Laptop Advice Please

[Horny_Husband]

Both my desktop and laptop are Dell's...... that's all I will buy now.

It's all I buy and recommend in my computer consulting company....

 

[RhumbRunner13]

Where did you get your file/program to remove McAfee? I have one for Norton that I keep on my thumbdrive.

Since you asked;
http://download.mcafee.com/products/licensed/cust_support_patches/MCPR.exe

It was sent to me by:
Josh Murano
Tier 2 Technical support Mentor
McAfee escalations

Worked well for me!

Rhumb

 

[Horny_Husband]

I just found out that I'm getting a new Dell Laptop from "santa".... very excited, because I adore them.

Them being Santa or Dell or a laptop?

 

[Horny_Husband]

Touchpads do take some getting used to. Thinkpads have an eraser-head mouse in the keyboard that some people find easier, but I hate them

Hate the touchpad. Mine is always screwing me over as I have a lazy wrists and always losing data because something gets highlighted and next key you press it gets deleted. Usually un-do works but sometimes I blaze right though things and never catch it until it's too late.

 

[Horny_Husband]

Since you asked;
http://download.mcafee.com/products/licensed/cust_support_patches/MCPR.exe

It was sent to me by:
Josh Murano
Tier 2 Technical support Mentor
McAfee escalations

Worked well for me!

Rhumb

Thanks a million man!

 

[Horny_Husband]

that little mouse thing in the keyboard is my favorite thing about a Thinkpad.

I can use that much quicker then a regular mouse on a laptop.

It may make a difference if you were always on the desktop computer and them move over to a laptop for some work. Maybe then that eraser head mouse is easier to use?

Hate those too!

 

[Horny_Husband]

that is way to expensive for having not even half of the shit that the other two come with.

Agreed, Bree. The other half of it is too expensive too. That being the software is more expensive to develope AND there is not as much quality software for the MAC as there is for the PC.

 

[Angel]

Some Dells (like mine) have it now too - the patent must have expired. I don't use it - I use an external mouse.

I despise that eraser thing - I didn't realize they'd made it onto other brands. My husband has a pre-lenovo thinkpad that is awesome, but I can't stand that eraserthing, and it drove me nuts when I used it. I would have been pissed if I ended up getting a Dell instead without realizing that thing was there, lol.

 

[hotguy1234]

I despise that eraser thing - I didn't realize they'd made it onto other brands. My husband has a pre-lenovo thinkpad that is awesome, but I can't stand that eraserthing, and it drove me nuts when I used it. I would have been pissed if I ended up getting a Dell instead without realizing that thing was there, lol.

they still give you a regular trackpad so it is not like the eraser is that big of a deal if you don't like it. Just go in the setting and deactive the thing and it will never affect you on any level

 

[The Heretic]

Agreed, Bree. The other half of it is too expensive too. That being the software is more expensive to develope AND there is not as much quality software for the MAC as there is for the PC.

You can get the same main software for the Mac as you can for the PC, Office, most Adobe products, and if you can't, then install Windows on it and run Windows alongside OSX.

For what they are, if you compare a Mac to a similarly configured PC, you will see they cost about the same, sometimes even less. It is just that Apple only makes higher end configured systems.

If you want to see expensive hardware and software, wait until you have to deal with Vista - especially the higher end Vista, not to mention their license terms.

Apple has two OS levels, OSX and OSX server, most people will not need the server product, and OSX only costs about $130 when you upgrade to a new major version (Leopard will be out next year).

Windows is going down the tubes. How many years has it taken for Vista to come out? Five? Six? How many major releases has Apple done since MS announced they were working on Vista? Two, three?

OSX is based on Unix and yet much easier to use/setup than any Linux distro. It has about 5.3% desktop market share and is growing rapidly - all Linux desktop distros are stuck as less than half that and not growing, even though they are free. Windos is slowly losing desktop share, and many people are saying they won't upgrade to Vista. That should say something.

 

[AlecBond]

abcde

 

[Angel]

they still give you a regular trackpad so it is not like the eraser is that big of a deal if you don't like it. Just go in the setting and deactive the thing and it will never affect you on any level

I realize that, as we HAVE ONE IN THE HOUSE. It's my husband's computer, why would I go in and fuck with the settings? He likes it.

It is a big deal to me if MY laptop had one, because the location annoys the shit out of me me when I'm typing.

 

[hotguy1234]

I realize that, as we HAVE ONE IN THE HOUSE. It's my husband's computer, why would I go in and fuck with the settings? He likes it.

It is a big deal to me if MY laptop had one, because the location annoys the shit out of me me when I'm typing.

May get in the way to some people. Overall I love the general design of an IBM keyboard, I find the keys well placed and I have an easier time typing on my Thinkpad then I do with my other laptop. I never even notice that little thing in the keyboard, and it has never caused me to miss a single key stroke.

For that reason I actually like it, because I find it more useful then the track pad, because I never have to reposition a finger on in. You can go to the edge of a trackpad and have to go back to the center again, but with the little eraser thing you just tilt the pad a bit to move the mouse, I like that

 

[hotguy1234]

Apple has two OS levels, OSX and OSX server, most people will not need the server product, and OSX only costs about $130 when you upgrade to a new major version (Leopard will be out next year).

Windows is going down the tubes. How many years has it taken for Vista to come out? Five? Six? How many major releases has Apple done since MS announced they were working on Vista? Two, three?

OSX is based on Unix and yet much easier to use/setup than any Linux distro. It has about 5.3% desktop market share and is growing rapidly - all Linux desktop distros are stuck as less than half that and not growing, even though they are free. Windos is slowly losing desktop share, and many people are saying they won't upgrade to Vista. That should say something.

OS X will never dominate the market, it will likely gain some ground but it will never be 50 % of the market. The reason being that Apple sees their OS as being something that is necessary to sell hardware the actual computers. HP, Dell, Lenovo, Compaq, etc are not planning to go away and stop making computers to sell. The will also not change over to just retagging Apple computers if they won't get a big enough profit margin.

If Vista bombs then the companies would probably look to Linux. ATI and Intel already are releasing vid drivers for Linux and if Wifi drivers become more popular suddenly the only thing holding Linux back is Multimedia support.

I would expect to see a big company make a deal to buy DVD, video rights so they can legally ship a copy of Linux that just works and have it preinstalled for people. It wouldn't take much work if someone really wanted to do this.

And it makes more sense to push Linux over OS X, because with Linux the dealers can still assemble their own computers and make money without giving Apple a hardware cut.

The majority of the market will only be between either Windows or if Linux can steal a slice some day.


OS X is a great product, but Apple learned in the past that they make the most money and have the best product when they control the entire system. They just wouldn't make enough off an Apple Clone computer

 

[The Heretic]

OS X will never dominate the market, it will likely gain some ground but it will never be 50 % of the market.

I don't think I said it would, but I do think that it will increase its market share - maybe to as much as 20% over the next decade or so. Microsoft will lose market share, and unless someone puts as much concerted effort/money and unified vision into a Linux desktop distro as Apple does with OSX, then Linux desktop share will continue to linger. That is the big difference; Linux desktop has no real unified vision or effort, just thousands of geeks doing their own thing. The OS, the kernel, they have a unified vision (for the most part); there is Linus, his team and the comapnies backing them - but not behind the desktop side. A few have tried, like Sun, and improvements have been made, but nothing approaching what Apple has done, and they still are way behind the curve when it comes to peripheral and laptop support (improvements, but still way behind). Apple has a huge advantage here - they only have to support their own hardware.

The reason being that Apple sees their OS as being something that is necessary to sell hardware the actual computers.

that may or may not be true, but their OS is still ahead of Vista, and they don't give it short shrift.

If Vista bombs then the companies would probably look to Linux. ATI and Intel already are releasing vid drivers for Linux and if Wifi drivers become more popular suddenly the only thing holding Linux back is Multimedia support.

I don't think Vista will bomb, it just won't see the kind of acceptance and upgrading the MS wants it to have. Those that absolutely don't have to upgrade probably won't - especially the home user. Me, I'll probably have to eventually upgrade to it at work to support it, but it will just be another platform to support.

On the desktop some companies will play with selling it on very low end computers, but they will still sell Windows.

I would expect to see a big company make a deal to buy DVD, video rights so they can legally ship a copy of Linux that just works and have it preinstalled for people. It wouldn't take much work if someone really wanted to do this.

No, it would take a lot of work - Linspire for example tried to do that. Sun has tried to do it. IBM, Novell (probably the best executed effort out there) have both tried.

And it makes more sense to push Linux over OS X, because with Linux the dealers can still assemble their own computers and make money without giving Apple a hardware cut.

Dealers and companies like Dell get a huge discount on Windows, so I don't think we'll see too much effort until someone really cleans up Linux on the desktop (again, Suse is the best example I've seen lately, but it is still way behind OSX or Windows).

 

[hotguy1234]

I am sure with Apple they willl consider it great success if they get 20 to 25 per cent of the market. With that they will do well since they will be selling both hardware and the OS for that market.



Linux is a bit of a ways off. It really wouldn't take that much work to make Linux good on the desktop, if a large company with deep pockets got pissed at M$ and decided to pump a large sum of money into rapid refinement of the user experience then Linux could get there quickly.

The core OS of Linux is rock solid and stable, similar to OS X. It is just there is not enough continuity and a few small things just don't work out of the box for a non techie right now.

For the most part it is mostly the user refinement, along with some control policy that would approve a Linux brand of devices to tag them for use on a system, and you would suddenly see it as a viable desktop OS quickly.

Pretty much we agree on most things.

If someone is using a laptop for general use there really is nothing wrong with an Apple computer. They are very sexy and well designed machines. I admire many of the things they do.

 

[Horny_Husband]

Good discussion gentlemen. I for one do not think that Apple will ever see the light of day on a 15% market share. They are only at 5 or so now.

I also do not see Vista flunking (especially after using it for the past year as a member of the beta team). It's a nice product. For what I know (and regarding Apple it's not as much as the PC) the Apple OS is NOT light years ahead of Windows. Apple reportedly stole the eye candy from MS after MS announced it. Blah blah blah blah. They complete pure and simple. I will grant them this that they get OS's out the door faster than MS. However, MS re-engineered Vista *twice* before they got it out the door.