Which laptop ? Help please.

[Nightjar]

I'm saying goodbye to my job soon and the MacBook it came with. : ( I won't miss the MacBook. it's not been ideal for my first few steps in astrophotography, and anyway there seems to be a far better choice of free software available for Windows based systems.

I plan to do some webcam and DSLR imaging, and also some widefield photography. I don't have an observatory but will use the laptop out in the garden and also away from home.

Does anyone recommend a particular make/manufacturer or can you give me some pointers towards the spec. In terms of disk space for example, what capacity would I need for image acquisition and processing. I would use a large External USB disks for backups and archives.

I have no set budget. It's more important to get the right spec and/or with upgrade options, and the right OS.

Any help would be much appreciated, thanks !

- Nightjar

[Bizibilder]

Most are OK - I bet there are as many suggestions as posts eventually! The only thing I would suggest is as many USB ports as you can - most only seem to have three. Battery life may be important unless you have a power supply - remember lappy batteries never last as long as the spec says!

[Nightjar]

Thanks ! Those are points that I hadn't even thought about.

Nightjar

[milkyjoe]

Hi.

I suppose the question we need answering first of all is what do you want to do with it, email, web, gaming etc. or just astro use?...

If the answer is the latter, I would highly recommend a Netbook running Windows or Linux (Linux runs much faster than Windows); Netbooks are a lot smaller to carry around for starters and, if you get one with a SS (solid state) drive, they don't get as hot and the battery life lasts much longer than a conventional laptop.

The only downside is that the cheaper one's don't have fast processors in them and don't come with an optical drive either, and may not be as good as a laptop at image processing.

Either get a netbook or look on the fleabay as I am sure there are gazillions of old laptops on there for sale! lol

Of course, there are many, many pros and cons to each device, so the choice may come down to personal preference! :-\

Hope that helps.

Rick.

[4lefts]

I would highly recommend a Netbook running Windows or Linux (Linux runs much faster than Windows)

don't want to get too off topic, but can you recommend any links/apps to get started imaging (with an spc900) on linux? does the camera have drivers on linux?

[Odd Dob]

I've been doing a lot of reading about what your options are for linux and astronomy as I've got a linux netbook and been looking at getting an astrophotography set up going - guiderscope and everything.

For astrophotography, linux is not ideal. Guiding sofware is severely limited due to the fact ascom doesn't work on linux and driver support for cameras is patchy and fairly experimental. There is wxastrocapture but again it's features and support on paper seems lacking compared to windows.

I should say by way of disclaimer I've got no hands on experience with this - I'm trying to avoid making an expensive purchase that I'll regret later.

[Nightjar]

Thanks for the advice. I'm now the owner of an HP Pavilion G9. 15.6 inch screen, 500Gb hard drive, 3 USB ports and a claim to '7 hours' battery time. Let's see how it will perform. Now for some astronomy apps ....

Nightjar

[milkyjoe]

I doubt you will get 7 hours out of it, 4 tops maybe, but you never know.