Laptop on the road ?

I use a Mac G4 15" Powerbook. has all the bells and whistles, and will be using it starting this week to post files from the field (Yellowstone) to my website and college professor. I also use it to process digital video and have the capability to burn CD's or DVD's in the field.

When I'm home it's attached to an external hard drive and a 21" monitor.

Accessories include bluetooth mouse, keyboard and cell phone.

I'd do it all over again, even though it has been somewhat spendy ... cheaper than a divorce, but not as cheap as a year in college between the costs of the computer and photography equipment.

Perhaps you are talking about the speed step stuff? Basically when the laptop is running on battery it will start to throttle down speeds in order to save battery life.

I rarely use mine on battery power, it's almost always plugged in. But I guess it would depend on how much memory you have, where you are shooting, etc. Once or twice I've brought my laptop with me shooting, well I left it in the car, shot some, went back to the car and copied everything over and then went out again.

Our new laptops will do about 3hrs on a "standard" battery, but that's working on things that aren't CPU intensive and without the DVD drive running (both of which will drop that time down a bit). If you can stand the weight, I'd go with a portable DVD player, it will also do one movie per charge, but at least you'll still have your laptop to do work on.

Andrew

I use a Tosh, Fabulous screen and v fast however it is big and not sturdy. I recently went on a road trip to the US and took a Panasonic Toughbook,

http://www.panasonic.c​om …hbook/learn_mor​e_tb18.asp

Very small, very light and as tough as old boots.

N

Funny, I was just about to say I would not get a Toshiba because they have the worst screens. My last two notebooks were Toshibas and they both work very well, but from what I've seen lately, Sony and HP are leading the way in terms of high resolution, ultra-bright and high contrast LCDs. I don't believe Toshiba offers a screen that has above a 1440x900 resolution which is very low by today's standards. HP offers their new Brightview displays which is available in 1680x1050, and Sony has XBrite which is a razor sharp 1920x1200. I haven't tried either of these outdoors yet, which is where they are supposed to excel, but I've seen photos on them and they are amazing compared to the stanard low res displays that most of the Toshibas and other notebooks seem to have. Maybe Toshiba has a model now where the newer LCD is available, but I haven't seen one yet.

I am writing this on a Toshiba Satellite Pro SP10 with the screen running @ 1920 x 1200.

Cheers

N

I’m amazed by the amount of Toshiba advocates as well. In my experience they’ve been nothing but problematic. Being in the IT field the last two companies have both used IBM Thinkpads exclusively, my present employer having almost a thousand of them in the field. They’re built well, last, and I’ve had a decent to good overall experience with technical support.

My only complaint with Thinkpads is the (IMHO) mediocre video cards they put in them. I personally want something a little more robust with the an eye for 3D, (I admit I like to play games.) but other than that I believe Thinkpads to be solid and reliable performers in a mobile environment.

neil_r wrote:
I am writing this on a Toshiba Satellite Pro SP10 with the screen running @ 1920 x 1200.

Cheers

N

Nice!!! I didn't even know they made that. How to you think that screen compares to the HP Brightview or Sony XBrite (The two models I "thought" I had it narrowed down to until just now).

I can't find the Toshiba Satellite Pro SP10 specifications anywhere. I see a lot of their notebooks support 1920x1440 on the external video connection, but I don't see any that have that high resolution of an LCD. Maybe it's not a US model?

Being totaly honest and non partisan, The Sony XBright pips it, I don't know the HP Product. Tosh is less expensive than Sony in the UK.

http://eu.computers.to​shiba-europe.com …5895&toshibaSho​p=reseller

Cheers

N

Following your link, I cannot find any of their notebooks with 1920x1440 resolution on the LCD, only the external video. The internal LCD on the A40 is listed as 1024x768. I'd be really interested to know if I can get this model here, because I'd rather stick with Toshiba except that I haven't seen this high res LCD you have.

Just rechecked my Laptop,

It is a Toshiba Satellit Pro SP10-804 Model No PSP10E-34FJR-EN, Pentium 4 WiFi and Nvidia G-Force FX. And It is running @ 1920 x 1200 (32bit) on the internal (attached) wide screen. I bought it through my Company on a purchase b4 tax deal.
Not sure if this is significant or not but on the plate with the model number it also states "Toshiba Europe Ltd GMBH"

Hope this helps

N

(P.S. If you can tell me how to do a screen capture I will post it)

I did some searches and it looks like that's a U.K. only model. I can't believe they wouldn't offer at least one model here with that display. I am looking for something exactly like what you have as a desktop replacement at home.