[Sabbo]

Hey everyone,

Me and two friends are planning to go backpacking through Europe early next year.

Since we'll be bringing digital cameras along one of my friend's suggested that we should hire a laptop (we plan to be over there for approx. 3 months) so we can store the photos from the cameras on it and access internet/email.

Has anyone got experience with brining a Laptop along backpacking?

What he plans to do is to leave it at relative's houses (I have relatives in Austria while my other friend has relatives in Malta)

His plan would be for example to leave the Laptop in Malta, go exploring Italy, then come back, grab the Laptop and head off to Austria.

I personally think this just increases travel cost and we aren't as flexible by going back and forth to pick up things.

I like the basic idea of the Laptop for storing photos though

Any suggestions? Thanks!!

[Kellie]

I have never traveled with one extensively, but keep in mind they are really heavy, just going from my University to the Airport, and then transfering from one flight to another with my laptop was enough for me to really second guess it. My advice would be to buy the cords for it and and just them and the hostel computers, and invest in a good online storage space instead. I would make sure that your average computer has this capacity, and you might want to try it on several computers before you go. Although, there are 3 of you and you can share the weight, it is definately a cumbersome and generally just an expensive piece of deadweight if you are trying to travel light.
good luck

[PhunkyFeelOne]

Hi

I'm about to head off to Europe myself, and was originally planning to do the same, laptop & digital camera style.

I've had 2 weeks experiencing doing the same in 2003, but found it to be a real pain after about 3 days...for the following reasons:

1. Make sure your travel insurance covers it.
2. What happens if you lose it? You've lost all your memories of your trip, plus any excess on your insurance, plus you'll still be paying for the hire.
3. It may not seem heavy (now), but it is awkward
and fragile-ish. And it's an extra bit of luggage.
4. It is cheaper and easier to go to a net cafe for internet\email - plus, it's often where you meet other travellers.
5. Having to constantly keep an eye on it EVERYWHERE you go, practically handcuffing it to your wrist.

The only semi-solution i have thought of so far is a USB storage drive that you can go to a net cafe, plug it and your camera\s in, dump it to the drive, then sort it all out later. Either that or a series of CDRW discs. My only question is whether net cafe's have USB ports or CDRW drives to use. (Maybe someone can answer that one???)

I think i'll end up doing the USB HDD think, get an 80Gb drive. That way I can:
1. store music on it, so I can update stuff on my MP3 unit.
2. Store copies of documents on it, for quick reference.
3. Copy pictures and Video
4. Burn stuff off it to CDR and send it home


Hope this has given you some ideas, let me\the forum know what you find out!

[Sabbo]

Yeah I've been suggesting ideas like that to him. All of them obviosuly have advantages/disadvantages

Laptop - Disadv.: Everything that you mentioned

Pro's: can view/upload pictures anywhere/anytime (like we could transfer pics at night)

USB Device: Disadv: cost, can't preview images, computer required

Pro: Small, stores lots of pictures/files

Webspace: In general it's not a good idea because you depend on internet connection + the hosting cost. Especially when considering that we probably we'll have pictures amounting to a few Gigabytes.

Extra Memory Card(s): Use Internet Cafe/Photo shop/Friends/Relatives houses to burn images on cd. Make 2 copies; 1 copy gets sent home and one stays with me. That way I (we) have a backup

Disadv: Availability of facilities and cost of card

I still kind of favour the last Idea


This brings me to my next point. I was just talking to my friend (Evan) and he seems to have this plan in his head to basically use a Relative's house as a "Base Camp", take sets of spare clothes and then make short trips and return. Then take everything and move on

Eg: Leave "extra" luggage on Malta, bring spare clothes and tour around Italy, stay at hostels overnight, then come back to Malta, pick up things and go on to Austria

Advantages: A safe place for storage (i hope [img]smile.gif[/img] )
Not too much weight to carry around

Disadvantges: Travel cost/time to get back to place
Dependent on "Base Camp"
Maybe a bit "rude"

My idea would be like:

Leave Malta (take all belongings) and move our way up north, when we find a place we like we look for a place for the night (hostel most likely), leave our backpacks in the room (except valuables of course [img]smile.gif[/img] ) and then explore the town/city. Then move on.

My way has the disadvantage of carrying everything around (at least until we have found a place to store it)

Advantages is that we are independant and aren't "chained" to a place. Also more cheaper/time effective (considering that we don't have to go back and pick up our gear)

Of course we will hopefully be able to stay at relatives for a few nights.
My grandmother for example owns a guesthouse in Salzburg (Austria) so it's no problem there.

It also depends how far away. I just think it's a bit redicilous if we are in Rome and want to go on to Austria that we have to travel over 700k's back to Malta to get the rest of our belongings.

A combination of his and my idea would probably work the best I think

We all go to the same school so we're going discuss it more tomorrow with our other friend (Jonathan)


What do you guys think,

Thanks again!

Sebastian

[ 08. March 2004, 16:10: Message edited by: Sabbo ]

[PhunkyFeelOne]

I only just realised you were from Sydney!

I'm kind of doing the "Base Camp" thing, a brother near Marseille (FR.), Dutch family (Dad's side), Irish family (Mum's side), plus a couple of other options. My "trips" will be more like month long adventures.

Getting a bit off the topic though...

You say you want to "download pics at night", but if you leave the laptop at your "base", that kind of kills that idea!!! A 40Gb USB drive (should be enough for a couple of weeks of hi-res shots) is around $200 if you shop around.
I had a pro digital still camera with a 1gb Microdrive, which took 15min of broadcast quality video to fill (or about 1000 1 megapixel still shots). So a 40Gb drive should be plenty of space (hint, if you go down this path, spend the extra $50 or so and get a laptop drive instead, more compact) The outright purchase cost would be less than the hire\insurance cost of a laptop (plus you own it afterwards)

There are $hitloads of internet cafe's in Europe. You won't be short of places to go. Remember also that libraries have computers.

Online storage, agree 100%, too much data.

Ultimately, it's your (and your mate's) choice, but having done it for 2 weeks myself last year, never again.

[Sabbo]

We're gonna go with the "Burn Pictures to cd option". As you said I'm sure there will be many places around where computers are available and these days most have a USB drive and Burner. Plus most Photoshops do it as well.

200$? wow not bad. We'll see. We haven't done much budgeding yet. Just some rough estimates and at the moment we're all saving up for the trip.

We also decided that we'll take all our stuff with us unless it's really just a 1 or 2 day trip and it's not too far away.

I can't wait for this year to end. I'm really looking forward to the trip [img]smile.gif[/img]

I came to Australia about 3.5 years ago from Austria and have only been back once about 2 years ago so it will be great to see all my old friends and relatives again. I haven't been out much of Austria (can you believe it) so I'm looking forward to the experiene especially that I can share it with two of my friends.

I was stressing about the final exams at school this year but now it's not as important anymore. I'm still gonna do my best but if I don't get the results I need for University it won't be "the end of the world"

Thanks for all your input. I'll keep you's updated on my (our) progress

[ 08. March 2004, 19:07: Message edited by: Sabbo ]

[Acerace]

Just try and keep it simple guys.

A laptop will draw attention to you, and if they are storing all you photos, and it gets stolen, thats that!

If you want to take a digital camera, buy 2 or 3 or 4 128mb memory cards, they are each good for about 500 photos at pretty good quality. Are you going to be taking 2000 photos?!? Here in England they sell for £30, approx $60 us. They are tiny and will not draw attention to the fact that you are carrying $2000 worth of computer with you. They are easy to carry, or post home if required.

Also, dont forget that there is extra security at airports for laptops these days.....all in all surely several memory cards are the best option?

I hope ive helped

Acerace

[PhunkyFeelOne]

Oh yeah, I forgot about the airport thing too! I was at Heathrow last year and woke to the infamous "Tanks at Heathrow" headline...yeah, fun...

In general, it was a pain because it had to be unpacked from the bag (at EVERY airport, and I passed through airport security 9 times, with no exceptions) and in Italy they made me actually boot it up!

In Oz, a cheap 128Mb SD Card card costs around A$104 (~42 pound) - get 2 of those, and you're already up to the cost of the 40Gb external USB drive (which can be used to store music, documents, pictures from home etc.)

Anyway, I guess it's up to the individual, final advice is no laptop. [img]smile.gif[/img]

[PhunkyFeelOne]

Sorry, had to add this:

http://www.lacie.com/au/products/product.htm?id=10063

Prices as follows:
20gb, USB2, A$240
20gb, Firewire\USB2, A$379
40gb, USB2,A$313
40gb, Firewire\USB2, A$469
60gb, Firewire\USB2, A$579, a bit silly now...

or, you can buy a case-kit for about A$30, and buy whatever laptop HDD you want to put in it.

[ 09. March 2004, 19:33: Message edited by: PhunkyFeelOne ]

[Tim Uden]

I've travelled with a laptop and wouldn't do it again. Although it is a nice thing to have if you stop somewhere for six months or so, it is too much hassle when you're on the move.

If you really want to view your pictures when you're on the road then you should just bring along a Pocket PC. They do most things a regular computer can do but fit in your pocket so they aren't a hassle to carry around and they don't make you a target for theives.

You just have to make sure that it uses the same size memory card as your camera. You also have to realise that a Pocket PC doesn't have enough memory to copy your photos to it so you will still need to take extra memory cards with you.

Memory cards (Compact Flash, SD, etc) are cheap in the UK (look for prices on www.amazon.co.uk) but it is also worth checking the prices in Australia before leaving home (look for prices on www.ht.com.au).

Of course you can always do what most other people do and just bring along a camera and a big memory card and pop into a camera shop or a decent internet café to burn your photos onto a CD whenever the memory card has filled up.

A USB HDD thing is a good idea as long as you have a way of getting your pictures copied across to it.