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Hey guys-
Had a general question. I'm going back to school and I've been shopping around for a notebook and I've narrowed it down to the M35-S456 (1.7 ghz, 512 mb, 80 gig, 15.4 xbrite, dvdrw) and the IBM T42p (1.7 ghz, 512 mb, 80 gig, 14.1 svga+, dvdrw). These computers are both similarly equiped and are both priced at 2k (The college i go to offers special ibm pricing. Please let me know what you guys think, any input would be greatly appreciated.[]
Majnoon
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I want to preface the reply by saying that I have used TP's since day one (them LX-40's & 770E's
), and the last unit I have in my possession is a now-discontinyed A21 series. I have always found the TP to be solid machines with excellent built, the tech support is generally 1st rate IMHO. When I was in charge of an IT group, I pretty much stuck by IBM for 90% of the time, this was after testing out some Toshiba's, Dell's, and Compaq's over the years, I always felt the slight premium of the TP's was a worthwhile investment and I don't believe any other brand could offer similar high availability in a business environment.
About a few weeks ago I was looking for a replacement laptop for personal use (been using a Compaq 2.4 P4 Evo). I need to have a machine with DVD burner, at least 13" screen, no heavier than 7 lbs, Firewire, decent battery and not over $2k. I need this machine primarily to use during vacation so that I can review the pictures I take and burn them to DVD - I shoot with a EOS 1D/2 & a 1Ds, so the images can fill up those 4G MD's in a hurry. Furthermore, I also want to burn the mini-DV footage to DVD. Note that I am not doing any editing, just review & burn.
I looked at the Fujitsu and the DVD burner is not +/-, and the configuartion readily available at the stores use 2x256 memory, so to get the machine to 1G, I would end up "wasting" the 2 sticks (I know I could order the correct configuration from Portable One). Then I tried to price the T42p and it was over what I intended to pay even after appplying the various discounts. Then I saw the M35-S456, ok, 512 using 1 slot, DVD +/-, 80G drive (even though it's not a fast drive), excellent screen, etc. It is not a bad compromise in the end.
Granted the build quality of the Toshiba is not as good as the Fujitsu and certainly below that of the the IBM (especially the platic insert across the top of the keyboard), and it's made in China rather than Japan or Mexico (if that matters), I am quite satisfied with this unit so far, performance is decent for what it is, the only thing I wished it had was built-in IR & BT so I can sync my iPaq or Treo600 w/o using the cables.
Paid $1,869 at Fry's, spent another $100 or so for a 512 stick from Crucial, and just decided to get the 3 year extended service with Accidental damage for $199. The ONLY downside for me at this point is the wider screen is hard to fit the unit into my existing camera/notebook backpack.
BTW, I notice the fan on the M35 is on quite often and that appears to be normal by most account.
Toshiba Satellite M35-S456 vs. T42p
Discussion in 'Toshiba' started by Majnoon, Aug 3, 2004.
