Stop me before I buy a Mac!

[FeralCom]

Not saying Macs are bad. I have never had one of my own, but I have worked with them for years and wouldn't mind owning one.

The new MA7011LL Macbooks are not too bad of a deal at $1,500...for Mac prices anyway. Only thing that kills it for me is the chepo Intel GPU. Im not sure I am willing to make that much of a sacrafice to run OSX becaus I just might accidently try to run a game or two.

I need another option that meets the following...

1. Under $1,500
2. Core 2 Duo or good AMD
3. Widescreen LCD 15" or less (no 17")
4. GPU thats not totaly crap
5. Internal optical drive
6. 1GB RAM and at least a 60G HDD
7. Must play well with Linux (pref Ubuntu)
8. No DELLs and sure as heck no Alienware.(I have my reasons)
9. Nothing that looks like it should have been part of the He-Man and the Masters of the Universe toy line of the 80s. (I have to go to corp. meetings)

Best I can come up with is...

ASUS S96J

15.4" WXGA 1280x800 LCD TFT
Intel® Core 2 Duo Mobile T5600 Dual-Core Processor (2x 1.83GHz/2MB Cache/667FSB)
1024MB DDR2-667 PC5300
Video Card Mobility 256MB ATI Radeon X1600 PCI-Express
80 GB 5400rpm Serial-ATA-150 Super Slim Notebook Hard Drive
CD-RW/DVD-RW Drive
3D Premium Surround Sound Onboard
10/100/1000 Network LAN
3x USB 2.0 Ports
3-in-1 Media Card Reader/Writer
Free Deluxe Carrying Case
MS Windows XP Media Center 2005 Edition w/ Free Upgrade Coupon for Windows Vista™ Home Premium
IEEE-1394 Firewire Port
Build-in Digital Web Video Camera
Wireless 802.11 a/b/g 3945 Mini-Card
Standard One(1) Year Limited Warranty

Total Price - $1,249

This seem like a decent setup at a fair price? Any other suggestions?

 

[funnyperson1]

Lenovo Thinkpad T60, looks like you could easily swing one for under $1,500 because they have a holiday sale with $300+ off, and to think I just got a Latitude because it was $300 less than the T60.

1. You can get one nicely specced out for under $1,500 with this sale.
2. Core 2 Duo
3. You can get a 14.1" 1400x1050 screen, there are also 15" options, but the 15" high res option is like $315 more.
4. X1400 is alright, should play most games, certainly FAR superior to the Intel crud
5. DVDRW
6. Both options, I would get the 100gb 5400rpm, and 1gb of ram
7. Shouldn't be a problem, just choose Intel Wireless, which works out of the box with Ubuntu
8. Its a thinkpad
9. Its a thinkpad, I think your business partners will love it!

The Lenovo personal configurator seems to be down right now, but from what I was working out just last week before the sale, for $1,800 I was getting this:
2ghz Core 2 Duo
1gb Ram
Radeon X1400
14.1" 1400x1050 screen
100gb 5400rpm
DVDRW drive
6-cell battery (up to 5 hours)
XP Home
3 year warranty

Now with this sale you could definitely get that same machine for around $1,500 and $1,350 with a 1 year warranty. Not only do you get a really powerful machine, you get one that is 4 lbs light and very well designed and robust.

 

[Xaotic]

Ironically, I heard from my manager that the T60 platform is the best for running the hacked Mac OS. You do need a compatible wireless card(non Intel, choose IBM branded, it's actually Atheros) that has the right model and firmware to run on the Thinkpad(thanks FCC, not). This one is available and compatible, if you have Intel and want to try it.

http://www.pcsuperstore.com/products/H16726-Lenovo-40Y7026.html/froogle/

Despite low numbers of resellerratings and some mixed reviews due to people having problems with ordering software, I had exceptionally good results in ordering the card. I ordered by phone 20 minutes before their 3PM EDT cutoff, by next day air, and recieved the card the following day(manager needed for a conference).

On battery life, I'd expect the 6 cell to do around 3 hours unless you really turn down the screen intensity and minimize power usage as much as possible.

 

[Eclypsyr]

Best I can come up with is...

ASUS S96J

15.4" WXGA 1280x800 LCD TFT
Intel® Core 2 Duo Mobile T5600 Dual-Core Processor (2x 1.83GHz/2MB Cache/667FSB)
1024MB DDR2-667 PC5300
Video Card Mobility 256MB ATI Radeon X1600 PCI-Express
80 GB 5400rpm Serial-ATA-150 Super Slim Notebook Hard Drive
CD-RW/DVD-RW Drive
3D Premium Surround Sound Onboard
10/100/1000 Network LAN
3x USB 2.0 Ports
3-in-1 Media Card Reader/Writer
Free Deluxe Carrying Case
MS Windows XP Media Center 2005 Edition w/ Free Upgrade Coupon for Windows Vista™ Home Premium
IEEE-1394 Firewire Port
Build-in Digital Web Video Camera
Wireless 802.11 a/b/g 3945 Mini-Card
Standard One(1) Year Limited Warranty

Total Price - $1,249

This seem like a decent setup at a fair price? Any other suggestions?

I have a really similar Acer notebook and it works great, I really like it. Plus you can get the extended warranty on newegg for ~$100. I have also successfully booted Ubuntu on it, so that shouldn't be a big deal.

Only differences is that my gpu was 128MB, 120GB HDD and no free carrying case.

My only complaint is that it gets pretty warm, but I got used to that within a week or so.

 

[hkgonra]

If you are looking for it to play with ubuntu why not go with system 76 ?
http://www.system76.com/