computers on liveaboard for a luddite

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dunkthepunk

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about toget a laptop for a liveaboard, going to sail the med for a time,then hopefully further a field,looking for something we can use for communicating,e-mail and phone,also navigation,and research on the net,funds to buy a system and starting from scratch,but dont really want expensive running costs,would like to find what are peoples best experiences.thanks dunk
 
We bought a low-end Compaq machine from PCWorld before our year in the Med - worked fine! I personally wouldn't want to go with an expensive machine as it could easily get ruined by water etc. Any low-medium spec machine will do what you want.

For communication we used a Vodafone Connect mobile card which gave us good coverage but proved significantly more expensive than their advertised costs so we restricted useage to picking up e-mails rather than surfing the net. In most of the Med you can track down a CyberCafe for serious browsing at a few Euros per hour.

I'd certainly give consideration to getting a WiFi enabled machine for broadband - as an additional bonus you may find pockets of free coverage!

We didn't use ours for navigation as you need to have it on all the time and battery life never lasts more than a couple of hours and runs out just when you need it - but if you do I'd look at getting a connection to your main battery supply- possibly through an inverter to guarantee quality of supply rather than direct to 12v as PCs can be sensitive to input voltage. We did however use a charting package (CMap-NT) with chip reader for planning purposes when plugged into shore power.
 
Low end spec laptops available now are more than adequate for your needs. The cheapest reported so far is the Acer from Tesco (although that may have been a special offer cause it is not shown on their website), followed by the Dell.

A wifi capability would certainly be useful, although if the spec doesnt include it, a PCMIA card will provide it.
 
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A wifi capability would certainly be useful, although if the spec doesnt include it, a PCMIA card will provide it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Just to let you know that PCMIA is now sometimes refered to by the name 'PC Card' - just to confuse the bewildered ! /forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif
 
Agree that low-end machine will now do the job.

I power laptop with a very small inverter that keeps the computer running for navigation without worries of battery closing down machine at a critical time.

Got the inverter from a car accessories shop as I remember. Was very cheap.
 
Howdy Dunk,

Finally something I might be able to give advice on after everyone being so kind to me…

Laptops can become a very personable item; meaning that depending on if you like large screen resolutions and things like that will depend on the level of machine you get. If you want to use it for phone services, it might sound stupid but check that it has a built in sound and mic-in facility and has at the very least 2 USB slots.

Be very careful when purchasing the “ultra – cheap” laptop as sometimes these are old stock and the manufacturers won’t support them anymore.

I am assuming that all of you may have heard of SKYPE? If not, and you have a broadband connection then you are wasting one of your computers greatest potentials – free and highly discounted phone calls. Unfortunately most of my relatives live in Australia and my wife and child live in Spain whilst I work in England during the week. PC to PC calls are free (you can even conference call) and PC – Landline cost around 1p per minute to anywhere in the world! You can even get a number from them so people can call you from Landlines and guess what? It comes with a voicemail service, so it would be really handy for when you get back from being out in the blue, to know you haven’t missed a call.

I paid ₤25 for a USB phone handset, which looks and acts just like a mobile phone. The clarity of the calls are as good or better then standard landline calls 95% of the time.

One other option to think about is using what is called a GSM modem. What this does is allow you to subscribe from someone like Vodafone for a Data Package on your mobile phone. It will cost you around ₤20 per month and will let you easily check emails and things. You just slide your SIM card into the modem and do the job. It isn’t broadband speed though but is a viable choice for communicating along as your ISP provides worldwide local dialing points. (myhosting.com does. I have used them for about 10 years now)

If you go the broadband data rate card route, make sure you understand the speed requirements for your laptop as well as investing in a separate WIFI card as a lot of Marinas now offer wireless broadband services. Again, your choice of card is critical as it needs to work with standard points. I can recommend a Netgear 54 –g & or n rated WIFI card which is around max connection speed on a standard commercial setup.

I hope this has helped a little.

Good luck.
 
I agree that a laptop with WiFi is the way to go as wireless techogoly is moving so fast and many areas are giving access for a low cost or free.
Low to medium spec will do as if the water does get in you have less to lose and these will run what you are looking for with ease.

With the advent of VoIP services such as Skype and the new WiMax technoloy that is due out soon the mobile phone companies will have to bring done there costs so connecting through your mobile or a datacard is only going to get cheaper which is good news.
 
Hello,

Does it pretty much have to be a laptop then, for naviagtion, becuase of the power requirments, etc? I was thinking of getting one computer to use for work (artist), navigation, and maybe as a telly :-) I couldn't use a laptop for work though as the screen isn't big enough! Maybe I should get a laptop and an additioanl monitor for use in moorings, which is the only place I'd be working anyway. Or maybe I should go back to pencils and paper. I haven't even got a boat yet, I'm just planning my impending escape from the daily grind.

Dave.
 
What size screen do you need. My laptop has a 17" widescreen, so hardly a laptop I guess but it does make it easier to move around than a pc.

You can always hook it up to an LCD tv as well if you need a bigger screen.
 
We have been living aboard for over a year and came down to the Med this summer. I have a Dell Inspiron 8600 with most of the add-ons; not exactly top of the range but a long way from the bottom. Having come from medium speed desktops, the first thing that struck me was how slow laptops are.

I do not do real time nav with the laptop - I just do route planning and upload to the plotter and radar, before we sail. I also use the laptop for the SSB - emails, weatherfax, RTTY and longer distance Navtex. And general internet using WiFi (with a powerful yagi antenna that gives me connection up to a mile away).

Apart from that, I use it for the normal office things - Word, Excel, etc. but the thing that requires the greatest speed is making DVDs from home movies and stills. That, and manipulating and editing still pictures, of course.

Given all the costs of getting set up to live aboard and go to the Med, I think you might consider it worth investing a bit in a decent spec laptop - unless you are on a very tight budget in which case, as others have said, you could manage with a basic machine.
 
A 12volt cable is a good buy, as you can then use the laptop even without shore power or generator. We check weather online and pick up email using a Vodafone Connect card. As mentioned earlier, you do have to be careful or it costs a lot.

Where would you put a desktop computer and monitor? I'm not sure how well they would withstand the motion of the boat - remember you can get very short seas in the Med.

I think laptops may be made more to withstand being moved than a normal computer as they are intended to be carried about, put in cars and planes etc.

While at sea I keep my laptop well padded in a special locker that we had made inside a desk, and its not too difficult to dig it out when needed. I can't see that it would be easy to store a desktop and monitor and yet have them quickly available when required.
 
You could try Aria for cheap screens. We use 2 Shuttle PCs for work which fit in a small bag and travel to and fro between office and boat (currently sitting in the saloon with 2 of these running with 2 x 17" flat screens) - keep screens and wireless k/boards/mice in each location but also use a laptop for other things when mains power not available or don't want to use inverter. Flat screen prices dropping rapidly - we even have a 20" Dell which is superb quality - the longer you wait the cheaper they'll be !
 
About using laptops, the motherboard on mine blew this summer. This was after a particularly session tacking hard all day, despite the fact that laptops are designed to be bumped around a bit. Or maybe it was something in the shorepower that disagreed with it. Or maybe it would have blown anyway.

Anyway, the interesting(ish) thing was that the local computer place (in Finland_ was going to charge 80 Euro an hour (minimum 80 Euro) just to diagnose the problem. They said that if it was a problem with the motherboard, it would cost 100's of Euro to put right, and I might as well buy a new computer.

I took the computer instead to an authorised notebook repair place in Poland. They charged a flat fee of £8 to look at the computer, which they would waive anyway if I repaired it with them. They diagnosed that the motherboard had failed. The total cost of replacing it, including their fee and the new motherboard was... £50.

Moral: don't bother trying to repair computers in western Europe, bring them somewhere more sensible!
 
p.s.

Also had a hard disc fail in a desktop and took it to a specialist data recovery place that quoted £800 to recover the data. Then took it instead to a place round the corner that recovered the data AND repaired the disc for... £16 /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
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