My IBM Thinkpad A31ps main system battery is dead. It won't charge any more, instead the battery light starts flashing. The battery is over three years old, but should still have like half of its original capacity. This sucks.

My secondary battery, more useful than having two CD drives I never use, is also down to two thirds, giving me a battery run time of less than 90 minutes.

Also other stuff has started breaking, starting with an USB port being damaged, bluetooth that never worked etc. - and the laptop is out of warranty by now.

I really need to get myself a new laptop (and especially a lighter one), but I know I'll miss the great 135 dpi display my A31p had... :-( also the built-in prism2.5 11 mBit wireless is excellent, good range.

My favourites include the ThinkPad X-series, but there are other options which are less expensive... or at least somewhat nonstandard like the Samsung X1, which has impressive specs, too. Or of course an Apple.

Debian really needs something like this "Laptop Mission" Ubuntu had... some free laptops for developers if they help on making the distribution work out of the box on their model. I'd apply right away now. ;-)