[Novalug] recommendations for laptop

Bryan J Smith b.j.smith@ieee.org
Mon Jan 25 16:07:56 EST 2016


This is the cheapest price ($139) I've ever seen for an full i3 mobile refurb:
- http://dealnews.com/Refurb-Lenovo-i3-Dual-1.4-GHz-11.6-Laptop-for-139-free-shipping/1580467.html

If you're looking for an 11.6" portable, and one not limited like a
Chromebook, this is probably the best you're going to find.  It's a
full i3 dual-core, even if SandyBridge generation (IvyBridge and
Haswell are not really any better), not an i-series crippled
Celeron/Pentium (much less _not_ an Atom-series Celeron/Pentium).

According to Crucial.COM, the Thinkpad X130E (Intel) is upgradable to
8GiB, and the 2.5" bay is replacable (not sure if full 9.5mm or only
7mm).


John Franklin via Novalug wrote:
> On the low-end, there are ~$200 chromebooks that can have
> Linux loaded on them.  These have very light processors, often
> little memory, small displays and a smaller battery thanks to the
> lower demands.  Great for mobile access, but don't expect to run
> VMs or a million browser tabs.

Bryan J Smith wrote:
> Which is why I bought a Lenovo Thinkpad e11 (AMD version) instead for
> the same price.  Quad-core, full AMD-V (virtualization), 8GiB RAM and
> a *real* 2.5" slot (even if only 7mm).  The Chomebooks are notorious
> for mega-slow eMMC, which can be slower than SD slots (depending on
> the card).
> Virtually all this space is 1366x768 too, unless you go $400.
> I mean, if you're going to get a Chromebook, might as well get an
> Android Tablet + Bluetooth Keyboard.  I still use my nVidia Shield
> Tablet LTE + Logitech K480, the former includes 32GB storage built-in
> plus an added 128GiB UHS-I card (160GB storage).  I've been running
> with this configuration for 18 months now, and it's still the best
> solution.



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