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Author Topic: Chinese computer?  (Read 2082 times)

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Offline KenC

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Chinese computer?
« on: February 22, 2012, 10:45:27 AM »
My lady is coming to me next week and I admit to some mild panic feelings.  LOL  Any tips for preparation will be appreciated.  Cleaning and ridding the place of any "Ex" material is a given.  Remember, this is not my first rodeo.  I guess I am looking for more specific input on an arriving Asian.
 
My first question would be regarding her being able to contact home via the computer.  As my geek skills were maxed out with using Yahoo Messanger, HELP!  How do I make my computer "Chinese friendly?"  Any cheap phone card suggestions would be also helpful.
Ken

Offline Bob_S

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Re: Chinese computer?
« Reply #1 on: February 22, 2012, 12:02:38 PM »
How about a Chinese and English Computer Keyboard (Black Wired USB Cable and Plug) available on Amazon for about $30.
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Offline Jeff S

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Re: Chinese computer?
« Reply #2 on: February 22, 2012, 02:12:32 PM »
Get a headphone and download skype for her too. I call landlines in Asia for about 2 cents a minute and cellphones for 6. If her friends or family have internet at home skype to skype is free - audio and video.

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Re: Chinese computer?
« Reply #2 on: February 22, 2012, 02:12:32 PM »

Offline thekfc

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Re: Chinese computer?
« Reply #3 on: February 22, 2012, 02:41:32 PM »
I just came back from lunch in Chinatown and I asked a lady in the store about calling China. She echoed what Jeff said - that is is very cheap to call China (and HK where she is from) and the rates would be between 1.5 & 2 cents per minute depending on which card you use and if you use local number or toll free number when calling. 
 
She also said that most of the cards are good aut she avoid the ones that have maintenance  & connection fees.
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Offline Capstone

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Re: Chinese computer?
« Reply #4 on: February 24, 2012, 02:19:06 PM »
Hi Ken,
 
About the only way to truly make a computer Chinese friendly is to install a Chinese version of Windows on it. My wife and I both have of our laptops' hard drives partitioned with the English version of windows running on one of the partitions and the Chinese version running on the other partition. That way we can both easily use either computer when needed. Those Chinese keyboards are next to useless because they only contain a very small number of characters and there are over 8000 characters in the Chinese language. When using a computer most Chinese enter text by typing pinyin (English transcription of Chinese characters) and then the Chinese version of windows will allow them to choose Chinese characters based upon the pinyin entered.
 
Your wife will probably want to use QQ (Chinese IM) to communicate with friends & family back home as well - you can download it free. Just be sure and download the Chinese version and not the English version because the Chinese version will allow the use of pinyin and corresponding Chinese character selection/matching as well. You don't need the Chinese version of Windows installed to run the Chinese version of QQ.
 
We don't use the phone much to talk with people back in China anymore. Apple products are so prevalent in China now that we use Facetime on our iPad or iPhone instead. Pretty much all of my wife's friends & family either have an iPad, iPhone or both so it makes things really easy. If you have a decent high speed internet connection then both the audio & video with Facetime is pretty good and it is completely free.   

Offline jm21-2

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Re: Chinese computer?
« Reply #5 on: March 29, 2012, 07:44:32 PM »
If she doesn't have her own laptop I might just go out and buy one. You can get a basic windows 7 laptop for pretty cheap and when you start it up for the first time you can choose which language of windows to use. At least that's the way my wife's laptop worked. It was an Asus and around $400 or so new with a good warranty. She loves it. I ended up getting myself pretty much the same model but with a little bit more processing power as I use it for work too.


I switched over my desktop to have Japanese language input and output at one point in college and it's really not the same. She might be able to get by with an IME (software plugin that allows her to type in pinyin and convert to Chinese) but really a Chinese version of windows would probably be a lot more comfortable for her. What Capstone suggested would work but if you're not at all computer savvy and you're not impoverished a new laptop might be a good idea.


Skype for phone calls works best for my wife.

Offline robert angel

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Re: Chinese computer?
« Reply #6 on: March 29, 2012, 08:42:05 PM »
Asus makes good stuff. They're one of the last companies to pretty much make the whole computer themselves, even the motherboard. Other companies pretty much shop around for the best (cheapest) deal they can get on various parts and except for the processor, you can't be sure what brand name parts you're getting. HP really does that a lot, as does Dell.Way of the world--you just might have a Chinese built transmission in your Ford Mustang!
 
I remember getting a Dell Ultra Sharp monitor and I noticed it said "Lucky Goldstar' inside it, which became LG later on, but other identical looking Ultrasharp monitors were built to the same specs by different companies but were of differering quality too.
China bought IBM's laptop division, named it Lenovo and while their website is clunky--somewhat 'lost in translation', they make a nice laptop. I would imagine if any company has Chinese language friendly computers, it's Lenovo. We've had good luck with under $400 Samsungs and most Toshibas seem good too
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Offline jm21-2

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Re: Chinese computer?
« Reply #7 on: March 29, 2012, 09:05:35 PM »
My wife worked at a very large multinational as a software engineer and dealt with all the major laptop manufacturers. I just go by what she says. There are actually only a few laptop manufacturers...I think you can count them on one hand...and then the laptops get re-branded and components switched out. Difference between ODM and OEM. For example clevo makes high end laptops that are re-branded as sager, falcon northwest, alienware, and several other brands. The exact same laptop sold by sager might be $2k and $4k as alienware and the only difference is the alienware has a different look (which may void the warranty).


Her old laptop she got factory direct through her company...was $200 or something like that and totally unbranded. It was the same laptop as one of the mid-level dell laptops.

 

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