[OPLINTECH] laptops

[Bob Neeper]

My thoughts:
A lot of things to consider when buying a laptop.

What used for, where used (desk, airplane, job site, etc.)
How often, how many hours per day
Who uses and take care of it, who updates & repairs
How easy to access the HD for changing
How critical to be 'up', warranty, cost
Company reputation, warranty repair turn around time
How often an OS upgrade is required as other programs require it
Initial cost
And so forth.

I have had 2 personal/work laptops since 2002.
A very, very, very expensive IBM Thinkpad T30 used for 7 years and still works
A cheap Dell I won at Lucas County Library in 2009 and currently using.

In 2002 I needed a multiuse one for Mettler-Toledo work, library admin and 
personal use.
It had to be durable ( job sites not always office environment) and dependable.
The T30 was rugged. Bought an extra hard drive and carrier to ghost every so 
often and other goodies.
Bought a 2 year warranty extension and later 2 more extensions to 7 years total
Warranty was a good investment as IBM had a problem 'forgetting' half the memory.
Excellent service with quick turnaround from the initial call.

The Dell was a consumer version $399 Inspiron Vista 32bit, Dual Core 2.16GHz, 
3GB ram, WD hard drive.
When the HD failed got an SSD from Chad.
6 years old 4/15/15 and  still adequate, although now will freezes for about 5 
seconds on initial start of Opera or Chrome.
But there are always a lot of other hoggy programs  running such as antivirus, 
Thunderbird both browsers, FreeFileSync.
Right now almost all memory is being used.
As for Vista, only about 5 or 6 BSOD's in 6 years.
No more Mettler use, just library and personal.

So my experience has been,  an expensive  IBM (now Lenova) or a cheap Dell can 
both be good.

Actually. except for the (expected) Western Digital HD failure, no other 
physical problems with the cheap Dell.
The expensive IBM had more physical problems but warranty covered the cost.

But, agreeing with Chad, my next one will probably be more commercial.
SSD, bumped up ram, fast CPU and so forth.

As for the library, we have run of the mill laptops for patron use, which isn't 
much.
When the staff needs one, they just use them.


R. W. (Bob) Neeper
(Retired Toledo Scale Engineer & Computer Guy)

Volunteering at:
Community Library
44 Burrer Dr.
Sunbury, Oh 43074
Tel:  (740)-965-3901

On 5/6/2015 9:10 AM, Tim Burns wrote:
>
> We're getting ready to order some admin staff laptops and was wondering 
> everyone's opinion on comsumer vs. commercial grade laptops.
> …<snip>...
> Is the business commercial grade laptops worth the extra money to get them for 
> a small library system? Comments and thoughts much appreciated.
>
> Fred Miller Jr

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