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Hi Alun,
Just to add - although you've probably had enough - we've used cheap netbooks rather than rugged laptops. They're much cheaper and smaller, and therefore it's a lot easier to carry spares. We used these in the context of geoscience fieldwork in mountains and quarries in the UK, and on a volcano in Nicaragua...
Enabling Remote Activity project - http://projects.kmi.open.ac.uk/era/
Overview paper - http://oro.open.ac.uk/24711/
As Paul mentioned it's worth getting one with an SSD rather than a spinny disk. We've used the Ubuntu Linux operating system rather than Windows or Apple OS, which avoids the hard-disk size issues. Our favourite is the Asus Eee 901 PC (although we also have some 701s). These have SSDs and pretty decent batteries - but are no longer available. Our current replacement is to use the Samsung N210 netbook and replace the standard hard drive with a good SSD. Pretty much any recent netbook will do - providing it has a decent (non-reflective) screen, a good battery and suitable processor power.
Another thing you might want to consider if you're colleague is going off-the-grid, is to include external laptop batteries. These are the best we've found - external Li-Ion batteries with multiple voltages and adaptor plugs...
http://www.global-battery.co.uk/universal-external-laptop-battery.html
Having an extra external SSD for backing up the laptop is well worth doing and can be easily automated as a user-proof script or service depending on which operating system they're using. In fact, if you assume the laptop/netbook will break then instead of using the internal drive just use an external drive or an SD card for data files. That way the data files can be easily moved onto the replacement device without any loss of precious field time.
Sorry for going on - I didn't want to go off on one, but I thought some of this might help. The Enabling Remote Activity project that I mentioned above started in 2006 as a way to improve access to our fieldwork courses, but the portable communications toolkit we developed is useful in loads of fieldwork contexts and so we've had lots of opportunities to learn from our mistakes.
Good luck with advising your colleague and I hope their fieldwork goes well.
Best Wishes,
Trevor.
Trevor Collins
Research Fellow
Knowledge Media Institute
The Open University, UK
-----Original Message-----
From: Alun Edwards [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 02 November 2011 12:26
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Laptops for field work
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Dear Mia, Paul and Michael, Many thanks for your suggestions. Ally
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Alun Edwards
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-----Original Message-----
From: Museums Computer Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Michael Stocking
Sent: 02 November 2011 12:23
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Laptops for field work
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We have used Panasonic Toughbooks which come in at various levels of ruggedisation, from droppable off a desk to (literally) armour plated. No problems so far. They can also include rubber seals around ports and the screen for dust resistance.
I would also consider taking a solid state drive as a field backup and a spare battery (or two).
Hope that helps.
Michael
=========================
Michael Stocking
Managing Director
Armadillo Systems
106 Cleveland Street
London W1T 6NX
+44 (0)20 7388 8757
[log in to unmask]
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www.ebooktreasures.org
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On 2 Nov 2011, at 12:04, Paul Groves wrote:
> ****************************************************************
> Find out more about the UKMW11 conference on 25 November 2011
> and how to register at http://bit.ly/ukmw11
> ****************************************************************
>
> Dear Alun,
>
> Going for a model with a SSD (Solid State Drive) instead of a
> traditional HDD (Hard Disk Drive) might be a good idea, as these are
> much less sensitive to vibration and being dropped etc., require less
> power (so more battery life) as well as being *much* faster. The
> downside is capacities tend to be more limited than HDDs and they're
> more expensive per megabyte, e..g. a 256Gb SSD will be about £270+
>
> Hope this helps!
>
> Paul
>
> On Fri, Oct 28, 2011 at 9:46 AM, Alun Edwards <[log in to unmask]>wrote:
>
>> ****************************************************************
>> Find out more about the UKMW11 conference on 25 November 2011
>> and how to register at http://bit.ly/ukmw11
>> ****************************************************************
>>
>> Dear all, We have an academic who is about to visit Tanzania for
>> field work (see below) and is asking advice about what semi-rugged
>> laptop she should take. Does anyone have any experience in using
>> laptops that purport to be more rugged than usual - any winners out there - or ones to avoid?
>> Many thanks, Ally
>>
>>
>>
>> I wonder whether you (or somebody else at OUCS) could give me some
>> advice on what laptop to buy for my fieldwork in Tanzania? The laptop
>> will be used to store, view and transcribe video-recorded group
>> discussions. It will be used also for more common tasks such as
>> creating word and excel documents, e-mail and the web-serfing. The
>> laptop will be transported on rough roads and will be exposed to
>> torpical wheather (hot temperatures and high humidity). I am trying
>> to find a semi-rugged laptop that is physically resistant to
>> vibrations/small dropping and bad whether conditions, and at the same
>> sufficiently powerful to enable the vision of video-recorded data
>> without slowing down and crashing etc. I am also looking for a machine that is not terribly expensive. I selected a number of potential options online.
>> However, I am pretty ignorant about features like processors and rams.
>> Therefore I would like to hear the advise of an IT expert before
>> buying a lap-top.
>>
>>
>> --
>> Alun Edwards
>> University of Oxford Learning Technologies Group
>>
>> E: [log in to unmask]
>> W: http://www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/ltg
>> T: 44 (0)1865 273200. Address: OUCS | 13 Banbury Road | Oxford OX26NN
>> LinkedIn: http://uk.linkedin.com/in/alunedwards | Twitter:
>> http://twitter.com/runcoco | Blog:
>> http://blogs.oucs.ox.ac.uk/runcoco/RunCoCo: how to run a community
>> collection online
>>
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>
>
>
> --
> Paul Groves
> Project Manager
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