IBM ThinkPad in Van...

[Sydnoahmom]

DH wants to bring his along in van when driving to WDW. He plans on using it for work and for the kids to watch DVD's. Its battery life is only about 3 hours. My neighbor suggested buying a power inverter(?) at Wal-Mart. Has anyone done this or have a differnt idea??

TIA,
Laurie

 

[Brian Noble]

If you're going to do less than six hours of driving per day, you could try getting another battery. However, playing DVDs keeps the processor pretty busy, and might give you even less time on one charge than you are accustomed to.

I toyed with the idea of a power inverter, but ended up buying a portable DVD player instead---I found a good deal on a Polaroid 7" model. If you go that route you want something like this:

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?type=product&id=1091100745000

Of the two options, the inverter is almost certainly cheaper than the battery, by a factor of around 2.

 

[cranbiz]

I have a Compaq E500 that I use on long trips. The power inverter works great with it and it was only about $60.00.

I got mine from West Marine on sale, but you can get them in most places.

 

[Lora]

This is exactly what we do. Dh uses his thinkpad for work and when it's dark, we let the kids watch a dvd on it. We plug the computer into the cig. lighter using an auto power adapter my dh got at Best Buy. We also have some sort of adapter that sends the sound through the cassette player to the speakers. I don't know what it's called, but it is a wire attached to a cassette tape.

 

[Geoff_M]

I'd recommend the power inverter over a dedicated car adapter for the laptop. The inverter is more flexible as it can be used for a number of lower wattage items that require AC power. For example, I plug my camera battery recharger into my inverter. The laptop adapter can only be used for the laptop.

 

[Sydnoahmom]

Thanks for the advice, I think we'll go with the power inverter. I'll be able to charge my camcorder and digital camera, too.