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Portables Hardware IT

3 Rugged Notebooks Take a Beating 119

Posted by timothy from the catharsis-defined dept.
bsk_cw writes "Brian Nadel got a chance to try to destroy three 'fully rugged' notebooks and get paid for it — Computerworld had him drop, spray, drown, bake, shake, and freeze notebooks from General Dynamics Itronix, Getac, and Panasonic. All three suffered some damage, but only the Getac M230 actually died as a result. Brian made videos of the tests (which were apparently done in his home, including his kitchen)."
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3 Rugged Notebooks Take a Beating More

3 Rugged Notebooks Take a Beating

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  • Obvious... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Bullseye_blam ( 589856 ) <bullseye_1.yahoo@com> on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:15AM (#23418338) Journal
    Brian made videos of the tests (which were apparently done in his home, including his kitchen)."

    Proof that Brian is not married.

    • Re:Obvious... (Score:4, Funny)

      by JCSoRocks ( 1142053 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:45AM (#23418706)
      He also missed out on an awesome opportunity for a Martha Stewart impression when he was pulling those things outta the oven.
      ...Proof that I am married?

      Insert obvious "you're not married you're gay / a nerd joke".

      • Re: (Score:1, Offtopic)

        by rockout ( 1039072 )
        You're not married, you're a nerd that thinks pre-emptively ragging on yourself will make you seem less gay.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by moshez ( 67187 )
      Not anymore, in any case.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by Schmyz ( 1265182 )
      well its good to know what the laptops can take...lord knows when we will fall asleep in our oven during a late night programming session...I mean come on...dont we all climb in to keep warm or is it only me?

  • Print link - avoid 6 pages of ads (Score:5, Informative)

    by adpsimpson ( 956630 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:19AM (#23418388)

    To save you having to wade through 6 ad-filled half pages - here's the link [computerworld.com].

    Why this link is't published to start with is beyond me.

    • Re:Print link - avoid 6 pages of ads (Score:4, Insightful)

      by X0563511 ( 793323 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:40AM (#23418656) Homepage Journal
      As stupid and annoying as going through 6 ad-filled pages, that is entirely the publisher's choice to do, and working around it would be, while maybe not wrong, not nice. They pay for their bandwidth, and you have to admit that going to slashdot without ad support, would suck.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by JustShootThemAll ( 1284898 )
        I tend to think of ads as electronic warfare. "They" try to get as much exposure, I try to minimize it. That means they get to try their latest pop-up/pop-under schemes, and I get to sharpen my skills with AdBlockPlus, NoScript and a very broad hostfile to exclude ad-domains. I'm not interested in the crap they peddle. I'm also think it is morally wrong to let them enjoy ad-income. And if they can't exist without the money from ads, well, they are free to remove their website.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Otter ( 3800 )
          I'm also think it is morally wrong to let them enjoy ad-income.

          Truly, sir, you are the new Socrates.

        • Re:Print link - avoid 6 pages of ads (Score:5, Interesting)

          by element-o.p. ( 939033 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @12:04PM (#23420034) Homepage

          I'm [sic] also think it is morally wrong to let them enjoy ad-income.

          Great thesis. Now support it.

          To put my money where my mouth is, I will attempt to support the opposing view (disclaimer: yes, I run Google AdSense on my web pages). Web pages such as the one in TFA are information that you, at your option, may find useful. Generating the content, and acquiring the bandwidth to provide it to you, costs money -- sometimes just a little bit (as in my case), and sometimes a lot (as, I suspect, in the case of TFA above -- destroying laptops in an abuse test can't be cheap). The content provider is providing that information to you completely free (as in beer). How then, if you do not charge for access to the content, do you pay for the bandwidth, hardware and, well, content required to provide interesting, relevant content? One way is to serve ads on the web page. Provided that the ads aren't the annoying, overly garish, flash-based crap that seriously detracts from the host web page, I don't believe this is too much to ask. As I said above, I put Google AdSense on my web pages because I don't think a simple text-based ad on the border of a web page is too intrusive. While other web hosts might disagree, I don't really give a rip if you want to run ad blockers, NoScript or edit your host files to block ads on my server. My web sites are primarily a hobby; I would just like to generate a little extra income to help offset the costs of bandwidth and servers. FWIW, I am a long way from breaking even on costs. My sites are pretty low volume (and ironically OTA right now; gotta call my upstream and find out what's going on...sigh).

          And if they can't exist without the money from ads, well, they are free to remove their website.

          On the flip side, if you are so morally opposed to ads on a web page, you are free to not visit my web sites ;)
          • Web pages such as the one in TFA are information that you, at your option, may find useful.

            True. I appreciate pages that are genuinely informative. The web can be a wonderful thing. On the other hand there are imperial truckloads of crappy sites. That, also, is the web.

            Generating the content, and acquiring the bandwidth to provide it to you, costs money -- sometimes just a little bit (as in my case), and sometimes a lot (as, I suspect, in the case of TFA above -- destroying laptops in an abuse test can'

            • Well, how do people get money? By working for it, for example. That is what I do, in any case.

              and where does your employer get the money to pay you? Or if you're self-employed how do your customers find you? and how do their employers get money to pay them? Selling products or selling services? Whatever it is there's a good chance that they need to advertise to be successful. Any economy where the entire means of production isn't state-owned (ie everywhere outside Cuba) will have advertising, it's necessary in order for any economy to function with any degree of efficiency.

              As I understand it, only first time visitors tend to click on ads. Once you get repeat visitors they mentally block them out and don't click any more.

              If that were true why do

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by WK2 ( 1072560 )

        As stupid and annoying as going through 6 ad-filled pages, that is entirely the publisher's choice to do, and working around it would be, while maybe not wrong, not nice.

        If only they would provide a single page article with ads. Then a site like slashdot could link to that, they would get ad money, and we wouldn't have to type or click so much just to RTFA. The problem isn't with the ads (we can just block those), we have objection to the click-fest.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by jdmetz ( 802257 )

      Why this link is't published to start with is beyond me.

      I think it is pretty obvious why the ad-filled link was published. Note that the article is from ComputerWorld, and the submitter was bsk_cw.

  • In Related News... (Score:5, Funny)

    by cptnapalm ( 120276 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:19AM (#23418398)
    Fisher-Price today announced that, rumors to the contrary, they do not intend to introduce notebooks for children. A company spokesman gave the company's reasoning in prepared remarks, "These laptops survived being buried, broiled, frozen and drowned for a weekend? That is a typical lazy Sunday for our products in the hands of our customers. We are supposed to be impressed by that? No, our customers would scoff at such fragility."
    • I wonder if anyone has any statistics on just how long stuff by FP lasts.

      I seem to recall having a fleet of it when I was a kid, much of which had been through my brother (a human wrecking machine as a child, I'm told).

      As far as I can tell, that stuff is nearly indestructible in the hands of all but the most determined children.

      Cheers
      • VERY good point...

        Too bad FP doesn't make laptops. Maybe they would be better suited for some of the people I work with than the Dells we currently buy <grin>

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by trongey ( 21550 )

      Fisher-Price today announced that, rumors to the contrary, they do not intend to introduce notebooks for children... our customers would scoff at such fragility.
      This is especially funny when you consider that everything from Fisher-Price is made of plastic.

  • Control group? (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    This doesn't seem to have any value unless you compare them to normal notebooks. It's just as important to know if buying any "rugged" notebook is worth it.

    I heard a few years ago that someone ran over his Powerbook G4 with a truck and it survived. I'd love to see how a Macbook Pro would compare to these "rugged" notebooks.
    • While being run over with a truck is awful for a person it really isn't that bad for a machine, even if it is a laptop. The truck's tire pressure on the road is only a few dozen psi due to all the contact area. Most laptops are reasonably strong and can handle some things stacked on them when just laying flat with the cover closed. Dropping it on its edge from airplane luggage rack height makes for a good test because the impact g force is huge. Rather than destroy some normal laptops doing that, just t

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by nolife ( 233813 )
        A guy at work backed over his Lenova T61 laptop that was in his laptop bag. The screen was shattered.
    • I heard a few years ago that someone ran over his Powerbook G4 with a truck and it survived. I'd love to see how a Macbook Pro would compare to these "rugged" notebooks.

      Probably not so good, at least in terms of being run over by a truck. I've found that the screens are not well protected nowadays seemingly due to the push to make the laptops as thin as possible.
      • I'm gonna have to agree with you about the screens issue. My friend recently had an empty plastic pop bottle thrown at him, and it hit his Powerbook G4 in the aluminum behind the screen... somehow, to everyone's shock, it left a good sized dent in the shell and caused a massive spider-web crack through his screen.

        That said, there was one time where I fell asleep with my iBook G4 on my lap 5 feet above the ground, and when I woke up with a start it fell to the ground (still running and plugged in) landing

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mkiwi ( 585287 )
      My first gen MacBook Pro fell from the top of a tall couch- while open. As it fell it hit a wall, further complicating matters.

      The notebook actually fell and the halves clapped together, breaking a section off where the latch secures the top and bottom. The section was on the inside and I super glued it back on- have not had any problems with since the incident. The only visible damage is a small dent where a "tooth" from the latch hit the keyboard side of the notebook and a small paint scuff mark.

      I'v

  • What kind of drop test is that? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by devnullkac ( 223246 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:20AM (#23418410) Homepage

    All the drop tests in the video showed the units being dropped onto a soft mat. Where's the drop onto the tile floor? Where's the drop onto parking lot asphalt? From a moving rental car? Landing under the wheels?

    • The Six Year Old Test (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Bananatree3 ( 872975 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:30AM (#23418560)
      Nothing is better than the six year old test. The Beeb ran a test a few years ago [bbc.co.uk] on rugged testing CF cards. They nailed them to a tree, given to a six year old with simply instructions to "destroy" and put in a strainer and stove top boiled. now THAT is what I call ruggedized testing.

      • Re:The Six Year Old Test (Score:5, Funny)

        by jellomizer ( 103300 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:49AM (#23418746)
        It would have been more disasterious if he gave it to a 4 year old and telling them to be careful with it.

        • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

          by AndrewNeo ( 979708 )
          I don't think it deserved that sort of torment :(

        • It would have been more disasterious if he gave it to a 4 year old and telling them to be careful with it.

          I think you have a potentially valuable line of research there.

          I'm sure you can apply for a grant to study the relative destructiveness of children of various ages under various instructions.

          You can fully quantify the Index of Capacity For Destruction under controlled (and uncontrolled) circumstances. As a control group, put them in the hands of people who think they're power users or pointy haired bos

      • My favorite is this one [youtube.com] again from the BBC.

    • All the drop tests in the video showed the units being dropped onto a soft mat. Where's the drop onto the tile floor? Where's the drop onto parking lot asphalt? From a moving rental car? Landing under the wheels?

      Woah there! You might break one doing that. Those things is expensive. Here's some other advice: if you accidentally drop your laptop, try not to drop your laptop.

      Also, why specifically a rental car?

      • Also, why specifically a rental car?

        It's a reference to the intended audience of the original article (based on the first paragraph): business travelers.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by triso ( 67491 )

      All the drop tests in the video showed the units being dropped onto a soft mat. Where's the drop onto the tile floor? Where's the drop onto parking lot asphalt? From a moving rental car? Landing under the wheels?

      I'm a sucker for the one-meter drop onto a cold washroom floor with ceramic tile on concrete.

  • kitchen test (Score:5, Funny)

    by commodoresloat ( 172735 ) * on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:21AM (#23418428)
    Well, come on, man, tell us what we need to know.

    Did it blend?

  • Laptop raper! (Score:3, Funny)

    by Bananatree3 ( 872975 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:22AM (#23418440)
    What kind of maniacal beast would cook their brand new multi thousand dollar laptop in the oven?? Maybe he was hit over the head when he was a kid with laptops and this is some kind of twisted cathartic therapy?
    • Ever left something in the car on the seat on a hot summer day? Stuff can get damn hot in there, so an oven is quite a reasonable emulation of that circumstance.
      • The above original post was a more a jest and not really serious. However, I completely agree that on a hot summer day, a car can become nice and toasty. I'm sure a black car with black leather seats would fry most bottoms, and bad things would happen to electronics. As with the guy who posted about his dad's ham radio, I am not surprised.
        • Living in Florida I test the black car with black leather seats on a daily basis. Word to the wise, the seats less of a danger then the steering wheel that will try to melt flesh along with the exposed metal on the seat belt.

    • What kind of maniacal beast would cook their brand new multi thousand dollar laptop in the oven?? Maybe he was hit over the head when he was a kid with laptops and this is some kind of twisted cathartic therapy?

      Do you really believe, deep in your heart, that someone hasn't accidentally done something equally insane to their machines?

      I bet somewhere in the Annals of Documented Carnage (TM) you'd find an example of a laptop being subjected to something in that vein. It simply has to have happened. :-P

      Heck, I

      • I bet somewhere in the Annals of Documented Carnage (TM) you'd find an example of a laptop being subjected to something in that vein. It simply has to have happened. :-P

        Oh sure - I can just imagine.

        "I put it in the oven to dry it out."
        "Dry it out?"
        "After I dropped it in the pool."
        [Forehead smack]

      • OK, you asked for it.

        I once worked for one of the big 2 PC manufacturers in technical support. There was a documented case of a customer who had spilt lots of liquid inside his desktop system, and decided he needed to dry it out. His solution: take the components out, spread them evenly on an oven rack, and bake for a while.

        As I understand it, the call came in because it wouldn't work when he put it all back together. It didn't work, of course...

        So, sometimes computers do indeed need to be able to sur

  • Laptop Testing services (Score:5, Funny)

    by name*censored* ( 884880 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:22AM (#23418446)
    Does this guy do house calls? If so, my neighbour's laptop might need some "testing".. I know his sound system works thanks to his rigorous 24 hour full-volume test, but I'd like to be just as confident in his laptop's abilities as well.

    Oh, and don't tell him you're testing it either. It's a ummmm..surprise birthday present from me. Yeah, that's it. Birthday present.
    • The reminds me of a situation I had with my neighbor, who also liked to test his sound system day and night, and also was quite unclean and brought a large amount of roaches with him. It appeared that he had an unsecured wireless network, in fact a WRT54G. Next thing you know I have OpenWRT on that baby and the DNS is pointing everything to TubGirl. Took him two weeks to buy a new router, but I saw him trying to fix it the whole time, bringing it up and down probably wondering what happened to his precio

  • drop test seems pointless (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:22AM (#23418448)
    They should not be dropped flat or on their spine to simulate drop damage. I've seen plenty of notebooks survive that. Pick a corner.
    • I've got two Acer Aspires that survived exactly that without a scratch. On linoleum, nothing TOO horrible or too soft.

  • Missed one (Score:5, Informative)

    by plopez ( 54068 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:25AM (#23418496) Journal
    He missed one, battery life at low temps. A few years back for a former employer we looked at ruggedized laptops for field work and battery life at low temps was a major draw back. Our conclusion was that pencil and paper was still the best.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by joshv ( 13017 )
      Huh, seems like it's be easy enough to add a temperature sensitive battery warmer - granted it would lower battery life a bit, but not as much as the temperature would.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by ca111a ( 1078961 )
      I wonder if running a CPU-intensive process on the background could address that (given, of course, the process is nice enough to other tasks)

  • Tiny Market (Score:4, Insightful)

    by MozeeToby ( 1163751 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:28AM (#23418538)

    The market is growing quickly. In 2007, with sales of 575,000 systems, rugged notebooks made up only about 1% of the global notebook market. However, Krebs forecasts growth for rugged systems to top 11% annually, with sales reaching 879,000 systems in 2011.
    So, they expect it to grow rapidly from 1% of the market all the way up to... 1.5% of the market over the next 3 years. Wooo!

  • The videos are a joke (Score:5, Informative)

    by Bazer ( 760541 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:31AM (#23418566)
    Don't bother clicking through for the videos. All three only show how they dropped the laptops on the floor. Whooping three shots per laptop: falling on the floor on the spine, base from 29 inches and in a bag from 60 inches. Nothing interesting. Just go with the print version [computerworld.com] if you want to read it.
    • I think I've posted this in another story quite a while ago, but this seems relevant again: Toughbooks are monkey-proof [monkey-proof.com]. Hopefully this will make up for the shitty videos from the article.
    • Yeah, that's pretty weak. I have an HP TC1100 tablet PC that survived a 6ft fall onto a concrete floor. Then it survived the exact same drop again (don't ask) a month later, but the hard drive died and the case corner cracked. Popped in a new drive (flash this time--it's still risking that fall periodically ;) and restored the OS and it's been cranking away every since.

  • The motorcycle-in-the-rain test (Score:3, Informative)

    by dtjohnson ( 102237 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @10:55AM (#23418836)
    My IBM (nee Lenovo) Thinkpad T40 still works flawlessly after being bungied to the back of a motorcycle in rainstorms. Let's see how those models do in THAT test.
    • They would do fine. These systems are much more ruggedized than your notebook so if yours could take it, they could too, and much more.

      Can your Thinkpad withstand having a cup of coffee dumped directly on the keyboard? These systems can.

      • Can your Thinkpad withstand having a cup of coffee dumped directly on the keyboard? These systems can.

        The "dump coffee on the keyboard" test is a relatively easy "rugged" feature to implement. Your initial point was correct (TFA's systems are more rugged in every way than a ThinkPad T Series), but ThinkPads are probably the most rugged "non-ruggedized" notebooks available. From the ThinkPad T Series "features" page:

        • Durability
          ThinkPad T61 features the sturdy ThinkPad Roll Cage to protect the notebook body, plus the new Top Cover Roll Cage to give extra protection to the display. This adds rigidity and
  • The company I work for has had trouble with toughbooks because people think they are alot more rugged than they really are. Employees have a real false sense of security with them. With the big macho 'Rugged Notebook' they expect it to be able to take abuse. What has happened in out experience is they still break when dropped from four feet onto pavement, and with a 'Rugged Notebook' they are more likely to be dropped because of the false sense of security. We have found that we are far better of with a really well built non-rugged notebook, like a t-series.

    • The company I work for has had trouble with toughbooks because people think they are alot more rugged than they really are.
      I've dropped Toughbooks a number of times from around 4 feet to a concrete floor. Most of our have also extensively bounced around the back of a C17 in ugly parts world.

      No issues.

    • I have had my P3 1GHz toughbook for a long time. It has survived MANY drops onto hard and soft surfaces. It has survived extended use in the rain. I even ran over the corner of it once and no bending/issues.

      The only issues it does have is the port cover hinges are very flimsy so most of the time those covers don't survive long.

    • The company I work for has had trouble with toughbooks because people think they are alot more rugged than they really are. Employees have a real false sense of security with them. With the big macho 'Rugged Notebook' they expect it to be able to take abuse. What has happened in out experience is they still break when dropped from four feet onto pavement, and with a 'Rugged Notebook' they are more likely to be dropped because of the false sense of security.

      You didn't make clear what level of "ruggedness" your company's Toughbooks were classified as. The current Toughbook line [panasonic.com] has 3 levels of "ruggedness": (1) fully-rugged, (2) semi-rugged, and (3) business-rugged. Only the fully-rugged Toughbooks can withstand the kind of abuse you (and TFA) were talking about (at least 3-foot drops). The other Toughbooks are only certified for 1-foot drops and are not the kind used outdoors by soldiers.

  • but... (Score:3, Funny)

    by wisdom_brewing ( 557753 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @11:03AM (#23418990) Homepage
    ... will it blend?
  • only touchpads? I'd imagine that a trackpoint would perform way better than a touchpad when wearing gloves, for example.
    • I know at least on the toughbooks the touchpad that they use is specifically a pressure sensitive touchpad. You can even use them with a stylus if you're wearing that thick of gloves. This is so you can use gloves with it. There is also the fact that most toughbooks have touchscreens as well. In my experience I've not had issues with wearing gloves with the touchpad. An old laptop of mine I had tried using the trackpoint with gloves, and found it somewhat difficult, too much play with the lack of tactile
  • Seriously, I have a toughbook cf73 (that cost a pretty penny) and that doesn't have OSS drivers for:
    1. Touchscreen (major reason I bought it)
    2. flash reader
    3. proprietary power management stuff

    I mean, I would never run Windows, but it kind of sucks that I paid so much and can't even use a free (real) OS.

    • That's surprising that the touchscreen doesn't work under linux. It must have something different than both the 27 and 19. The 19 has kernel drives for the touchscreen. The 27 there wasn't any drivers we could find for it, but it was a straightforward serial device (if you dump it to screen and touch it you get tx,y, let go rx,y (where x and y are the x and y coordinates))which did not take much work to get working.While its unlikely to be the same as the 27, for the 27 its just /dev/ttyS3.

  • Itronics (Score:4, Informative)

    by Ceiynt ( 993620 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @11:55AM (#23419842)
    I work for an ambulance company. We use the Itronics GoBook III. It's rugged and touted for use by Fire depts, Police, Military and Ambulance people, with some other as well. We have a fleet of about 30 of these books, and have yet to have a problem with the rugged parts. We do have issues with displays getting cracked, ports breaking loose, missing keys, things like that. We've had one run over by an ambulance(they are heavy), and it survived. It was misformed but usable. As for actual performance, good luck. Your top of the line electronics do not match well with survivability in rugged laptops. They do make fine weapons to defend yourself with if need be.
    • Jeez man you work for an ambulance company; those things must be loaded up with drugs and sharp/pointy objects; the best weapon you can find to defend yourself with is a freakin laptop??
  • I'm sure it adds something to the cost of laptop to make it "tough", but is the real reason they're not all "tough" for a $5 upcharge is that makers want them to break (even after we buy their overpriced cases) so we come back and buy another one after trivial Newtonian physics has been experienced?

    Why can't they make them all tough, or at least make "toughness" such a trivial feature that it doesn't require spending an extra $1500?
  • Not surprised the Panisonic passed. I seriously doubt the tests he performed measure up to the tests the DoD performs on the Panisonics.
  • Why did he only test them to 25 degrees? I've had to take my laptop outside in colder. If I had to guess, I'd say the coldest I've taken my laptop (a Dell Inspiron 6000, hardly a tough laptop) out in is 10, and it's worked fine afterwards. If he's going to test the physical limits of these tough-books he should test them beyond everyday temperatures, especially since winter temperatures often get below 25 in many places.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by skiddie ( 773482 )
      Because that's how cold his freezer got, and the reviewer was too lazy to go to a testing lab (or he didn't want his ice cream to get freezer burn)? I don't know as I DNRTFA.
    • Our toughbooks work fine up here in Alaska. It was -45 out, and the thing worked just like it normally does. Battery life was a little lacking, but we had a generator. Its also the only laptop I'm able to use wearing gloves.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Acer500 ( 846698 )
        My uncle has a sailing boat, and his Toughbook works pretty well under bad weather conditions, using gloves, etc... definitely a plus.

        He hasn't really tested it to its limits, but a regular laptop wouldn't have been an option (especially under regatta conditions). And with the OZI Explorer + GPS combo, it's a huge advantage.
  • "To imitate the sudden freezing, thawing and overheating of a notebook, I put each system into the freezer at 25 degrees Fahrenheit and let it sit there for 15 minutes. After they were allowed to warm up, I put them into an oven set to 175 degrees Fahrenheit for 15 minutes."

    15 minutes at 25 degrees? Come on -- find me a laptop, rugged or not, that *couldn't* do this. What a useless test.
  • I'm not a fanboy. I'm a consumer.
    Dell has 2?
    Latitude XFR D630
    Latitude ATG D630
    They claim that "it meets the strict military standard, MIL-STD 810F"

  • Gobook III (Score:3, Informative)

    by pdawson ( 89236 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @01:16PM (#23421582)
    Watch out for the Itronix Gobooks, we've got some of them deployed in our police cruisers, and the PC card slots are not well attached to the MB. With the celluar data cards installed there (due to needing ext antenna connector) we've destroyed 4 of 6 that way.

    The Toughbook CF-27s we had before this survived years w/o a hitch, on the other hand.

  • My Experiences (Score:3, Interesting)

    by BigDork1001 ( 683341 ) on Thursday May 15, 2008 @03:31PM (#23423998) Homepage
    I'm a net admin in the Air Force currently deployed to Baghdad. Here on base we have various models of the Panasonic Toughbook and the Itronix.

    When I first got here someone who worked flight line brought in an Panasonic that had fallout out of an airborn helicopter and onto the tarmac. It was all dented up and I could actually see the internal components. I plugged it in and the damn thing powered right up! I was shocked because this thing was beat up.

    Oh Itronix... we seriously thought these things were made here in Iraq. What hunks of crap! I've had my share of experiences with them, all bad. They are slow, buggy, bulky, ugly... If price is not an issue definitely go with the Panasonic over Itronix. If I ever get a choice, I choose Panasonic over Itronix.

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