…of computing matters…

Some of you may already know about my computer woes of recent months: My HP Pavilion dv6729ca laptop is dying a slow death with its expired 3 year warranty and and it’s 6th system board seemingly in failure mode. Of course, the dv6000 series is known for system board failures, so I’m sure that nobody is gasping in surprise at this one… To add insult to injury, my Mini 2140 also seems to have started to die a similar death and a bit of reasearch reveals that some of those Minis (the 2133 being the worst) are starting to drop like flies with motherboard failures as well. I’m back because I am now working from a brand-new Dell Studio XPS 16 (1647, specifically), which is absolutely amazing so far.

So, if anyone is looking for a cheap laptop… You know… I might be looking to discard sell an old laptop to someone.

The HP Mini is still hanging around for a bit, but it will be getting an early retirement as well. I am looking at the Dell Vostro 1220, Lenovo ThinkPad x100e and Sony Vaio Y as potential replacements. The ThinkPad Edge 13 and Dell Studio 14 are also contenders, but at 13.3″ in size, they’re a tad bit large… but are much less of a compromise, on the plus side. Which leaves me really unsure of which direction I want to go for my non tank, actually pretty portable machine. Though, the practical/rational choice would be to go with the ultraportable route (NO more netbooks) and pick something like a Vostro 1220, seeing as the Studio XPS is capable of handling anything I can throw at it, has a 5 hour battery life (3.5 under heavy use) and, while heavy comapared to most machines, I am capable of carrying the thing around without much trouble.

I’ll keep you guys posted on whatever I decide to do… I’ll surely make another post on the subject once I get to replace the Mini.

Here they are: out with the old, the Pavilion dv6729ca sitting to the right; in with the new, the Dell Studio XPS 16 on the left.

That’s all for now, I guess…

Cheers,
DBC

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