Musings and Thoughts

My printer hates me. Well the bubble-jet-crap one does. The pixma i.e. scanner doesn’t get used much as a printer.

Perhaps doing all my printing on one day of the week probably isn’t a good idea. But does it have to kill my ink cartridges so? I have to change them once a week. Least they’re easily refillable I suppose. But then it also seems to skip sheets so when you’re trying to print lecture notes sequentially on both sides, to which, say uh oh. In particular, the printer hates accounting lecture notes for some reason. The page numbers get so out of whack that its not even funny anymore. page 28, page 13, page 32, page 4. Yeah. Rather worrying. Of course, I wonder if Onenote is the cause of it as the problem ceases when I turn them into pdf files. Onenote’s printing abilities are sorely lacking after all.
On the other hand, pdf files. I am not quite sure what’s going on with colour management, but it seems to treat white as light grey and so it wastes infinitely more ink on something that doesn’t seem any different. Perhaps I’ll try and turn on the contrast.
Of course, I suppose.. the primary factor for less than sound printing — I use lined paper to print on instead of plain. ;P It’s really great because you don’t have to staple holes =D Not so great when the pages stick together.

So you would think that after having about 5 canon bubblejets break in a row [and one HP multifunction which I shall never mention again Maybe I'll stick with Canons after all], I would stop buying them. But hey, like this newspaper article I once read [and may have actually saved on my computer in the form of a blurry photograph (oh look, I almost never use my canon camera. Is it because its a canon too? Although truthfully, that's probably due to my subpar photography abilities that needs lots of touchups in the wonderful invention known as photoshop to look decent) ] mentioned, printers are practically disposable. Mehh.

My two subjects with assignments are done, but now i need to focus on the homework. Because, you know, I will be assessed on it more than likely. Whether it be of the verbal form or the quizzical form.

Since its nearing the end of semester, I’ve been thinking of getting a Tablet PC for next sem. Unfortunately, I can’t decide between a lenovo x41t or a toshiba tecra m4. *sigh* Power or weight? Who knows, but the price seems okay. However, I’m seriously might be mroe in favour of the tecra right now with everything except its weight even though I’ve always liked IBM more. Hm.

Okay, lets start with a comparison.

Comparison between a IBM/Lenovo Thinkpad x41T and a Toshiba Tecra M4

Firstly,
RAM: 1gb each and well, I do want this to be an upgrade to my current computer so I shan’t try any lower.

Processor: M4′s is faster by far with an Intel Pentium M 770 2.13GHz,Intg 2MB on-die L2 cache;533MHz FSB whereas the X41t is the older Pentium M Dothan 1.5GHz.

Harddrive: M4 is still better with an 80gb though 5400rpm drive compared to X41t’s 60gb. Of course, neither really matters thaaat much since I don’t plan on putting too much on it other than school work, photoshop, illustrator, painter, onenote, office, etc. — okay, well, it looks less than it sounds xD

Screen size: I need glasses. But I’m short sighted. However, 1280 is rather small for me on my 17″ LCD and I prefer 1024. Soo screen sizes? M4′s is 14.1″ 1400 by 1050 as the maximum I suppose, whilst the X41T is 12″. Much smaller, and much more portable. But if I look back at the ol’ 14″ CRT screen I used to have, it was still pretty small. This may be a setback, but I’m pretty sure you can set the resolution lower xD The screen bit also adds weight for the M4.

Optical storage drive: M4 has a DVD burner attached, the X41t doesn’t and its in the docking station and its a DVD-ROM/CD-RW. Hm.. ehhh. Doesn’t really matter if I can shove either onto my network but I suppose burner adds weight to the M4. According to this thread though, it doesn’t count as much http://forum.tabletpcreview.com/showthread.php?t=485

Stylus: Okay, the pen. Now this part annoys me most about the x41t and I suppose I just noticed it ^^; But anyway, it has no eraser at the top. Now, I’m quite used to this with my acecat flair, but hey now, this thing uses a wacom! M4 however has a eraser, although you apparently have to press hard to use it. But the fact that there is one is nice.

Graphics card: Weelll, x41t is.. an intel integrated chip. Ain’t going to load my Sims 2 if my current computer is any indication, whilst the m4 has an nVidia GeForce Go 6200 TE. Never did pay attention to graphics cards, but it’s apparently significantly better.

Battery: Now you’re getting somewhere! X41t is truly ultraportable in that it has an 8 cell battery and the person I might buy off packed it with two. *nods* But apparently that makes it unbalanced. Hm. The m4 however, has a 6 cell battery, and the m4 uses more power and apparently lasts only 3 hours. I suppose that’s fine if the lecture halls will have power plugs.. though I suppose I don’t mind that much since lectures hardly go for that long and I would use pen and paper in tutorials. That might need a backup battery though.

Weight: Bleh. The M4 is 2.8kg. That is pretty bad and you can hardly use it as a clipboard. Use it as a normal laptop, however, and it might be quite useful. The x41t however, is nice and light and at least 1kg less and falls under more portable.

So now, I have a dilemma. Haha. Perhaps price will decide for me, but currently, the Tecra is cheaper [yes, yes, its an auction site u.u] so I’m thinking of that. Perhaps I’ll just bring it with me and use it in certain lectures instead.

Of course, I can’t check the handwriting recognition capabilities of these two so I don’t know, however, that would be a deciding factor on what I would use it with xD.

Okay, so perhaps it is a little presumptuous that I’ll be making good enough use of it – methinks I need to study more and make sure I CAN return next semester rather than compare laptops for it. =P That said, I do plan to get some study done after the Queen’s Birthday long weekend. *yawn*
Might need to revise the latter few lectures for accounting since I’m quite stable with the practice set, QMA I need work on linear programming and onwards [although, it the latest e-quiz 4, I scored 10/10 first go so now I'm getting a little overconfident :/] Oh well, it might be best if I do the self-study questions first. As for economics, I should read over my past notes, and write some palm card sized ones with my latter lectures but CRAP o.o I need to write up answers for the discussion questions so they all fit nicely too if I get the question in the exams o.O I don’t know how long each has to be but..