024x600 which is standard for netbooks.
With regards to the comment about which version of Windows to get, just don’t bother looking, as there’s no difference between the 32 and 64-bit versions of Windows 7, except for the drivers and I can’t see you downloading and updating them very often.
@LostSwede: Yep, she will probably be happy with much cheaper stuff, and the ones you pointed out look like good deals. The one item I gave as an example was probably the maximum she could need, if she really, really hates a slow PC
Honestly: You will get that potentially with any brand, any model. With consumer notebooks no brand / company is willing to spend much on good engineering, because people just don’t pay for it. Depending on how good the engineering teams (mechanical, electrical, BIOS, …) of the one model you chose are, and how their mood, how the time of day etc. is, you will get a troublesome or a trouble-free notebook. Oh, and the manufacturing guys can screw it up, too. Royally.
That is why for example companies that need their IT to “simply work” do NOT buy consumer computers, but the stuff made for business / corporate use. You know, the stuff where everyone says “hey but you can get the same specs for half the price” 
Not a 100% change to get good quality, but a much better one as far as I know.
All the MSIs, ASUSes, Acers, HPs, DELLs, Fujitsus, Lenovos, Toshibas and so on will have very varying quality in the consumer product design. One model is good, another a dud. Even same model one piece can be OK, the other piece breaks soon.
Good luck chosing guys & gals - I am happy my current work is not “making sure consumer notebooks are good”, but instead business stuff like Servers People at least are willing to spend money to make sure those thingies run smooth… and the development cycle is long enough to allow for lots of reviews and in-depth testing.
I have had insight into many brands’ (and ODMs’ - that are the guys who actually build the stuff for some brands) design and manufacturing, and this is the base for my above rant
Or unless you want to do stuff like use Firefox smoothly, sync your (WM) phone with your PC (Office10 64bit)… or run some old software you till have or your friend gave you… or… use some existing scanner or printer… or…
Maybe my info is outdated a bit by now (I just read ~50% of Win7 users run64bit according to MS?), I mostly read about it after Win7 launched, and currently only read about issues in rather specialized forums like XDA-Developers etc.
Just out of curiosity (I am not using 64bit Windows, and not interested in it as long as I don’t need more than 3.5GB RAM and keep reading of people having troubles, and solving it by going back to 32bit OS)… is there any reason why a user like housecat should go to the 64bit edition? My thought in recommending the 32bit version was that she probably will not get more than 4GB RAM anyway, and can just simply avoid lots of very small nagging issues, incompatibilities, etc. by getting the 32bit version…
I’m more of a hardware than software guy, so I am very open to being corrected in these software things 
Ok, for the average user, there really is NO difference these days. You can run any 32-bit programs on the 64-bit version of Windows, no problems at all. I haven’t had a single program that hasn’t worked in 64-bit Windows 7 and it’s not like you have a choice when you buy a notebook, it comes with whatever it comes with.
Seriously, this is a none issue at this stage unless you’re running some old pre-Windows XP programs which would be crazy anyhow.
There is a difference. Memory address space is one. 4GB.
32 is basically obsolete and only ships on craptops that won’t ever be updated past 4GB. Run 64-bit. It’s stupid not to in this day and age.