September 7, 2006
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Laptops cheaper than desktops?
But first, a short quiz. What has the greatest effect on the speed of your everyday computing (startup, email, web browsing, switching applications)?
A) Processor gigahertz
B) Processor model name
C) RAM
D) Hard drive speed (RPM)
E) Video card RAMFor most modern computers, the answer is C. I don’t have hard numbers, but here’s my experience running Windows XP with various amounts of RAM:
256 MB: sluggish
512 MB: okay
1024 MB = 1GB: zippySo last week I specced out a machine for my cousin-in-law. We decided the only requirements were: 1GB RAM, WinXP, and a DVD drive to watch movies. She wanted a desktop (no need to move it around), so we added “LCD monitor” to the list. After looking through a number of websites, we ended up ordering an entry-level machine from the Dell website for $500, including a 17″ LCD monitor.
Today I got a flyer from Micro Center advertising a $499 laptop (Winbook V415) that includes 1GB RAM, a DVD *burner*, Win XP *Pro*, 15.4″ screen, and all the standard features (USB 2.0, ethernet, wireless). Since when did laptops cost the same as desktops, and what’s driving the price down?
One Laptop Per Child is a project started by the MIT Media Lab — their goal is create $100 laptops and give them to poor children for education. I think that’s a great idea to unleash their learning potential and get them started on World of Warcraft. But seriously, if regular low-end laptops keep getting cheaper, maybe market forces themselves will bring about this price point.
Comments (12)
Answer is D
Have you ever tried using a low-end laptop 4200RPM HDD in a moderately-powered machine? Horrible.
But more memory does help.
I believe that the reasonable minimum that most people report for XP is about 380MB. 1GB is good.
The most expensive components in a laptop are the CPU and motherboard. CPUs are cheap now for low-end laptops because Intel has a pile of factories that are using previous-generation manufacturing technologies, and can’t make the newest high-end chips. So instead of decommissioning them at great expense, they let them make the Celerons and old cheaper processors until they get around to upgrading them (which takes years and costs billions of $). Intel also produces motherboards… The chips for which can be produced using even older processor fab technologies, so they can use old factories for those, too. Economies of scale come into play, and so laptops get cheap. Low-end TFTs for laptops are also far cheaper now, due to larger TFTs in desktop use… Hence the overall price drop.
OLPC is a great initiative
I think they changed the price to $140 now, but added lots of features, including wireless mesh networking and memory card slots…!
Heh, my first reaction was the hard disk also, but that’s because I’ll usually put a good amount of memory into my systems making the disk speed the bottleneck. Hard to say though, would you rather have a desktop with 256 MB of memory and a 15K SCSI disk, or a laptop with 2 gigs of RAM and a 4200 RPM disk? They kinda go hand in hand.
did u factor in display size? laptops may be getting cheaper, but i haven’t seen any cheap laptops with 17 inch displays.
i dig laptops as much as any person on earth, but their two great shortcomings are screen size and ergonomics. laptop ergonomics are as unhealthy as mcdonalds. i carry around an external keyboard everywhere with my laptop. this laptop per child thing is great but may bring a lot of RSI to the third world along with the all the wonders of modern computing
i have to say that now that i’ve upgraded my RAM, and have decent 7200rpm hard drives, my CPU is now the slow factor, but that’s just a guess. i’m still using PATA for my hard drives, so the drive interface might also be a slowing factor.
You’re experience with WinXP is skewing your answer to #1. This OS requires 1GB RAM to operate normal apps comfortably without swapping out to virtual memory (i.e., your slow HD). The reason that laptop costs as little as the desktop PC you spec’ed out is because you got a bad price for the desktop. With rebates/discounts and buying the RAM from somewhere other than Dell you could have purchased that system in the $300-400 range. Also, if you take a closer look at the quality of components in the Winbook vs. the Dell you’ll probably see more reasons why the Winbook is so cheap.
*Your (jeez.. I hate making those typo’s!)
Hi all, thanks for your informed comments. Yes, my answer is based on a lot of assumptions, such as the “typical” new low-end system sold today, using WinXP.
Phil, can you link me a system that includes 1GB and a 17″ LCD for less than $500? I did a fair amount of websearching before settling on the Dell. No doubt there are better offers that come along occasionally, but she needed the computer ASAP (and is actually borrowing June’s laptop until it arrives).
http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.gsp?product_id=4837463
$398 + tax, plus $50 for memory, comes with dual layer DVD burner. (Dell sometimes charges tax). FYI, you can sometimes buy Dell coupons off ebay as well. Dell seems to have changed their pricing strategy so it’s harder to find the crazy deals.
Microcenter sells desktops starting at $250, but you’d have to deal with rebates to get a cheap LCD ($150 AR) and then add $50 to make it 1GB RAM.
oops… ignore walmart… that’s a CRT. Can still go microcenter…
How many times can I post? I just checked dell’s site and found a $369 desktop with 19″ flat panel, but add $100 to get 1GB memory.
Yep, looks like the latest Dell deal is $469 for the 1GB machine with a 19″ monitor. Save $30 and get 2″ more on the screen. Oh well.
Yeah, the deals I’m alluding to involve temporal discounts of various flavors (e.g., rebates). I usually lurk around dealcatcher.com when I’m in the market for something. I hate buying computer stuff under time pressure.