hi
i just wonder if there is anybody out there who is travelling with a lap top and can tell me a bit about it

First is it worth it
secondly how pratical is it ( like do they break all the time )
which one would you recomment
where do you get the energy from etc
would be great to hear from somebody

peter

Bikers here don't agree often, almost any topic is controversial, except this one (AFAIK): Don't take a notebook with you. They are heavy, require lots of space in your luggage, are expensive, break easily, are a frequent target for thieves etc. Unless you have a really really darn good reason to take it with you, don't. And if you do have to take it, get a panasonic toughbook

I have used one for the first time during a 3 weeks trip to the baltic states last year. As it has got a VERY SMALL form-factor (like a paperback-book) it is possible to keep it in the handlebar-bag - and therefore you have it with you most of the times when away from the bike. The device is a SONY U71, the tiniest thing running Windows XP on the market. Unfortunately it's not officially available in Europe, I got mine from a company in Germany importing them directly from Japan and who offer a great service (www.digital-nomad.de)

It's great to have everything with you, sit in a restaurant and being able to check your mails (best if you can use a hot spot through integrated wireless), to prebook a hotel through Internet, have a real PC with a 30GB Disk for viewing and storing your digital photos or even typing your diary with the included foldable USB-keyboard. It's gonna be part of my standard equipment on bike-tours in future!

Need any more information? Check http://jkontherun.blogs.com/jkontherun/2004/07/sony_u70_review.html or http://jkontherun.blogs.com/jkontherun/2004/08/a_typical_day_w.html

PS: A brand new Sony U has just been announced....

1. no
2. not at all

why you want to take it ?

Hi peterkern, I was traveling by bike 2 weeks with my laptop, Sony Vaio 10,6" quite small and not so heavy but not usefull I was more worried for my baggage than normal and in this 15 days I used no more than 2 hours.

Think were you will sleep and if you are going to hotels or hostels maybe you will give more use than me. But in campings I didn't used.

If you want to carry the laptop to download your photos you can do that in a good internet cofe's or in the photo shops for not so much money and more safety for your laptop.

I was carring my laptop during one short tour in Scotland to this time sleeping in Bed&Brekfast for work was so good but not to use internet was inpossible to find wireless and when i founded was with password so not usefull if you want to use internet neets to pay or hotels with the need or go to the internet or cibercafe.


My recomendations is, carry one usb stik, pendrive, mp3 player or similar and enjoy your music and when you can download from your camara the photos and enjoy.


I hope to be usefull

Marc

It depends what you need to do with it.
There are some very light ultraportable laptops nowadays, but in most cases maybe a PDA can be enough.
I have just completed a 2 weeks trip, camping out most nights and I used a PDA and a cell phone to check emails, check weather for the next few days and mainly as a GPS navegator (with a bluetooth GPS). This was very handy to go across cities and when I didn´t have a clue where I was and where to go.
Now I am working on a ultralight flexible solar pannel to feed all these toys: PDA, cell phone and GPS

My recomendations is, carry one usb, pendrive, mp3 player or similar and enjoy your music and when you can download from your camera the photos and enjoy.

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A cheap choice with low weight might be the Asus eee-pc . Since it uses flash memory as mass-storage device, it should be more robust then a (sub-)notebook, and its weight is less then 1kg. It is linux based, but a windows xp version has already been announced.

Unfortunatly the battery-lifetime is only 3-4h, so if you really want to be independent a PDA with an external keyboard might be a better choice. To some PDAs (like the LOOX 520/560) you can even attach USB-Keyboards.

Nokia has the internet tablet PCs N800/N810, which could be a good deal, either. The latter includes a keyboard and a gps-device, but I don't think that the keyboard is useful for writing longer texts like travel reports, so again it might be better to use the cheaper N800 in combitation with a bluetooth keyboard.