replace a lap top

[Zoe Girl]

okay what is a great way to choose something to replace a laptop, including if i am going to pay monthly fees for access or just have a way to check into the free wi-fi systems, or what! i don't play games just the web sites, writing and reading basically but as you can see by my lack of appropriate capital letters this one needs to be replaced! it is all so much to evaluate right now

[razz]

Get a refurbished Macbook I just had a problem with the Safari (used to access the internet) stopping completely on my Macbook. I used my refurbished iPhone and got the Apple chat line and solved the problem caused by an extension on my Kaspersky antivirus. Love !!

[SteveinMN]

I favor Apple as well but you really should let your usage dictate what you buy.

If you've already bought into an "ecosystem" (Apple, Windows, Android, etc.), you might want to stick with an updated version of that rather than stand the learning curve/incompatibilities of something different and rather than possibly have to buy new apps to replace the ones you have. (This might be necessary anyway, though, based on how old your current system is.)

If you're mostly consuming information (i.e., not writing pages and pages), a tablet might be the way to go. There are wireless external keyboards available for them if you find you're typing more than is comfortable on the glass/virtual keyboard. If you go tablet, the choices really are iPad or Android. I'd recommend sticking with a reputable brand, not some here-today-gone-tomorrow brand you've never heard of, and I especially would recommend getting your hands on one first to see if it works for you. Cheap tablets, in particular, are cheap partly because the screens are not very good and they use older, slower processors. Buying one of those (and sticking it in a drawer because you don't like using it) is false savings.

My wife is on her second iPad (her mom has her first); we bought it as a replacement for her ancient MacBook. She loves it -- much more portable than her laptop and the battery goes an entire day or longer (not the case with the laptop). She can check work email and really hasn't found much she can't do with her iPad that she used to do with her MacBook.

Tablets and laptops/desktops all access the Internet and most software-as-a-service (e.g., Mint, Hulu, etc.) the same way, so that price really should not change for you. The only consideration up front is if you know you'll want cellular data. It adds to the up-front cost of the device, but it's a simpler solution (and sometimes cheaper) than adding a mobile hotspot afterward.

[ToomuchStuff]

Why don't you have capital letters?
Is the shift key broken?
Is the caps lock key broken?
Does it not have any USB ports, that you could plug in a cheap keyboard and use?
How do you access the Internet now?

[Zoe Girl]

i already have a plug in keyboard, i had dropped some tea on the original keyboard and now the external keyboard also has issues. i can get a capital i or t if i do caps lock and then the letter, and then turn it off. when i desperately need to send a work email on this then i can at least do that. the thing is slow, drops connections, randomly switches from browser to browser. and most annoyingly sometimes plays the one album i have on i-tunes when i am watching a serious ted talk or important training video. so the thing is on the last stretch and that is okay,

i have home internet and then when i could still unplug it for over an hour i would use wi fi out at coffee shops. that is really all i need, i see some cool tablets through my cell phone service but i am not sure exactly how those work. i do type things so i would need a keyboard for part of the time but it would be soooo nice to bring my meditation group talks on a device and just prop it up and read it. i could easily reference all the other documents i use. i collect email addresses so i could just have people type it into the mail chimp program directly and i would be ready to go.

i am getting my new work laptop tomorrow, i assume it is just about the same as my current yet falling apart dell laptop. i have an android personal phone and a work i-phone. So i have a little of everything which makes it harder to choose.

[ToomuchStuff]

If you need a keyboard, I recommend you stay away from a tablet. Most of the keyboards I have seen for them are chintzy and the tablets don't have the storage space or memory of a regular computer.
A chromebook, will have similar storage to a tablet, but have a keyboard and be setup to have a storage account online (but no direct internet access).
Your computer could probably be software fixed and either one or both keyboards replaced, but other things like older batteries, etc. do leave a diminishing returns point.

Depending on what you do, you might be better off just using the work laptop for a while and saving up while looking for a deal (refurbished one off some site, one someone upgrades, a personal desktop computer and use the work one for portable stuff, etc).

[Zoe Girl]

the people i bought this refurbished mac from agree that i should not put any money into it, i push the limits of things. i will give the work laptop a week to help me decide but i really like to not use it for personal things unless there is no other choice. i don't do anything questionable but still it is better to keep things separate. a chromebook may be a good idea and many of those are really inexpensive too.

in reading all this i realize i have not had a desktop computer at work or at home in over 7 years. the first switch to laptops was expensive but i have been portable since then. at work we travel between locations so we have been portable for a long time, just interesting.

[SteveinMN]

Unless you are almost always around a Wi-Fi connection (and you're either running a VPN or are OK with an insecure data connection), disconnect a Chromebook from the Internet and make sure it can do what you want it to do.

[freshstart]

I bought my first macbook, totally entry level and a refurb from Apple, lasted 9 yrs, had to replace DVD drive once, even though it was years out of warranty, they said no charge, I'm a good customer (???I had the cheapest refurbed laptop, an ancient iPod and was a late iPhone adopter). I did have to replace I think the hard drive, or something, I don't remember, it was around $100. I will never go back to Windows. I love the Genius Bar, free phone support.

The laptop I have now is the entry level macbook pro, I added memory or RAM, I forget, my brother told me what to get and I did pay for a year of One to One hour long sessions as often as I want to work on whatever I want. I've only gone 3 times, but I go to the same guy, he explains things the way I understand them. Even if I don't go back, he was worth it. I got that specific lap top because it is the last one with a DVD drive and although I know you can buy an external, I wanted it in place because I like to watch foreign films from the library and I cannot read subtitles on a tv. Probably sounds silly, but I know what I like. I bought it new because the refurbed price was not that much lower. However, I just got an deal email the other day that they are now available for between $700-800. I think that's a fantastic deal. If I can get 9 yrs out of a macbook, then cost per year of use, they end up being a good deal IMO.

Oh, when I was at Disney, my iPhone fell out of my purse, someone kindly turned it in but it had been stepped on. Went to the nearest Apple store, sick to my stomach because the phone was out of warranty but my phone plan was not yet offering me new phone choices. I bring it in, the guy takes it in the back, comes back with a new one (not even a refurb) and tells me the "your a loyal customer thing" again and gives it to me free, he even got everything off my old one onto the new one.

that's my 2 cents, Apple cunningly (albeit, generously) created a lifelong customer in me.

I personally wouldn't choose a tablet over a laptop if I could afford the difference. I have an iPad mini and it's too small, I hate using the pen to do stuff. I bought a really cheap keyboard but haven't tried it yet. Good luck!

[bekkilyn]

Another thing to consider about tablets vs. laptops is whether you want the capability of running various java applets. There's a bunch out there for teachers to use for math, as one example, that demonstrate things like Geogebra, algebra tiles, probability games, etc. I don't think tablets can run many of these if they can even run java at all. I vaguely remember hearing something about Apple not implementing it on the ipad. I'd only use a tablet as a secondary device since I want the most guarantee possible to have the capability of running anything I need, so I'd go with the laptop given a choice. There are really small, lightweight ones available that even include internal hard drives, so you wouldn't necessarily need to lug around much more weight than a tablet.

[JaneV2.0]

Newer laptops can run apps, I believe. You get some special software and then load up the apps. I'm hazy on the details, but you could Google.

[SteveinMN]

So, Zoe Girl, have you made a choice?

[Zoe Girl]

So, Zoe Girl, have you made a choice?
Not totally, I am leaning towards a lap top however. I am still waiting on our tech department at work to set up my new work laptop so I am not changing out both at the same time. The network drive does not work on my old work laptop so I will be hand-transferring files, sigh.

So the laptop preference is from losing internet service last night. I have been getting my bills in email but to the Comcast email address I have never checked! So I went a night without internet and realized that I couldn't listen to music or watch shows! I was back to DVD's, and I thought that I would want that capability on whatever I get. I have a fairly large collection of DVD's, is there a way to save those on another device?

I think I need a new couch before Thanksgiving and family coming so I hope to have the work laptop as a stop-gap for a couple months.

[SteveinMN]

I have a fairly large collection of DVD's, is there a way to save those on another device?
There is, much the same way CDs can be "ripped" to a computer- or cloud-based library. However, DVDs can run quite large -- several gigabytes (GB) per DVD. That could chew up a lot of space on a hard drive or cloud.