Thanks to all of you who responded to my question about lenovo vs dell laptops. I've summarized the comments I got from folks and am pasting that below. The comments below are shorted from what I got... so it's not word for word, just including the main themes. Overall I got feedback that was totally contradictory (thanks for nothing!) in some respects and consistent in others, but I wouldn't say it's definitive toward one or the other. Different people have had good and bad experiences with both. Hopefully if anyone else is looking for insight on GIS laptops the below summary will be helpful. Thanks again for the feedback. <br>
<br><br><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d">A number of folks suggested getting an SSD drive as being very
important. </span><br><br>
<p class="MsoNormal">Someone reported having purchased 7 dells over the last
several years. Not good support, and lots of problems. Have purchased Lenovo’s
recently and have had a much better experience.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Used almost 20 dells in past 12 years. Good experience with
computers and support. Suggests buying directly from Dell, not from a store,
you may pay slightly more but you’ll get a much better computer with better
parts, etc. <span style> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d">Oregon Dept. of Forestry has been using Dell Precision M4600 for
GIS with good results.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d">Someone suggested Lenovo quality has dropped off after they were
bought out by someone else. HP makes decent laptops, cheaper and work fine.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d">Make sure to get a strong graphics processor and lots of memory
for drawing rasters. Gaming laptops have great speed. Dell serves a lot of govt
agencies. Have had good exp with Dell laptop.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d">We just got 2 of the Dell Latitude e6530 laptops. Top of
the line and fast. Have not had time to run Arc on it yet but it looks
like it will run great. Just get lots of memory!</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d">Really liked the Dell Latitude e6350, as did others in office.
Best laptop ever had, no problems for anyone in office after 9 mos. Fast, good
battery, ssd drive make it great. Nvidia card is good. <span style> </span>In the past used Dell Precisions, good.<span style> </span>These were designed to be easily reapaired. <span style> </span>Make sure to avoid Dell Vostro lines.<span style> </span>Bad experiences with HP and Toshiba. <span style> </span>Optionally wait for the Haswell chips and wifi
802.11ac to come out.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d">Lenovo with an internal wireless card used with net motion has
been good.<span style> </span>More affordable than more
rugged options. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d">Keep in mind that with ArcGIS 10.2 and 11 after that coming out
much of the GIS processing will be done in the cloud. <span style> </span>Good reference doc <a href="http://resources.arcgis.com/en/help/system-requirements/10.1/index.html#/ArcGIS_10_1_for_Desktop/015100000002000000/">here</a>
from esri. <span style> </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d">HP EliteBook 6930p, Intel dual processors at 2.2ghz and 4gb of
ram, and it has less problems than the Lenovo’s that my co-workers have used. <span style> </span>Also have a dell latitude e6400 with dual 3ghz
processors and 4gb of ram that I mainly use citrix on for ArcGIS tasks and it
does fine.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d">Have had a Lenovo Thinkpad (motherboard failed after 4 years), a
Sony Viao (going 5 years strong). Buy something that is suited to what you
really need… for travel, get good battery, etc. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I have 10+ years of government experience supporting Dell
machines using GIS in a government setting and I would recommend them. I
recommend a Dell Precision laptop with dual hard drives (non-RAID), at least
8GB RAM (I have 16) and the fastest processor you can afford. ArcGIS can
utilize multiple cores but, for ArcGIS, the money is better spent on higher CPU
speed than on more CPU cores.<span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Calibri;color:#1f497d"></span></p>
<br clear="all"><br>-- <br>Erik Fernandez<br>Wilderness Coordinator<br>Oregon Wild, formerly ONRC<br>(503) 283-6343 x202<span style="font-family:Arial;background-color:rgb(255,255,255)"><b><a style="color:rgb(0,0,204)"></a></b></span><br>
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