While the technology industry has become increasingly focused on highly mobile devices such as tablets and smart phones, there’s still a need for the kind of computing power that only a full-fledged PC can provide. One of the biggest questions for any consumer is whether they should purchase a desktop computer or a laptop. Though desktop PCs are being declared outdated by many analysts, they still have an important place in many homes and offices. Which type of machine is right for you depends on a number of factors including form and function.

Laptops have come a long way since the 90′s, when customers could expect to spend thousands on a machine which was essentially a glorified word editor with an Ethernet port or a simple phone jack for dial-up Internet access. Nowadays, cheap laptops from companies like Tesco or entry level laptops from Dell come with up to 4 GB of RAM, dual or even quad-core CPUs and versatile Graphics Cards for High-Definition video playback and gaming. While it’s true that laptops are close to desktops in terms of raw power for the money, they still have higher failure rates than desktops and are difficult to upgrade outside of additional RAM or larger and faster hard drives. They’re extremely portable, but you’re more or less stuck with what you buy. It’s true that desktop PCs have lost some of their appeal due to the emergence of more portable laptops, they remain popular for a few good reasons.

For one, they’re less fragile and are less prone to hardware failure. Secondly, they can be custom-built to match a person’s needs and tastes easily and quickly, not to mention more cheaply than notebooks. And third, they can be upgraded part by part to keep them from becoming obsolete in a shorter time frame than notebook computers. The spacious tower that houses a desktop PC’s components makes adequate cooling less of an issue, and desktop components such as CPUs and GPUs are more powerful than their equivalent mobile versions. Naturally, anyone interested in making gradual, incremental upgrades to their computer should opt for a desktop PC. Graphic designers, gaming enthusiasts and those trying to get the most value out of their hardware should purchase a full-tower setup or even build their own rig.

For those who are on the go a lot or who simply don’t need a powerful machine, any mid-range laptop should do the trick. Due to the relative convergence of laptops and desktop PCs in terms of price versus performance, the deciding factor comes down to personal taste and your own unique needs as the situation may warrant.

With the recent explosion of netbook sales in the US, I feel the need to make some recommendations for college students looking to purchase a netbook for school. First, let’s be clear: netbooks are not laptop replacements. While they can serve as a supplemental computer to a desktop or full-size laptop, they are not powerful enough to stand alone as a everyday-use device. Although the price tag may be tempting for the non-techy occasional user, the power is not enough to complete most tasks.

Netbook Power

In general, netbooks contain a very weak processor, only 1GB RAM, and usually a 100GB or less hard drive. While this may be sufficient for simple web browsing and word processing, multitasking is a difficult task for most netbooks. If you’re the type to write a paper while listening to music, while also searching the web, you’re going to want to steer clear of the netbook. However, if you are only planning to use the netbook for quick tasks such as independently browsing the web and word processing, a netbook might be a nice choice for a lightweight on-the-go device.

Netbooks in Computer Science

One common use for netbooks is in the field of Computer Science. I’ve seen most CS students with netbooks running Linux (usually Ubuntu), and using them for quick coding and searching on-the-go. Netbooks tend to run Linux well; the operating system is very light and thus lends itself well to the weak components usually found in a netbook.

Netbook Prices

Since they’ve been popular for a couple years now, netbooks come in several different varieties and price-points. Any buyer should be aware of what their money should be getting them; spending over $500 on a netbook is generally not a good idea. Seeing as you could get a midrange full-size laptop for around $600, it wouldn’t really make much sense to pay for the extra portability. This is unless of course the netbook has special features, such as a large amount of flash/solid-state storage or processing power.

Where to Purchase

Since netbooks are generally low in price, it becomes more advantageous to purchase them through sites such as Amazon or Newegg. These sites offer netbooks at the lowest prices without any required bundle or warranty. While you probably won’t be covered by the manufacturer in case of the product being defective in the long-term, most of these vendors will cover immediate problems with the product.

Source: Student Monitor

CNN reported this Saturday that among college students interviewed this spring, 24% of laptop owners own a Mac. Compared to the minute overall reach of Apple computers in the general market, what does this report actually mean for the future of Macs? It is easy to dismiss survey results in most cases; but this statistic seems to hold more water than the typical. It is well-known that Apple’s marketing campaigns speak well to younger users, and generally capture more interest among higher education students than other sectors of the market. However, it is likely that this user-percentage may continue once these students graduate college and move into the general marketplace. Apple has a remarkably low bounce-rate: once a user buys a Mac, there is a very good chance they will continue buying Macs over PCs.

Could Macs be the future of the personal laptop market?

Microsoft on Monday announced that Office for Mac 2011 will be released at the end of October in the form of two different packages.  Office for Mac Home and Student 2011 and Office for Mac Home and Business 2011 will provide “pricing and edition options map closer with Office for the Windows operating system”. Also, in not-so-typical Microsoft fashion, they will be offering a free upgrade to Office for Mac 2011 to anyone who purchases Office 2008 after August 1st.

College students purchasing the Office for Mac Home and Student 2011 will only be charged $99, saving them $20 off the standard price for a single install. My advice? Purchase Office 2008 and upgrade when it comes out; if you think you can go until October without Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, you may as well just wait for the release.

So you want to use OnLive on your Mac but you only have a wireless connection? No problem. With a few simple steps, you can be using OnLive in 5 minutes. It works, trust me. I just used it on my Macbook and it worked like a dream.

1. Download and Install Pdanet for Mac. You’ll need to restart your computer after the installation. Note that at some point you may get a message saying that there is no iPhone connected. Ignore this message, you don’t need an iPhone to do this.

2. After restarting, you should see an icon for Pdanet at the top of your screen to the left of the Spotlight icon. Click and choose “Connect”.

3. Open Network Preferences. “Ethernet Adaptor (en6)” should appear. Make sure it is being used as a connection.

4. Open OnLive. You may get a warning for low latency, but you should be able to continue through anyway.

5. You’re done! Enjoy!

Have a Macbook or iMac? Sometimes it can be hard to find good software, especially free college mac apps for students (emphasis on “free”). I personally use all of the following applications in college on a daily basis, and I think they should be a part of any OS X user’s Applications folder, especially a college student’s.

10. Skype

Skype is a fantastic text/audio/video chatting application, which allows you to communicate with your friends and family for free, whenever you want and wherever you are. All you need to do to start chatting is download the program (available on Mac OSX, Windows, and Linux), create a Skype Account, and add your friends/family to your contact list.

Skype Download Page

9. Carbon Copy

Carbon Copy is a simple application for backing up data. When used with an external hard drive, Carbon Copy either backs up an exact image of your Mac’s hard drive, or any files/folders that you choose to be backed up. The most useful feature, however, is the ability to schedule periodic backup times for your hard drive. For example, you can set Carbon Copy to backup your entire hard drive to your “Backup” folder on your external hard drive, every Wednesday at 2:00AM. When you wake up, your files will be updated and you will be notified that the process is complete.  Its a great replacement for the sometimes-intrusive Time Machine application.

Carbon Copy Download Page

8. Adium

Don’t like iChat’s bubbly interface? Check out Adium. It is easily the most popular alternate messaging application for OS X. It has support for every messaging client you can think of, allows for customized interfaces, and has a ton of features/options that you won’t find in iChat. Definitely worth a try if you’ve just purchased a Mac and iChat isn’t fulfilling your needs.

Adium Download page

7. Dropbox

Dropbox is a fantastic service which uses a “cloud-based” storage system in order to provide you with a free 2GB folder that is centralized on their servers. For non-technical people, basically Dropbox is an application which places a new folder on you computer called “My Dropbox”. It has 2GB worth of space, and anything you place in that folder may be downloaded at any time from the Dropbox website, or you may synchronize your “My Dropbox” folder with more than one computer. Basically, it keeps all of your important documents, pictures, and whatever else you would like to protect in a secured folder outside of your hard drive. It can be great for a college student because it avoids the need to manually sync your files whether you are in your room, the lab, or the home. Also, if your hard drive goes down, you still have all of your important files available through Dropbox. The 2GB storage option is free, but you can opt in and purchase even more storage for a low monthly fee.

Dropbox Download Page

6. Thunderbird

Made by the same developer as Firefox, Thunderbird is Mozilla’s Email client for Mac OS X and Windows. I’ve generally found it to be more reliable and less buggy than Apple’s Mail application, and it boasts a few more features as well. Thunderbird uses a lot of the same great interface features as Firefox, most notably tabbed browsing, which allows the user to view messages in tabs instead of separate windows. This application is definitely worth a try, and it definitely doesn’t hurt to have a backup email client in case Mail goes down.

Thunderbird Download Page

5. VLC

VLC is a multimedia video player that supports just about every format you could imagine. Before Apple’s Quicktime recent update, there were a lot of unsupported video formats on the Apple out of the box. You could solve this with a few plugins, but in general the one-stop solution was to download VLC. Despite the new Quicktime updates and its support of more video formats, VLC is still a great, stable video player, and is a must-have on any computer running OS X.

VLC Download Page

4. LogMeIn

LogMeIn is a fantastic remote desktop tool that offers a basic free service to all registered users. I personally use the remote desktop at work, where I can access my desktop in case I need to look at files, or just access data that I cannot access on my work computer. Because my computer at work is a PC, and my computer at home is a Mac, I cannot use most remote desktop tools because they only work on Windows machines. This can be a great tool for college for the same reason that the Dropbox app is good: it makes it easy to manage files across different computers. LogMeIn has great customer service and also offers more features through their paid plans, but in my experience the features were more of a luxury than necessity. However, with any new account you get a week worth of the Pro account free, so check out some of the features and you may find its worth while to pay for the service.

LogMeIn Download Page

3. Firefox

In case you’ve been living under a rock for the past five or ten years, Firefox is the most popular search engine following Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. It is arguably the fastest and most secure browser out there. It is a free download and is developed under a completely open-source platform. Anyone can download the source code, edit it, and submit their updates for revision. Since there are so many people involved in the Firefox project, Mozilla is able to keep the software up-to-date constantly, and quickly fix bugs. It is essential to have alongside Safari. They are both great browsers, but you might find Firefox is more natural to use, especially if you are migrating to OS X from Windows.

Firefox Download Page

2. Vuze

Vuze is “the most powerful bitorrent client on earth”. While this may be a bit of an exaggeration, it is surprisingly not far from the truth. Vuze is filled with functions beyond the simple torrent download client. They offer a full-fledged torrent search function, which allows you to search several torrent sites with only one click. You can begin downloading the files without even going to the torrent page; there is a “Download This” link next to each search result. If its media you’re downloading, you can play/watch it straight from the program. The program get be a bit heavy at times, but it is easily the most intuitive and function-filled torrent application for OS X out there.

Vuze Download Page

1. Quicksilver

Coming in at number one is my all-time favorite application: Quicksilver. Generally, Quicksilver is a productivity application that allows the user to quickly find any file, folder, drive, or application in seconds, and complete any command possible on it. How it works is very intuitive. You keep the application open in the background all the time, and when you complete a simple key combination (ex: option+spacebar), a little window opens up. You then type whatever you want to open; for example, you can type “vuze” and then hit the enter key. Poof! Vuze is open, and you didnt even have to move your mouse. This may seem like a lot of keystrokes just to open a program, but you will find it intuitive and easy to use as soon as you open it. Quicksilver has a ton of features and customizable functions, including the ability to control functions within other applications, such as iTunes.

Quicksilver Download Page

Like the post? Please share it by clicking any of the icons below. Sharing is Caring!

So you love the portability of your laptop, but want the elegance and functionality of a desktop? No problem! With a few simple steps, you could have a fully functional desktop without buying the actual PC.

Requirements

There are a few things that you need to figure out before you decide to purchase the necessary equipment for a Desktop. For this process, you’re going to need a video output connection on your laptop. In most cases, this will be a VGA, DVI, or HDMI cable. In some laptop models, there are proprietary video output ports that are not compatible with VGA, DVI, or HDMI connections. The most notable of these laptops are Apple’s line of Macbooks. These computers use either a Mini DVI (older models) or Mini Displayport connectors. In order to connect these laptops to a monitor, you’ll need to purchase an adapter that converts the proprietary connection to either a VGA, DVI, or HDMI connection. Unfortunately, if you do not have a video output port on your laptop, you will not be able to use your laptop as a desktop.

You’ll also need to keep in mind that you will need at least two free USB ports at all times to connect your keyboard and laptop. In most cases this won’t be a problem, but if it is, you can purchase a USB hub that adds additional USB ports for a pretty small price (around $10-$20)

Equipment

The following items are necessary to converting your laptop to a desktop:

1. Monitor with a VGA, DVI, or HDMI input
2. Keyboard
3. Mouse
4. Speakers (note: though low quality, speakers are often built into the monitor)

Cost

This may seem like it could cost a lot of money, but in reality, you can have your desktop running for under $300 if you keep an eye on your budget and spend time researching good deals. The largest component to your budget will obviously be your monitor, which will probably run you around $200 to $250. Your mouse should run you around $20, and your keyboard will probably run you around $50. Keep in mind that the price of your components will depend on your needs. Gamers, for example, will probably want to invest in a nice gaming mouse and keyboard.

Configuration

Once you have all of your equipment, you’ll just need to set it up. Personally, I prefer to set my laptop on a dedicated cooling tray. This keeps the laptop cool and keeps fan speeds down; you should note that your computer will be doing extra work by transferring the display to a higher resolution on a bigger screen. Also, this makes a dedicated “base-station” of sorts. I can keep all of the wires at the base-station and simply unplug and take the laptop when I want to use it elsewhere. The configuration is simple:

1. Connect your laptop’s video output cable to your monitor
2. Connect your USB keyboard and mouse to your laptop
3. If you’re using a VGA connection, connect the audio cable to your laptop’s headphone jack

Style

One of the things I love about using my laptop as a desktop is that it gives me the opportunity to have a really elegant computer without the cost of an actual PC. If you have a cabinet where you can hide all of the wires and hold your base-station, you should definitely utilize that space. You’ll be surprised with how sleek the picture will look; the change from a laptop to desktop is dramatic, and I think you’ll be surprised with how easy and affordable it is.

The iPad is the hot new gadget of 2010, but can it really replace a laptop? For a college student, the answer is simple. No, it can not. Here are five reasons you should keep that $500 for books and keep your brand new laptop.

1. You Can’t Type on It (without getting carpal tunnel).

Okay, so maybe I’m overreacting…a little. But there is no way you’re going to want to write that overdue, twenty page paper on a less-than-responsive touch-screen keyboard.

2. It’s Distracting!

Let’s face it; who can resist exiting out of that boring website on mid-century American history when you have a fun game of “Angry Birds” only an app away? There are distractions on your laptop too, but if you’re anything like me you don’t equate iPad or iPhone with work and studying. Your natural tendency will be to play games over writing your paper or researching for your thesis.

3. You Can’t Put Software On It.

Yeah, we all know that Macs don’t run Windows software and that means we will all be forced to figure out a way around it. But the iPad? It doesn’t run ANY software, it runs apps. What are you going to do when you need to perform some tests with software provided by your professor? There’s no “App for that”.

4. Wifi/3G Only.

What if your dorm room (like mine) doesn’t provide wireless internet? Your iPad only runs on a wifi connection, unless you want to add the extra $30-$50 / month 3G service bill onto your tuition check. Who wants to do that when you can use that money for…books?

5. No Support.

Most colleges these days have Support teams that you can bring your laptop to in case of any mishaps or hardware issues. Although most of these teams now offer support for PCs and Macs, chances are they don’t do iPads. What are you supposed to do when your project is due tomorrow and your iPad won’t turn on? Hopefully you can sell it to one of your friends who wants a big, shiny paperweight.

There are several ways to make sure you are getting the biggest bang for your buck when buying your new college laptop. With these seven simple tips, you should be saving hundreds on your next laptop. Feel free to write in any other tips to webmaster@college-laptop.org .

1. Education Discounts.

Most computer companies have education discounts or even separate online stores with special savings for students. Google Search or check around the website for “university” or “education” stores.

2. Don’t Buy Software Pre-Installed.

Don’t purchase software at the same time you buy your computer unless you know you are getting a deal. Most companies charge premiums for having the software installed on your computer when you receive it. Chances are good that you can get it cheaper elsewhere, and easily install it yourself.

3. Don’t Do Bundles.

Companies usually just take whatever extra products they have left in the warehouse (the stuff no one buys), bundle it, and pass it off as a “good deal”. Usually, it’s not.

4. Do Your Research.

Make sure that when you are “building your computer” online that you aren’t paying an obscene amount for minimal upgrades. The best example is RAM. Most of the time companies will charge double the money of the actual memory sticks just for the installation. Be sure you aren’t paying $200 for memory sticks that can be bought for $100 and installed manually.

5. Stay Away From Extended Warranties.

In most cases, the extended warranty that is available to buy at the time of your purchase is a waste of money. Check review websites for warranty-specific information to make sure you don’t throw away your cash on a warranty that won’t really cover anything anyway.

6. Use Coupons!

This is such a simple tip that is often overlooked. If buying online, check websites that offer coupon codes (Google Search: “coupon codes” to find a few). Most of the time there are well-known codes that will save you up to 10% or even give you free shipping on your order.

7. Don’t Buy Without Getting Something Back

Know about promotions! Laptop sales always exist; you just have to know when to buy. For example, every year Apple offers a free iPod with the purchase of a Mac. A simple Google Search will let you know if you’re buying at the right time, or throwing away a free gadget or promotion.