rugged laptop under $1500?

[jonah255]

I'm looking for a laptop that can survive daily use and perhaps a jolt here and there. Not concernced about performance. Good battery life would be nice but is not required, 3 hrs is more then enough.

I was seriously considering a IBM ThinkPad T30 that PC Connection is selling for $1350.
T30 Deal
I read through the comments on CNET. About half of these are junk: people complaining about the features, the performance, and the looks. Though there did seem to be a good number of people that had to return them to get either the hard drive or motherboard replaced. Also briefly scanned usenet. There were lots of people having trouble with the 2nd dimm slot, having it fail after awhile and requiring a new motherboard. Also in this forum it seems like there are a good deal of posts about T40 problems.

My dad has a toughbook (cf-17) which is real solid, but at the moment there aren't any in my price range. So I'm wondering who else makes a sturdy laptop for daily use.

thanks,
jonah

 

[Novaric]

well, my father, my brother and i all use thinkpads and none of us have any problems with them. My brother has a real old model (hand me down from dad), i have a t23 and he has like a t20. Some other AT'r mentioned he heard lots of reports of bad mobos, but i have no experiance with that. Honestly, from what i've heard, the thinkpads are some of the most durable notebooks on the market, i IMO probably THE most durable under 1500 dollars. FYI, my friends (who are twins) are both planning to purchase T30s...i can tell you how that goes in a few weeks.

 

[TaylorD]

nothing is as rugged as panasonics line of "toughbooks", though they are more expensive, you can sometimes find a deal on ebay