Re: Off-topic: What laptop to buy for my daughter for college?

["Robert Holmgren" holmgren@xxxxxxxx]

** Reply to message from Lisa Kleinholz  on Sun, 15 May
2005 11:13:28 -0700 (PDT)

> My daughter needs a laptop for college.

If she's going to college next autumn, why not wait until then to buy the
notebook? Most colleges offer huge discounts on machines from quality
manufacturers (typically in the 40%-off range -- academic versions of software
are similarly cheap), and they have techies who specialize in those particular
machines, can install whatever security and networking the campus uses, handle
problems quickly, repair hardware, setup the campus wireless stuff, etc.
Students don't need supercomputers. The most important thing is to tell her to
treat the machine with great delicacy -- e.g. when you set it down on a hard
surface, make a soft landing. Notebooks are nowhere near as resilient as
manufacturers lead us to believe.

Mac is an excellent suggestion.

Re Lenovo: they bought the Thinkpad personnel too, so I don't think there's
going to be any radical change. But there are already strong signs that prices
will come down.

Then buy a computer for yourself, using your daughter's student discount. I
got my last Thinkpad with an MSRP of $2600 for $1450, loaded.