Super cheap laptop

[HFWR]

I'd imagine a portable in 1981 was anything but...

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

I'm glad that we can finally move past that unpleasant Inspiron 1000.

I'll call my mother in law later on and tell her to stop enjoying hers per your orders.

I can see why the 'blow me' started courtesy of your 'humble' efforts.

 

[wabmester]

I'd imagine a portable in 1981 was anything but...

You might be surprised.   There was, of course, the suitcase-sized Osborne, but there was also the slim Epson HX-20 (similar to the TRS-80 Model 100 that appeared in 1983).

In fact, the clamshell design that we associate with laptops today was originated in 1982 (GRiD Compass).

 

[wabmester]

I can see why the 'blow me' started courtesy of your 'humble' efforts.

Damn, I was *sure* that I could elicit one from you too! You're made of tougher stuff than I thought. All I could get from you was "I'm going to take my ball and go home now."

I love you, man.

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Nah, i'm staying here with my ball. Just not going to bother to let anyone else play with it.

 

[KB]

I got him the Dell 9300. The least expensive one. He will be composing music on it....so I thought I'd get him a pretty good one and after that......he's on his own. I did the same for his older brother when he started college last year. I hadn't planned on having an annual laptop budget, maybe I better revisit that. I might want a new one NEXT year. Thanks for all the info...

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Not a bad machine and its kind of amazing what you can get these days for your $. I still have a $3800 IBM stinkpad from ~5 years ago and a $1200 toshiba from ~4 years ago that cant hold a candle to even the weakest offerings out there today.

Hey Wab...one last thing. Remember your sage advice on the SIDS monitor that you said was a 'worthless piece of junk'?

Saved my kids life tonight. Alarm went off at 1:30 for the first time. When I went flying in he wasnt breathing and his nose was stuffed up. He's fine now. In the meanwhile its kept us from worrying about him all night long for 4+ months now.

This by the way is working just fine in his new full sized crib, regardless of where he sleeps in it. I could drop a pea on the corner of the mattress and it would detect the movement. Its worked in a portable crib with a foam mattress, a pack 'n' play, and a regular crib. Pretty versatile and problem free.

But thanks anyhow for your input on this 'waste of money'.

Unfortunately I'm wide awake now, and I've got jury duty in a couple of hours...

 

[REWahoo]

Unfortunately I'm wide awake now, and I've got jury duty in a couple of hours...

Let me guess... Your motto is "Bring in the guilty b*stard, give him a fair trial and hang his *ss!"

REW

 

[Martha]

Any bets on TH actually getting on a jury?

 

[unclemick]

The lady logging us in on the jury pool computer - put me in as retired - NOT RETIRED ENGINER. She said with my address - Odds were, I would never be called. "fishermen enforce their own brand of justice." Neither the defense nor the prosecution wants you.

She was right.

 

[Eagle43]

Last time I was invited to a jury pool was for a capitol murder case. Defense lawyer in voire dire asked me if I was jury foreman for a case I had been on several years before. My reply was "No, but I'm running for office." I was asked to leave! Man, was I happy?

I've also heard that if you bring in a copy of Rush Limbaugh's books and/or the Bible to a criminal case, you get excused. What do you think, Martha? Of course, all of this was when I was working and you really didn't want to be on a jury. Now, it could be interesting and I do have all day!

 

[wabmester]

Alarm went off at 1:30 for the first time.  When I went flying in he wasnt breathing and his nose was stuffed up.  He's fine now.  In the meanwhile its kept us from worrying about him all night long for 4+ months now.

That's great that it worked for you. It didn't work for us. In fact, the whole of idea of a crib in a separate room didn't work for us, but everybody is different, and there's lots of variability in the manufacturing of consumer products.

I've never heard of a kid who stopped breathing due to a stuffy nose. He should automatically go to mouth breathing. You might ask your doc about that episode, but the kid was probably just holding his breath because he knew it would freak you out. Ours does stuff like that all the time.

 

[laurence]

Wab, my daughter caught a cold that spread to her lungs, went into acute respitory distress, I had to call 911 and we did the whole ambulance thing down to Children's hospital ( I never thought my first ambulance ride would not involve my health!). Long story short, had to intibate her, spent a week in the hospital (I wrote this all out before). Point is, she got the cold from me, all it did to me was make me a little under the weather. Babies are so much more fragile, what is a minor annoyance to you can be life threatening to them as their little bodies are over taxed.

Th, are you taking Jr. to the doctor? Any prognosis? Hope all is well.

 

[wabmester]

Yikes. There is certainly a lot of scary stuff that can happen to kids, but the SIDS stats and stories definitely make parents paranoid. I would constantly poke our kid to see if she was still alive. Their breath is so shallow that it's really hard to tell if they're breathing at that age. And they actually stop breathing for about 5 seconds at a stretch as part of their normal cycle.

Now that our kid is two, we stop poking her. Except for acts of revenge.

Back to "super" deals on laptops: if your employer has a Dell EPP program, Dell has a 33%-off coupon that stacks with the usual EPP discount (usually 12-16%). This is a pretty good deal if you want something like their top-of-the-line XPS2 (it'll save you $1000+ off list).

Coupon code: $TKJWTR58PPDBN (good only on the EPP site)

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Mom is "the doctor". Certified annually for 13 years for neonatal resuscitation. In this case she said he urped up a little and that clogged his nose. He probably choked a little and may have started mouth breathing. When I jerked him up out of the bed, that may have cleared his breathing path. Cleaning out his nose with the saline and squeeze bulbs we have splattered all over the house kept him happy.

All in all I'm pretty happy with that $99 spent.

Wab, you probably missed the point even though you confirmed it. Consumer goods ARE all over the place, as are needs. A point I've kept repeating. It would have been as easy to agree with that as opposed to crapping on a recommendation I made (which I still stand by for the purpose stated), along with the further baiting and crapping.

My mistake was being baited and continuing the conversation. But you're good at that. So let me close by saying BLOW ME!

'nuff said about that.

Well, as far as the jury thing goes, its still undecided. Its a huge case. Think one other major court case we discussed in a thread recently and you have the approximate scope. Of course I cant talk about it.

They brought in ~120 people for the jury pool of 12+ alternates. We plowed through about 45 today and its back to 11 regular and no alternates. Nobody wants to be in on this thing as it may run as little as 8 days but as long as several months.

Last goddamn thing I need now that my wife just went to day shifts. We have no day care and last thing on earth I want is to leave my kid with strangers. If I'm going to get any sleep before a day in the jury box, we'd need to get overnight care. Under that setup, Gabe would be in care all night and all day and my wife wouldnt see him at all for 2-3 days at a time until she was off shift.

Guess what. That aint gonna happen.

I have one of these "stop me when you want me to go home" speeches already lined up. I'm about to go from "You Dont Know Me" to "You Dont Want Me".

 

[wabmester]

Wab, you probably missed the point even though you confirmed it.

Oh, c'mon.   A retiree's mind is the devil's playground.   I threw that little bit about product variability in as a bone for you.   Glad you liked it

Alright, I'll stop baiting you about that hot-n-heavy 1000 beastie.   In actuallity, it's not a bad idea to buy a very low-end dog from Dell.   They have the secret sauce to customer satisfaction.   If you bitch about a bad machine in the first 21 days, even if the badness is by design, they are *extremely* likely to send you a new replacement, and that replacement is very likely to be an upgraded machine.    The will even do this anytime during the warranty period (well beyond the 21-day return period) if you pester them enough.    And your odds for a nifty replacement go up significantly if the original doggy model is now out of production.

Basically, it's hard to go wrong with a Dell as long as you're patient and persistent.

P.S. I'm glad Junior is doing well. This kid stuff is fun.

 

[laurence]

I seem to always miss the love fest.

Glad to hear everything cleared up, TH. Didn't realise you had little tikes too, Wab. I have a sensitive spot on this issue, don't mind me. Sun rises and sets with Tori, but that's probably the case for most parents.

 

[Eagle43]

Well, as far as the jury thing goes, its still undecided. Its a huge case. Think one other major court case we discussed in a thread recently and you have the approximate scope. Of course I cant talk about it.

They brought in ~120 people for the jury pool of 12+ alternates. We plowed through about 45 today and its back to 11 regular and no alternates. Nobody wants to be in on this thing as it may run as little as 8 days but as long as several months.

Last goddamn thing I need now that my wife just went to day shifts. We have no day care and last thing on earth I want is to leave my kid with strangers. If I'm going to get any sleep before a day in the jury box, we'd need to get overnight care. Under that setup, Gabe would be in care all night and all day and my wife wouldnt see him at all for 2-3 days at a time until she was off shift.

Guess what. That aint gonna happen.

I have one of these "stop me when you want me to go home" speeches already lined up. I'm about to go from "You Dont Know Me" to "You Dont Want Me".

Ask 'em to point out the "guilty bastard". After that, you should be on your way to babysit in about 5 mins or so. Or I can send you a copy of "See I told You So".

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Thats the fun part. Both 'sides' have already dribbled out so much about the case that I felt more like both were delivering closing statements than asking juror questions. I think i've heard enough to figure out that the guy is probably guilty but that the DA wont prove the case. Exactly what I want to spend several weeks/months sitting through while my wife doesnt sleep...

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Didn't realise you had little tikes too, Wab.

Yeah, that ruined this "spore" theory I had been developing...

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Thats the fun part. Both 'sides' have already dribbled out so much about the case that I felt more like both were delivering closing statements than asking juror questions. I think i've heard enough to figure out that the guy is probably guilty but that the DA wont prove the case. Exactly what I want to spend several weeks/months sitting through while my wife doesnt sleep...

Oohh! I get to quote myself and reply. How fun.

Boy did they not want me.

Case was a serial child molester that had three 8 year old female victims complaining of abuse over a year period, along with 17 counts of giving them pornography.

The defense attorney pretty much flat out said that one of the little girls was "promiscuous", another had complained of abuse before that turned out to not be true, and the third had complained of abuse before that resulted in a conviction. That the parents had coached the children to make the allegations.

 

[Eagle43]

Shades of Michael Jackson?

 

[Nords]

Any bets on TH actually getting on a jury? 

C'mon, Martha, you're practically begging for another round of "dumb lawyer" jokes...

 

[nwsteve]

Back to "super" deals on laptops: if your employer has a Dell EPP program, Dell has a 33%-off coupon that stacks with the usual EPP discount (usually 12-16%).   This is a pretty good deal if you want something like their top-of-the-line XPS2 (it'll save you $1000+ off list).

Coupon code: $TKJWTR58PPDBN (good only on the EPP site)

Just saw this on Fatwallet for today
For a limited time and limited quantity, receive up to $750 off when you configure one of the Dell Systems listed below to reach $1499 before tax and shipping. Simply apply the coupon code TZT85TH32SMG0B has been applied in the check out.
Offer is available on these E-value codes or order codes containing the following sequences only: i6000a5, i6000a6, 6000a7, i700ma2, i600MA, i9300A2
Any comments if this as good as it seems?
nwsteve

 

[wabmester]

Any comments if this as good as it seems?

That's about as good as it gets for discounts on new systems from Dell. They run this promo periodically, and it tends to sell out pretty quickly (mostly due to people buying systems for resale on eBay).

The trick is to stay as close to $1500 list as you can, since anything above that is fat margins for Dell.