New laptop

[Ben Pfaff]

Hi guys.  Well, I bought that laptop that I spoke about before
(Compaq Armada M700, 500 MHz, 192 MB, 12 GB, 8x DVD).  I'm typing
and sending this message from it.  My experiences so far:

	- It's *fast*.  I didn't imagine that an upgrade from a
          233 MHz PII to a 500 MHz PII would be a big deal, but
          it makes a real difference.

	- It's only about 1-1/4" thick, 12" wide, 10" long, and
          quite light too.

	- Everything works under Linux.  Graphics, sound,
          built-in Ethernet, DVD drive, USB.  The parallel-port
          floppy interface works, even if you hot-plug it.  I was
          able to switch to an external monitor from the
          keyboard, too.

	- The little mouse pointer thingy embedded into the
          keyboard is a lot easier to use than I expected.  Maybe
          I'll try to find a full-size keyboard with one of these
          eventually.  And it has a full *three* mouse buttons,
          great for X.

	- Debian 2.2 installed on it without any special
          prodding.  It even detected the built-in Ethernet port
          at boot time, automatically, so that I could install
          via HTTP over DHCP.

	- I even got it to play a DVD with a little help from
          linuxvideo.org.  It looks like its ATI Rage Mobility
          chipset is soon going to be supported for decoding
          acceleration, too.

	- Its keyboard is quite usable, but I think I'm going to
          have to map the Window keys into Alt keys, just like I
          do on my desktop keyboard.  The Alt keys are just too
          hard to reach with any finger but my thumb.

	- Supposedly the modem works, too, but I haven't tried
          it, or the PC Card slots, or the power-saving support.

Recommended.

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