Toshiba Satellite P25 Series. A little more than I wanted to spend, but it is freaking sweet. Got the wireless network working in the place now, too. Anyway, I am happy with the purchase.
You b*stard!!!! That's a badass machine, congrats. BTW, check out your new shoes: http://www.reebok.com/x/us/rbk/features/scarter/index.asp
The guy helping us specifically was great. But he had to get his sales manager to complete the sale and he was slimy - pushed extended warranties, etc. on us really hard.
Some of the latest laptops come with TV tuners built in. The new one Clevo has released will have a Radeon 9600 PRO 128 MB video card in it. Clevo is the ODM that companies like Sager, Alienware, and other manufacturers put their name on. The only problem is that most of these things' battery lives are next to nothing because they use Pentium desktop chips that hopefully will slowly be phased out now that the Centrino processors are picking up steam.
Battery life is not great, but this is 90% a desktop replacement, meaning it will almost always be plugged in - yet still very easy to move around the house, which was key for me. Main case in point, where our desktop was before, I couldn't watch Rocket's road games and join chat at the same time. Now I'll be able to. Sweet.
You could've gotten a $50 video card for your pc and piped the video into your PC. I know what you mean, though. I have a 4 year old laptop that I really don't need. It's just a PII 366, but it does everything I need it to do at the moment : play dvd's when I travel, do email when I travel, and surf the 'Net when I travel. Outside of that, I really don't need a laptop. That may change by next summer when I may splurge and get a new one. As for a laptop being a desktop replacement for me, I usually replace the mobo and CPU on my PC every 1-2 years which is something that I won't be able to do easily with a laptop, and buying a new laptop every 1-2 years isn't worth it. Anyway, d00d... enjoy your laptop. My Toshiba has lasted for 4 years with no problems other than the 1 dead pixel it came with.
I'm not smart enough with computers to do some of those things you said - I just upgrade every 3 or 4 years. Although, they did have those new smart panel screens that seem to work like you were describing. I had put off buying a new computer for at least 8 months, and had followed every computer thread on here, but it usually ends up being some way too detailed conversation for me. Now, if you want to see who can do more with Excel, I probably got you there, though.
Hey JayZ... I have a sinking feeling I might actually know you... especially since you mentioned Willowbrook Mall. Would you mind posting your initials or something to distinguish yourself?
Mine are MG. I used to live near Willowbrook Mall before I went to school in Austin. Does anybody besides the chopshop internet stalkers know me? I'm just being a smartie pants. But for real, I'm from that area too.