Vaio VGN-B3VP
Background
The laptop - every nerds essential tool. I had some serious trouble finding a decent laptop last fall when I needed one. I first got a Packard Bell with a 15" screen and a P4 processor, but that was a big mistake, first the USB crapped out on me, then it wouldn't boot anymore. After waiting almost a month to get it fixed I was happy to get it back, but soon realized the USB ports still didn't work properly and a week or so later the screen went dead. I sent it back for repairs and it was gone for over a month, I then called to check when they'd have it done, but they still waited for parts so I marched down to the store from where I had bought it and demanded my money back.To replace it i bought a Advent laptop (some Gigantti's own brand) laptop with a 12" wide screen and a 1.7Ghz Pentium M. The specs seemed awesome and the price was half of that of a similar Dell, I was happy. Until I got home. They had forgotten to put a wlan card in my laptop, i kid you not!
I went back to the store, and they just said it had to have been a typo in the specs, but I demanded a new working one. They were out of them, but promised to order one for me so I'd get it in a week. When I went back next week they had no clue of any order. Furious, I demanded the salesperson to check if any of their other locations had the laptop in stock and it turned out that one not far away indeed had one left. I asked the salesperson if he could reserve it for me so I could drive there and exchange my faulty laptop for it. This task seemed seemed too daunting to him and he just explained to me that he wasn't authorized to do such a thing.
Now, taking matters into my own hands, I called up the store myself to see if they could hold on to the laptop for me until the next day so I could go and get it. They were very helpful and set the laptop aside for me, just made me wonder how I had the proper authorizations to make that happen when the salesperson didn't. I guess he was just lazy.
Anyway. I got my replacement and it had a wlan card in it like the box said and I was happy once again. But as fate would have it my joy wouldn't last for long this time either. The laptop always seemed to bluescreen (yes, I used windows on it) at critical times so I figured I had messed up something earlier when I had restored a restore point. I figured I might as well format the laptop and reistall a clean version of windows and get the partitions set up so I could install linux on it later. During the many failed install tries it finally hit me, the machine was crashing due to overheating, because obviously they couldn't afford a decent fan in a no name laptop. Sigh. Back to square one.
This time I knew I'd have to choose more wisely. I searched around and ended up getting a Sony Vaio VGN-B3VP from verkkokauppa. I have not regretted that decision.
The Laptop
The laptop has a 14.1" screen, not one of those new glary kinds, just a plain non-reflective screen. Plus points from me.
It has a 1,60 GHz Intel® Pentium® M 725 processor which is fast enough for me and the speed scales down nicely to give excellent batterly life.
It initially came with 512 megs of ram, but I slapped in an extra 512 of kingston for some extra breathing space.
It has an integrated display controller, so this won't be a hit for anyone looking to play games on their laptop, but for people needing a laptop for work its great.
Overall I'm very happy with it, I have yet to have any problems with it, which just amazes me after my previous experiences. I'm definately glad I invested the extra cash on a decent laptop instead of trying to find some cheapo laptop that seems too good to be true and ends up being exactly that.
Linux compatibility
This is a huge plus for me. I'll explain in more detail under projects>SuSE on Vaio, but as a short summary this is a good laptop for anyone looking to run linux on their laptop or might be interested to try somtime in the future this is a good choice. Installing SuSE 10.0 from the DVD and doing a system update gets you up and runnning, even the Fn-key combos work. Excellent.Specs
Processor: Intel Pentium M 1.6 GHzRam: 512 MB (DDR SDRAM)
Screen: 14.1 in. XGA TFT LCD 1024 x 768
Preinstalled Operating System: Microsoft Windows XP Professional
Motherboard chipset: Intel 855GME
Harddrive: 60GB IDE
Graphics: Intel 855GME
DVD-drive: DVD±RW -- 24x (CD) • 8x (DVD+R) • 8x (DVD-R)
Ports: 1 x Type I/II PC Card Slot, 1 x Memory Stick Card Slot, Docking Station/Port Replicator, 1 x Memory Stick PRO, 1 x Memory Stick DUO, 2 x USB 2.0, 1 x IEEE 1394a (FireWire), VGA out, RJ-11 (modem), RJ-45 (NIC)
Networking: Integrated 10/100 • Integrated Wireless LAN (ipw2200)
Battery life: 7.9 Hour(s).
The battery life is as always a bit of an overstatement, but I've found it to be very good overall. Using windows I got about 6 hours out of it, Using linux I get about 4-5, which is acceptable for me as I can easily get through a schoolday with one charge.
