I am looking for advice for buying a laptop to replace my current Latitude D810 - which served me reasonable well, although lately is anything but quiet (the fans are getting old).

I'm looking for: XP (no Vista, thanks), Core2 Duo 7500/7700, 15.4" screen hi-res (e.g. WSXGA+ 1680x1050), 7200rpm HDD. Doesn't have to be ultra-portable, it won't travel that much. No more than 1,500 - 1,700 Euros.

I am thinking maybe a Latitude 830 (when the hi-res screens will be available in Netherlands) but I don't know how quiet it is. I also considered a Lenovo for a while, but recent reports on quality issues made me steer away.

Should I wait for notebooks with 45nm CPUs maybe?

All suggestions and experiences are welcome.

I use a D630. The quality is not bad, but certainly less than Lenovo Thinkpads. Dunno about non-Thinkpad Lenovo machines (do they have high-res screens?).

It's not particularly quiet. Maybe if you put XP on it it'd work better, but Vista likes to run stuff in the background that thrashes the hard drive (I have a 7200 rpm drive, seeks are very much audible), and taxes the CPU (the fan does spin up every now and then at idle).

I'm typing on this on a Lenovo R61, and I am very happy with the noise level. Of course it makes more noise than my desktop, but SPCR is to thank for that . I bought mine from Newegg with XP preloaded and 1GB of memory for $849. The only downside is that it only has a 1 year manufacturer warranty so it's good to get the extended warranty. I'm running Vista and I bought an extra 2GB of memory ($40) for a total of 3GB and it runs great. There are a couple Thinkpads at newegg with the new 45nm chips, but I couldn't wait for them. Big note is that while Lenovo means well, I ended up taking off all of the preloaded software except for the fingerprint logon software. Too much junk...

How often does the fan come on at idle?

45nm should bring you improved runtime on battery.

I've recently bought an IBM/Lenovo Thinkpad T61p for my brother, which is quite a nice machine, although in terms of portability I would still prefer my 14.1" 4:3 T60p - both machines offer exceptional build quality (the T60p being a slight edge better), very high speed (the T60p has a Core Duo T2700, the T61p a T7700). They are both quite quiet, although of course not as quiet as my desktop. But most of the time I'm using my notebook on the road, so that doesn't matter.

What have you heard of bad Lenovo build quality? I'm surrounded with happy Thinkpad users here , but everyone complains that the original IBM Thinkpads were even better (the last was the T43). But in the notebook market it's like everywhere else: among the blind, the one-eyed is king (meaning that although their quality has decreased, they are still among the top brands in terms of quality).

About the Thinkpad quality, what kind of scared me was this:
http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/lenovo- ... gValue+asc

But I guess you are right, the quality of Thinkpads still seems to be quite decent. For some reason they seem harder to find in Netherlands though, but that's a different topic.

Has anyone here had a chance to compare the noise levels of a Thinkpad T61 and a Dell Latitude 830?

this is spam

Probably Steve Jobs angry that Lenovo overbeat MacBook Air with their X300

cnet reviews = crap. Very superficial reviews.

In terms of silence by best experience has been with dell due to the ability to use fan control with i8kfangui on most models.

A lot manufacturers have paranoid fan settings when it comes to powerful graphics cards on laptops, so to be avoided if you don't need it. 15.4" is a good size for everyday use, I actually prefer it to 17", even if I don't have to transport my pc.

So did anyone get any laptop recently that you would recommend?

Is it true that dual core would be the quietest, or are Core2duo equally (or more?) quiet..?

Thanks!

any dell that supports i8kfangui will be quiet...

So if it's listed on this website it will be quiet? http://www.diefer.de/i8kfan/
But warranty is void then, no?
Is there anything that will run okay & you keep the warranty?

I just got a Lenovo Thinkpad T400, and it's very quiet, though not silent. It's also quite powerful, sporting Centrino 2 with these new CPUs drawing very little power.

I stepped up from the (still IBM) T60p (which was stolen), and I could not notice any decline in quality. Instead, it feels even sturdier than my old notebook.

I just picked up a Thinkpad T500

silent? no. but its nice and quiet.
Its also quite the powerhouse with T9400 dual core cpu and switchable integrated/discrete graphics.

Compared to my OLD Thinkpad A31 the build quality seems pretty close. somewhat lighter but the keyboard makes a different sound when I type on it.
Lenovo also has the option for XP if you want that instead of vista.

As for price -- you get what you pay for. I paid $1900 USD

It's funny - you can get XP preinstalled, and afterwards you can even have the Lenovo service send you both Vista and XP recovery media sets (at least here in Germany).

I'm the proud owner of a Dell E6500 (X4500, P8400, 4Gb, LED).

I ended up with it almost by accident, but thought with a week's free trial, I'd give it a go.

Result. I've spent the last 3 hours configuring it, downloading software (firefox, etc), and I still don't know what the fan sounds like, because it hasn't come on yet. When it does, it's supposed to be fairly quiet (see the German review for it and the T500, on NoteBookCheck.net).

The LED screen is totally silent at this stage, and there is no decernable Intel buzz/hum at all. The loudest noise I'm hearing at the moment is the Mitron SSD I swapped in. SSD's may have have no moving parts, but they aren't completely silent (based on a sample size of 2!).

I had planned on buying a T500, seeing you can control when the fan cuts in with 3rd party software. Also it has switchable graphics cards, and the quietest notebook fan under load (again see review in German at above link). However, seeing there's a restocking fee if I scored a T500 with Intel buzz or a humming screen, I'd probably just keep this guy now.

This is my 4th notebook in 6 months (including a WYSE thin client notebook with no moving parts- which had terriable screen hum), in my own search for something silent at low CPU load. It's a small sample size, and still very early days, but so far I'd rate the E6500 as highly recommended!


Edited to add: The honeymoon is over. At a room temp of 19-20dC the fan stays off with low intensive CPU work for hours (as long as the WiFi is also off- these generate a great deal of heat), but at a room temp of 25dC it's a different story- fan on most of the time.

I'll try a T500 next, as TPFanControl apparently still works on the new T4/500 series, and would allow me to stretch the point at which the fan cuts on.

I can also vouch for Lenovo, owning a T400 for about 5 months now. The loudest part of it is the hard drive (I have the lower processor speed with IGP).

The fan may run at low speed sometimes (I can feel air moving, but can't really hear anything...), but the 5400 hard drive seek is a muted "cruncy" sound. Believe it or not, I have heard that 7200's are better for noise (not for battery though!)

I promote the new Dell Latitude 12". I have an older X1 and its a fanless design. they now have SDD in them so its completely silent. They have C2D's 1.6ghz in them I believe.