Well, it has been 4 years (Exactly!) now since my last new laptop, and it was about time for a change!
So what laptop did I end up getting? A pretty darn good one. I was looking with my father at the various laptops we could find at stores. We were on some sort of budget, so looking at some higher end laptops online was not really an option, and buying it locally for my birthday seemed the most sense. We found this at Staples.
An HP Pavilion dv7 laptop. Once I saw this thing I knew that was what I would want to have for perhaps the next 4-8 years of my life.
This thing is pretty darn good. 17.3 inch wide screen, Intel i7 Core processor (Quad-Core, 8 threads @ 2.00 GHz), 750 GB Hard drive, 6GB RAM. 4 USB ports, two per side, full size keyboard, large touchpad, a fingerprint scanner, HD webcam, Blu-Ray drive. This thing is pretty good! It was actually over my father’s budget, but I helped him a little with my money, so it is all good! I do hate the fact that most laptops have their Function (F Keys) only available by holding down the Fn key before hitting one of them. Otherwise they do things like change brightness, music controls, volume, etc. I believe there is a program though that can toggle them.
More details about the processor can be found at http://ark.intel.com/products/52219/Intel-Core-i7-2630QM-Processor-(6M-Cache-2_00-GHz)
I am pleased with its performance and definitely will not mind it. It comes with pretty loud speakers too from Beats Audio. Overall, I would rate the laptop 4.5/5.0. For about $800. Never imagined money could buy this kind of computer power. But we get more and more as time goes on!
750GB? I will Never run out of hard drive space. I think my entire life I have used about 80-100GB worth of data, programs, music, videos, etc. Now I have way too much space!
This is definitely an upgrade, and a wonderful birthday gift! (Birthday’s on January 31st, in case you are curious.)
The Windows Experience Index was very high too. I remember my old laptop having the lowest score at 2.9 and the highest at 3.8.
Funny thing though, we got this laptop at a $75.00 markdown because they sold out, but my father really knew I wanted it. They gave him the one that they used on display, cleaning it up and everything of course. Staples, pretty good store for many things.
As you may know, I was doing a lot with Linux lately. I plan to stick with Windows for now. I have used it before, and I can use it again. You have to admit, Windows is definitely better since Windows 7. Don’t fret though! My server remains on Ubuntu along with my old laptop. I even have my oldest laptop with a dual boot Ubuntu/Windows XP mix.
I will still be doing lots of programming, in fact, by going back to Windows my live streams will be as prevalent as ever! Glad to be on such a powerful computer for once in my life, I can say I am very satisfied for now. I got most of my productivity programs (I did not forget them!) and I am ready to go!
