Ferrari 4005: Other Reviews are Misleading!

My Ferrari was just backed off the truck -- the FedEx truck that is. I saw the FedEx truck out the window so I sent my housekeeper/aid running to the door to lay across the threshhold so the driver couldn't escape without a signature. You see, I am trying to recover from disabling back surgery so I can't even get to the door. Even though FedEx knows me well enough to leave packages, I'm was deathly afraid they wouldn't leave a Ferrari at my door step unprotected. She got there in plenty of time. I've had her practicing wind sprints in view of having the two day delivery notice.

Okay, the packaging was very nice. I'm not going into that. Also, I've read about how nice the laptop looks and I have even looked at photographs. Everyone has their own adjectives which I am not going to try to summarize. The reason is that none of you adequately prepared me for the absolute beauty of this machine. Not a "laptop." Not a "lappy." Not a "notebook." Not even a "cutie pie." It's a "MACHINE" How else do I put it into words that are not misleading. If any of you bought a BMW or Mercedes in the '80s, after owning an American car, and opened the hood with the engine idling, and you weren't sure if the car was actually running. That was a MACHINE. Fit and finish of mechanical parts. I haven't even started this machine up yet, but that's the impression I get. Power, Precision. I don't own an F-4005 laptop. I own an F-4005 machine.

Also, more specifically, it almost doesn't look like a laptop. I love the fit and finish of my Sony and, to a lesser degree, my Dell. Not the same as this machine. This looks like a carbon ingot. It almost looks like a ledger book made of glass. While the colors and tags are differernt, they are interesting and not ostentatious. It's a DIFFERENT MACHINE

Okay. Gotta go. I'm thinking about opening it up and looking at the keyboard and screen. If you want, I will edit this as I make more discoveries.

Addendum: Step #2: NTFS, Keyboard, Screen, Mouse, Backup


File conversion went smoothly. If you're going to do it from a DOS prompt, you are going to have to remember the name of your volume/partition. From the factory, mine was set as Acer and Acerdata for C: and D:, respectively. If you do it from My Computer - right click, reformat, make sure it is set on NTFS. It will reformat and covert the files. Slower than DOS because of reformatting, easier, and no volume name to deal with.

Keyboard. I am a touch typist. Typing was the best course I ever took in High School. Because of it, it makes my D600 unusable for me, with the Delete key three keys in from the right instead of in the top right corner. Also Dell's keyboard is too mushy. The F-4005 keyboard is great. A quality equivalent to IBM and Sony. Hard to say if exactly the same but I would rate it excellant. The curve is absolutely fine. Took about a minute to adjust. The whole layout and quality is consistent with my initial impression of this MACHINE.

The Screen. Absolutely beautiful. Looks like a movie screen. Moving from two 14.1" laptops to this and moving to this resolution is like dumping your 35" TV for a 52" DLP with a Maverick chip or a Plasma. For those of you who have done it or sit looking at them on display, you know what I mean.

The fan. You must be kidding me. What fan? Since I am doing a bit of recovering, bed rest is my life. I have a stand next to my bed which until today had just a Sony and Dell running full time. Now it also has the Machine which running "full time." Hold on a second. I just had to take a break to hold the unit up to my ear to make sure it had a fan. I got worried for a second. I think I heard it (and my ears are fine). Of course, I have a/c, a fan, a kid on the phone, a wife who breathes, a TV, a dog, some gas, etc. I can't imagine this fan coming into play except maybe in a library. I'll get back to you if that should become relevant.

Processor. This machine boots up on a moment's notice. Admittedly, the programs are not loaded yet but it is obvious that it flies. I'll get back to you in a few days as the machine gets populated.

DVD. I don't hear any noises that are of any moment whatsover while the DVDs load. Sounds fine. Normal. Loads fast. After all it is a mechanism. Nothing negative whatsoever. Made a recovery disk using a DUAL layer DVD. I am sure it is a waste of a dual layer, but it felt great having one disk and it was the only DVD I had. It went smooth as silk using a Verbatim.

Heat. Remember the bedrest? That does not mean sitting up in bed. Guess where this machine sits. It's been running for about 4 hours. Not even warm. True, it is only idling. Nothing really taxing the processor but that's a very good start. I'll get back to you on this.

Touchpad. This is my only criticism so far. I like my pointer to fly across the screen. Despite setting the pointer movement to the highest setting, it is not fast enough for me. This may just be a function of the driver software having to move the pointer a greater distance across the 15.4" screen. I imagine the 17" owners have a greater problem. I would like to see this addressed. But no heat leakage yet in or around the touchpad or palmrest.

Well that's Day Number 1 and I am running out of steam. I hope this gives you a little bit of a different perspective from a different type of user. Tomorrow I am hoping to move on to applications and getting more familiar with my MACHINE

If you tell me that this is of no use, I will stop my rambling.

By the way, props out to Buy.com. I ordered the F-4005 on Wedneday late afternoon with 2 day delivery. It left Oregon that evening and was delivered to me in Florida before noon on Friday. Also, I worked with Yub.com which is a social club/buyers discount mall combination site. They have arrangements with major retailers like Buy.com, Dell, Target, Apple, Foot Locker, Sony, etc. etc. I am not looking to meet anyone but I was happy to get a 3% discount. I have used them many times which has paid for the small membership fee many times over (just in my first order). When I ran into a little bit of a problem with my order, they actually assisted me. All around, I dealt with nice people at Yub.com and Buy.com. (I have no interest in them except I am particularly sensitive right now to people who make my life easier).

Please, tell me if you want me to continue with my rambling review!

Addendum: Step #3 That 5 degree keyboard started smiling at me and got me going again! It's alive!

Well the applications have to be installed so I am up and running again. They absolutely fly by. Sometimes you hardly get to see the progress bar. I know it's not like gaming but to install Office on a customized basis and to be done in a minute is pretty amazing. Firefox done in like 30 seconds. These are just guesses because they flew; that's the best I can say.

Speakers. Again, I must be missing something from the other reviewers. I guess again it's the gaming issue. For the sound affects from applications these are by far better speakers than the other two laptops I am using. Quality and Volume. The placement of the speakers where your palms rest I guess is somewhat questionable because you actually want to to hear this sound it is so good. If you are traveling and you want to see a DVD they probably are well positioned. In any case, laptop speakers are never going to be more than adequate and these are fine.

Touchpad. I just had two failures of the scrolling feature of the touchpad on this site. Have to go to the scrolling bar rather than use the pad. Not sure what that's about yet. It looks to me more like user error rather than a failure in that a little bar appears next to the cursor as if I am supposed to do something with it. Once time it did crash, however, with a report to Mircrosoft. Any problems reported with Firefox, this touchpad and this forum's software? No problem when using Firefox on my Sony and I think it's a Synaptics like this but not with the center button. So far that's the only thing I haven't figured out yet. I'm not big on opening manuals until it's too late! Is it a finger tip rest?

AC Adapter. Seems about the same size, weight and heat as my Sony and Dell. Dell D600's might be lighter. Nothing overwhelming or particularly unusual here. Just normal.

The screen is more and more amazing. Brightness, clarity, definition/resolution. However, I am almost getting psyched out by it. I have to reduce the window of my programs so much (have you ever run Word in Wide Screen?), I am starting to think that maybe I need a smaller laptop to travel with. This is despite the fact that it is only about 2 inches wider than my Sony and Dell, probably 50% thinner than my Sony and 25% thinner than my Dell (estimates) and a pound lighter than my Sony. It just looks so massive that it makes me want to peck on a tiny keyboard @ 3 pounds to travel with. I guess it's just a matter of getting used to having a widescreen MACHINE on your lap.

Have any of you given some thought to organizing 100gb? My thoughts are to put Program Files on c:\ and then communication programs (Firefox, AOL, Winfax, etc.) and game programs on d:\ along with data. I guess that's because Program Files is my biggest directory while many of you it might be games. Also, I have a lot of data from Word, Word Perfect and Excel.

Confession: I was stupid. I thought the wallpaper calendar was a calendaring program. Took about two clicks and a right click to realize otherwize. Anyone who mentions this is not my buddy. Since hardly any of you have shown much interst in my travails, you're not my buddy anyway so don't talk to me.

Covert.

Thanks. I updated my review but it seems like there's little interest in a non-technical running commentary. Also, my humour/ranting is obviously not unappreciated. That's cool. No worry. But ... I think I am going to trash it before someone burns it down. It's you and me against the world.

I'll sleep on it ... but I don't sleep. Now what?

Depressed.

Bad night. A lot of pain so I was up until past 4 am. But when I woke up the site of that MACHINE on the stand by my bed (sitting on top of the Dell) brought a smile to my face. Don't worry, the Sony is okay. It was sitting on its side on the floor. All units still humming and cool.

I don't think I am going to be able to get out of bed to locate my key numbers for my software today. Also waiting for delivery of some new software bought at very competive prices. Not sure if it's on a truck or rubber raft crossing very large oceans. Big, big rest day all because I had the nerve and take the family out for dinner. (Sitting is the kiss of death for me in a body brace. WTF so is standing, walking, laying down. Great.).

BTW is the red on the sides painted or impregnated plastic?

Maybe later or tomorrow if I don't blow this thread up first! Thanks for the very limited support, guys and girls.

YinYang - I don't play games. Maybe I should. If I had to start from scratch with one game, what should it be. Is there any socially redeeming game that includes killing and/or space ships? It should also take advantage of the MACHINE'S attributes.

Battlefield 2 is Socially Redeeming on F-4005?

Covert -

I checked Battlefield 2 out. Looks socially redeeming to me. I might buy some sandbags and put around the doors just to add some realism. I just read that the Pentagon for the first time in history is now making contigency battle plans for uniformed attacks within the US. I am now NRA member but maybe this "game" helps prepare us??!!

Maybe your were just short sighted in your studies.

1. Do you need controls to effectively play?
2. Do you need to play on Internet in groups?
3. Do you play it on your 1.1GHz? or on a faster desktop? How do you think it will do on the MACHINE?

You know, with the President's announcement about visiting Mars, Quake 4 is starting to look practical.

Guys - I finally felt good enough to give you an Addendum - Step #3 today. See above!

I hope you have a great party tonight. Where is it?

Nice call on the touchpad, reptar. Thanks. Definitely takes care of the scroll issue but doesn't help the speed issue as I was hoping. I like the pointer to move very fast across the screen. I already have it on the fastest setting. Needs another boost. Seems like it would be fast enough if the screen was 14.1 but, to me, it needs a little more turbo charging to get it across 15.4". Maybe it takes a little getting used to.

Weekend Update

Well, this weekend went "smooth as silk." I told you about my major problem with the scrolling of the touchpad which was quickly resolved by a driver update. Other than Winfax, all software installed perfectly - and rediculously fast. I guess the only way of putting it in perspective is sending you back to a 33.3k download of Explorer vs. Broadband. Maybe that's not even valid. You almost don't get to see the progress bar on certain program installations. Sometimes I like knowing what component is being installed. What to do? Whew! Done. I can't get the next disk fast enough.

Keyboard. I keep coming back to this because of it's importance to me. This was a deal breaker if the keyboard was bad. In transfering over some data I had to go back to my D600. I am telling you it took me minutes to type an email address just because of that damn delete key location and some related misplacments or misalignment of keys. Yet on the MACHINE I was blasting away in seconds. I don't think it took me a solid minute to become acclumated. Okay, there is some minor clickiness of some keys but nothing that stops you from typing. Everything is where it belongs. Also I note that you catch your fingers on the bottom sides of the keys when they are rebouding. Still minor. A feeling, not an impediment. I am sure I won't notice it after a while.

Screen Sizing. One annoying thing that I know is a user (a/k/a ME) problem is that some programs do not retain their last screen size. So when I reopen Firefox, I need stadium seating to work on the keyboard. It is so wide, I expect space ships to be flying across the screen. I haven't checked to see if this is the same in all programs or not.

Drive Organization. Well I committed to this organization of the partitions. C:\ obviously goes to Program Files. D:\ I seperated out what I call Communication Program Files (Firefox, AOL, Winfax, maybe Thunderbird, etc.), Utility Programs (antivirus, spyware) and Data which is a big one for me (Word, Excel). That's my way of balancing it out. Games would also go in their own directory on D:\Game Program Files because I would have many more applications than games.

Cases. I guess this will become the next issue. Any suggestions?

Symantec has made a few suggestions as to why Winfax crashes but so far no success.

BEAUTY AND THE BEAST Well, there has been a lot of talk about how good this MACHINE looks and the relative cost-reward of spending a few hundred extra on its looks. So far every visitor I had this weekend spent all the time talking about the Beauty. Little attention was paid to the Beast. I leave it to you to figure out which is which!

Thanks to you all (including Moderators) for not blowing this type of commentary off. I know it's not the norm.

Well it's been running for one week, and I am happy to report I have nothing new to report. The MACHINE is solid as a rock. The OS is solid. I cannot find anything to complain about other than the movement of the pointer is a little slower than I would prefer and the caps on the bottom of the keys catch on your fingers a little like Dell's. (Otherwise, nothing like a Dell keyboard!) It's fast......, clear, quiet, barely warm, good looking and classy. Quality of build is the best I've seen. So that's it for now.

Will do regarding getting into some games. Just have to get well enough to get out of a body cast and sit up comfortably for a prolonged time. Sounds like you guys are going at it for hours. Also, I don't think banging away on a mouse-keypad combo would work well while laying in bed! Thanks to all you well wishers.