Re: [Discuss-gnuradio] Re: notebook computers

[Rick Parrish]

My laptop ramblings ...

My first laptop was a Winbook XL3 that I bought on sale new in 2000. The 
cool feature of this model was the "triple spindle" - CDROM, HDD, and 
LS-120 "superdisk". It was heavy - which is fine - I don't like small 
breezes affecting my typing platform. It worked great ... except for 
small cracks that spread throughout the external case. I sent the unit 
in for repair on the last month of the 12 month warranty. They sent it 
back with new plastic. In the following months, the plastic began to 
crack again. With no warranty to cover what I consider to be a 
manufacturer's defect, I decided to abandon the Winbook brand (which 
BTW, is manufactured by Twinhead). Anyone need spare parts for their XL3 
(like hinges, screen, DVD-ROM or CPU) ?

My current laptop is a now 18 month old Compaq Presario 2100. This model 
does not come with an internal floppy. Of course, so many folks use 
flash drives or some sort of wireless access for exchanging files so 
this wasn't as big an adjustment as I first thought. I did accidentally 
crack the screen - my fault and definitely not covered by warranty. HP's 
website listed a replacement screen for $595. I could purchase a new 
laptop for around $1000 to $1100. Two aftermarket dealers offered to 
sell the same part to me for about $470. Finally, e-bay to the rescue! I 
was the winning bid on an OEM refurbished screen for $170 - including 
shipping.

Note to self: check keyboard deck area for debris before closing laptop!

I don't like booting multiple OSes from the same HDD so I physically 
swap HDDs when I need to boot a different OS. Swapping the HDD on this 
model is slightly easier than the Winbook - about six screws in all. The 
other HDD holds a stale copy of Slackware 9.

The Compaq - which came with Windows XP Home - hit me with a suprise 
when I needed to run Windows 2000 on it. I needed to run a C++ compiler 
suite made by Paradigm for a consulting client (target platform was an 
embedded X86 processor running inside a point of sale terminal). This 
compiler came with a USB dongle. The driver for the USB dongle would 
only work on Windows 2000. When I boot the Presario in Windows 2000 
(using the HDD pulled from the Winbook), I'm stuck with a dimunitive 640 
x 480 x 4 bit color bare VGA screen. The video drivers for this laptop 
(which uses a fairly recent video chipset) only works on Windows XP. The 
project - and my agony - lasted for several months.

Regards,
Rick