What do you do with your laptops?

[nollidttam]

For some reason, I'm suddenly concerned about our laptops being stolen out of our room. We are staying off site. I guess because most safes are too small for laptops.
So what do y'all do with your laptops when you are at the parks?
Thanks so much!

 

[Indio]

We leave ours at home. My oldest has already asked if he could take his with us - I said no. We're going on vacation away from computers! We don't need to check work e-mails or anything either, so it's not like we need one with us. You could rent a locker at the parks to store them. The lockers are around $7 for the day and they are big enough.

 

[nollidttam]

Yeah, I've thought of not taking them, but we'll be there for 2 weeks and want a place to upload our photos to every night.

 

[torsie24]

I have a new netbook which is tiny and will fit into a safe, BUT if yours definitely wont, then what we tend to do for stuff that wont fit in a safe is put everything we don;t want on dislpay into our suitcase and lock the case.

Yes there is nothing to stop someone taking your whole case, but it makes me feel a bit safer on the occasions we don't have a safe.

 

[cuchu2005]

Hi, whenever we carry valuables that don't fit in the safe or when there's no safe at all, we don't totally unpack. We leave some clothing in the suitcase, and we hide whatever the item is concealed in there. If it's dirty clothes, the better. We then lock our suitcase with a lock. Finally we put the suitcase in the closet, if there's space enough in it.

I know it doesn't sound fail proof, but people usally think that suitcases are empty (moreover if they are in the closet). If it's a moderate reputation hotel I don't think someone would go to the extent of violating the padlock or taking the entire suitcase.

So far, that has worked for us, and not only at Disney (we've always stayed off site), but every city we've visited.

Hope it helps,

Mx

 

[torsie24]

Great minds Mx

 

[nollidttam]

Thanks so much for helping me put my mind at ease. That is exactly what I had been thinking of doing, just wasn't sure how smart it was! I even thought of using a bike chain to tether my suitcase to the closet rod..but figured that was a bit overkill!!

 

[LilMommyBug]

We plan on putting ours in our suitcase w/dirty clothes on top.

 

[wilde_oscar]

I ahve traveled with a lot of high dollar electronics... in general, I don't leave anything sitting out, I put it all back in the bag or carry case. and put it in a pile wit hthe rest of the dirty laundry. no one ever seems to care

 

[SCDisneyFan]

One thing that advocate doing is using zip-ties to lock your zippers closed. When I travel, I purchase zipties of an uncommon color, and use them to tell whether or not someone has attempted to tamper with my bags, etc... If you really get creative you can use them to tamper-proof several things in the room, and them simply cut them away when you need to enter your case. I worry that luggage locks arent tamper-proof enough because some can be opened and closed back without leaving a hint of what was done (if you know what your doing). I keep the main stash of ties in the room safe so one cannot be replaced if it is cut loose. I use this not to prevent bags from being stolen, but to prevent small things from being stolen out of bags that I may not notice till I got home. There are plenty of things that for one reason or another I cant fit into the room safe, and many places that I would rather not leave open to someone whos looking for a quick take, or even simply just curious.

 

[jennc27]

We found a lock for our laptop. It looks like a bike chain with a loop on one end and the other has a number combination lock that hooks into the computer. We plan on looping it onto a large non moveable item, like the bed, or use the clothes rack and putting clothes on top of it to hide it. Still working on how to hide it. We found it on sale at Wal-Mart for $10.00. They are normally around $40.00.

 

[wild4dis]

I always travel with my laptop..work and pleasure.

We were just at OKW for 9 nights with 3 laptops in one room and left them hooked up on the counter in the living area, now I know that mousekeeping only came to our room once (maybe twice??) in that timeframe because of DVC setup, but we have done this for years with no issues. I loaded photos, updated DIS board and yes, even checked work emails every night. Kids like having it to surf the web (Facebook!!)on some downtime and dvds for the plane.
I have brought my laptop to AS-Sport and POFQ in the past, put it in the laptop bag and in the closet area with no problems.......

 

[WillCAD]

Thanks so much for helping me put my mind at ease. That is exactly what I had been thinking of doing, just wasn't sure how smart it was! I even thought of using a bike chain to tether my suitcase to the closet rod..but figured that was a bit overkill!!

That's not a bad idea, except that I think the closet rods in most of the hotels and resorts are fairly fragile and would probably rip right out. But it would probably work well at the Values, since they don't have rods, per se, but have Rubbermaid wire shelving in the vanity area that's a little more robust.

We found a lock for our laptop. It looks like a bike chain with a loop on one end and the other has a number combination lock that hooks into the computer. We plan on looping it onto a large non moveable item, like the bed, or use the clothes rack and putting clothes on top of it to hide it. Still working on how to hide it. We found it on sale at Wal-Mart for $10.00. They are normally around $40.00.

When I stay at a WDW resort, it's always one of the Values. The Values have wire shelving in the vanity area, and I use one of those steel cable laptop locks to secure my laptop to the shelf by weaving the cable in and out among multiple tines. I typically throw some stuff on top to make it less conspicuous, though of course a professional hotel thief will immediately look in the drawers, on the shelves, and in the luggage for valuables (if a bag is locked, the thief will simply cart the whole thing off and cut it open at his leisure - it's only locked if there is something worth stealing inside it!)

A laptop cable is like The Club. It won't prevent a theft if the thief has bolt cutters, but it will slow down the average grab-and-dash artist who is looking stricltly for portable items of value that he can dump into a handy bag or suitcase and run to the pawn shop.

 

[TronkoMouse]

I just brought my *older* laptop with me last week to POR and left it out on the desk all week running and screen locked. Before going down I cleaned out my browser cache and password store and keep any important files on it in an encrypted drive using TrueCrypt. Taking those precautions I felt that there was really nothing of value that anyone could get at if it was peeked at or stolen. I backed up all the photos we were taking onto a flash drive and kept that in the safe.

Not that I was purposely looking in room windows with open shades while walking to/from our room, but I must have seen about a half dozen laptops sitting out on tables just like mine (one wasn't even screen locked).

Since it seems relatively common to have a laptop in your room, I would be much more concerned about an iPod or iPhone walking out the door than a laptop.

--Kevin

 

[Hoan & Poopie]

Not a laptop but we always have a camera with us that's too big to fit in the safe. When we don't bring it with us we have always left it locked in a suitcase. Not covered with dirty laundry though......we put that thing up to our eye!

 

[SnowandMittens]

When my BF and I brought our laptop down, we took the charger and the battery and locket them in the safe. We used the laptop lock that someone mentioned earlier and locked it in the room.

It was fine, but we also would leave a coat or something over it, just in case.

We also took a picture of the serial number on the bottom of the computer and we have the kind of insurance that if your laptop is stolen, our company will replace it.

 

[nollidttam]

Wow such great ideas..thanks!
My dh asked the same question that another poster mentioned....if it is locked, isn't that more of an incentive for someone to think there is something of value in there.
So now..where do I get these laptop locks? In the electonics dept?

 

[SnowandMittens]

Yup! I got mine at Walmart for about $20.

 

[RocketCityMama]

When we went in Dec we took both laptops and just put them in the laptop bags we took and put them with our luggage. Once I think I left mine sitting out all day and there were no issues. We stayed on property at CSR and I really never felt like I had to worry about it. I think hubby may have put his in the safe, only because it's a work computer with alot of classified info.

 

[webstah]

Yeah, I've thought of not taking them, but we'll be there for 2 weeks and want a place to upload our photos to every night.

I have three memory sticks for my camera.
Using them, I can hold well over 1,000 high def pictures, a well as 2 hrs of video I can shoot with the camera. I can also buy additional ones at Disney if needed. (it hasn't been necessary yet)
I upload everything to my PC when I get home.
All my stuff fits in the room safe.