just ignore and let this one die

I feel this thread is missing an excerpt from a Stephen King book. So here is one.

On a very hot day in August of 1994, my wife told me she was going down to the Derry Rite Aid to pick up a refill on her sinus medicine prescription -- this is stuff you can buy over the counter these days, I believe. I'd finished my writing for the day and offered to pick it up for her. She said thanks, but she wanted to get a piece of fish at the supermarket next door anyway; two birds with one stone and all of that. She blew a kiss at me off the palm of her hand and went out. The next time I saw her, she was on TV. That's how you identify the dead here in Derry -- no walking down a subterranean corridor with green tiles on the walls and long fluorescent bars overhead, no naked body rolling out of a chilly drawer on casters; you just go into an office marked PRIVATE and look at a TV screen and say yep or nope.

The Rite Aid and the Shopwell are less than a mile from our house, in a little neighborhood strip mall which also supports a video store, a used-book store named Spread It Around (they do a very brisk business in my old paperbacks), a Radio Shack, and a Fast Foto. It's on Up-Mile Hill, at the intersection of Witcham and Jackson.

She parked in front of Blockbuster Video, went into the drugstore, and did business with Mr. Joe Wyzer, who was the druggist in those days; he has since moved on to the Rite Aid in Bangor. At the checkout she picked up one of those little chocolates with marshmallow inside, this one in the shape of a mouse. I found it later, in her purse. I unwrapped it and ate it myself, sitting at the kitchen table with the contents of her red handbag spread out in front of me, and it was like taking Communion. When it was gone except for the taste of chocolate on my tongue and in my throat, I burst into tears. I sat there in the litter of her Kleenex and makeup and keys and half-finished rolls of Certs and cried with my hands over my eyes, the way a kid cries.

The sinus inhaler was in a Rite Aid bag. It had cost twelve dollars and eighteen cents. There was something else in the bag, too -- an item which had cost twenty-two-fifty. I looked at this other item for a long time, seeing it but not understanding it. I was surprised, maybe even stunned, but the idea that Johanna Arlen Noonan might have been leading another life, one I knew nothing about, never crossed my mind. Not then.

Luck may have a lot to do with it. I have an under $600 US lappy that i put $200 worth of RAM into- IT IS NOT FAST! but works well. I generally run several applications at the same time, including this, Gimp and AvPainter and it works. I do run a lap cooling thingie with it. It is by no means ideal but you shd be able to find something that will work if not screaming at least work.

This makes me want to read the rest of the book, which one is it? Stephen King is one of my favorite authors - Dark Tower series, The Stand - and one of my least - Cujo, Christine.

There is definitely a marked difference between manufacturers of laptops. I have heard stories like yours Amara. I personally have always stuck with Dell for SL (have had 3 now) and seen 4 more different models running SL of friends and they have always been fast for the time they were current and a long while after. The Vostro 1500 I mentioned is screamingly fast even now, 6 months after my friend got hers.
It is true I have heard horror stories about Dell as well as any PC manufacturer but my experience and the experience of the people I have known use Dell's have been great. YMMV is all I can say.

This makes me want to read the rest of the book, which one is it? Stephen King is one of my favorite authors - Dark Tower series, The Stand - and one of my least - Cujo, Christine.

Lexxi, this is what I have learned about SL and laptops:

I have a friend who is using a Dell Vostro 1500 which runs SL like a dream, was relatively inexpensive and has yet to meltdown after 6 months of SL and heavy GIMP/AvPainter use.
Try to get a laptop one with those specs at least as a minimum (Dell have full specs on their website).

The Nvidia graphics part should be at least 256Mb, preferable 512Mb. The processor speed does not matter much, you can go top end or stick to middle of the road on that, I would not recommend getting the lowest option.

Physical screen size should be whatever you are personally happy with and most are at least 1600x1050 resolution which is fine for most SL usage.

One thing to avoid is anything that has Vista on it, try to stick with XP. The Nvidia drivers for Vista are problematic for most PCs, the XP ones less so.

Try to get at least 2Gb of memory though if you go above that be aware that Windows will not use more than about 3 - 3.5Gb unless you get a 64-bit version of Windows. Laptops running 64-Bit versions of Windows can have their own special problems too so they are best avoided for less hassles.

If there is an option for a faster hard drive and you can afford it then take it, SL will run faster if the hard drive is faster due to heavy reliance on cached files.

Most laptops will run fairly warm under SL usage, try to budget a laptop cooler into your purchase and your laptop should last a little longer than without.

Hope that helps

Here's the chart you wanted: (i think)

I had a laptop I used for SL, but it overheated so much I actually burnt myself pretty badly on it. I think to get a decent lappy its gonna cost you. It certainly looked like that when I went shopping.

My PC works SL brilliantly and was well under your budget. Course it's not a laptop, but as far as I can tell, desktops are better on a budget if you wanna run SL.
I have a HP Pavillion A6332.uk Desktop. It was less than £400 so not sure what that translates to in $ but its under $900 I'm sure.
(course, I have the Vista problem with SL, so am on a Nicholaz viewer)

Yes it good to have creative friends to inspire and give you ideas in how to improve.
I never did clothes in The Sims, I did paintings, floor and wall textures, sometime furniture recolors.
It was much easier in many ways to recolor already established objects then to make originals like in SL.
Vrml objects in Cybertown I briefly tried, it was a nightmare. I am just not very good with 3d objects, animations and more complex stuff but I recently wanted to figure out how to do Christmas Doodle Toy Soldiers and Ballerina but I got no clue how to pull of 3d illusion on flat prims that move in circles like musical boxes, I got idea but not exactly inspired to paint the Christmas Doodle Toy Soldiers and Ballerina.
Issue is the how to figure out get animations, and everything right I got no clue how to do it, I try but often even my best ideas fail, often more complex things I need help from friends.
Also hitting a wall with this texture changing Doodle house I am just not inspired to do the room textures even though friend helped me program a Decor system but it still a ways off to be FD user friendly.
My textures are too Doodlistic for most people to want to use.
And even the items that have taken me months to make rarely sell, and I just don't have desire to promote or stress myself out over few linden dollars.
People will steal if they can but I don't think my stuff is going to be profitable enough to anyone steal in first place.

I'm using an Acer Aspire 5920, with the nvidia 8600M graphics card (256MB), and Vista (boo!). It runs SL just fine most of the time, but it does get a little warm.

I think the key is finding a laptop that does NOT have integrated graphics. And proper ventilation when using it.

Have you thought about trying ebay, or other second hand source? Once you know a model that works, it might be a good way to save a little money. (If you can stomach the risk of getting a lemon of course)

Oops- I failed to mention- mine is a Dell and it's been running SL for two years.

Hmmm how strange, did you get the Intel integrated graphics instead of Nvidia? If so then that is the reason, Intel integrated graphics is a poor choice for 3D graphics sadly.

@ Kaimi - It's Bag of Bones - http://www.amazon.com/Bag-Bones-Stephen-King/dp/067102423X/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1228249916&sr=8-1

Thanks I was looking at the Dell Vostro 1710. As it is 17inches instead of 15. Those extra inches, I see, really add to the cost, though.

Somewhat wobbly (as noted in last message), as some of this information I'm getting is going against itself. Competing. Get XP mentioned here. Was thought, also. Then get information that Vista ok, runs faster. Confused.

Which one of the numbers indicates how fast the hard drive might be?

Here's the chart you wanted: (i think)

System Reqs... http://secondlife.com/support/sysreqs.php

I had a laptop I used for SL, but it overheated so much I actually burnt myself pretty badly on it. I think to get a decent lappy its gonna cost you. It certainly looked like that when I went shopping.

My PC works SL brilliantly and was well under your budget. Course it's not a laptop, but as far as I can tell, desktops are better on a budget if you wanna run SL.
I have a HP Pavillion A6332.uk Desktop. It was less than £400 so not sure what that translates to in $ but its under $900 I'm sure.
(course, I have the Vista problem with SL, so am on a Nicholaz viewer)

Yes, larger LCD panels are much more expensive than smaller ones.

Vista does run faster but Nvidia's drivers are crap and you will be lucky if you can stay in SL for 10 mins without crashing.
XP is a safer option, you will not notice the difference in speed anyway in real terms.

The hard disk numbers to look for are the seek times (lower the better) and the amount of cache ram they have (8mb, etc...)
Other than that an easy guide is if you are paying more for the same size for the same computer then it is likely to be a faster drive

Hope your wobbly time passes soon

According to Dell here is what I have- except I have 2GB or RAM -

System Type: Inspiron 640m / E1405
Ship Date: 11/9/2006
Dell IBU: Americas
Quantity Parts # Part Description
1 MK014 PROCESSOR..., T1350, 1.86, 2MB, SINGLE CORE YONAH..., C0
1 NC929 KEYBOARD..., 87, UNITED STATES..., ENGLAND/ENGLISH..., SINGLE POINTING..., D PLUS SERIES...
1 MN331 KIT..., SOFTWARE..., DELL MEDIA DIRECT..., 3, DIGITAL VIDEO DISK DRIVE...
1 DF771 CORD..., POWER..., 125, 1M, C7, 2P, DUAL..., UNITED STATES...
1 DF263 ASSEMBLY..., ADAPTER..., ALTERNATING CURRENT..., 65W, MOBILE 2007..., LITEON..., WORLD WIDE...
1 Y5522 DUAL IN-LINE MEMORY MODULE..., 512MB, 533, 64X64, 8K, 200
1 GR343 KIT..., SOFTWARE..., OVERPACK..., WINDOWS XP..., MCE05U, DIGITAL VIDEO DISK DRIVE..., ENGLAND/ENGLISH...
1 DY654 KIT..., SOFTWARE..., WORKS..., 8.5, OFFICE..., TRIAL, ENGLAND/ENGLISH...
1 G9653 LIQUID CRYSTAL DISPLAY..., 14.1WXGA, VIDEO ELEC. STDS. ASSOC...., LGP
1 JC078 ASSEMBLY..., CABLE..., COAXIAL ..., LIQUID CRYSTAL DISPLAY..., 14.1, 630M
1 JC080 BEZEL..., PLASTIC..., LIQUID CRYSTAL DISPLAY..., 14.1, NOTEBOOK..., 630M
1 MG532 ASSEMBLY..., BASE (ASSEMBLY OR GROUP)..., BOTTOM..., CONEXANT SYSTEMS INC...., 640M, WISTRON...
1 C9553 BATTERY..., PRIMARY..., 53WH, 6C, LITHIUM..., SIMPLO
1 Y6913 HARD DRIVE..., 80G, Serial ATA..., 9.5, 5.4, SA060
1 PC559 CARD (CIRCUIT)..., WIRELESS..., MINICARD..., DW1390, BROADCOM CORPORATION...
1 GH766 ASSEMBLY..., DVD+/-RW..., 8X, PHILIPS, SULLIVAN/TOBAGO...

Oh, is that what Jerboa meant by integrated? I saw that option, and instantly moved it to one of the other options as integrated wasn't on the recommend system list here on SL.