laptop and powersupply for astrophotography, whats the min?

im getting ready to try out astrophotography. il need a laptop to capture the images, and I am not bring my shiny mac book pro outside to get destroyed by dew. I will pick up a low cost rubbishy laptop but im wondering whats the min spec i should be looking for? it doesnt have to be able to do much except control my scope and capture images

Oh, and regarding power supplies, how do you power your goTo mounts and laptops when your out in the middle of nowhere?

Thanks guys

You don't need to worry about your Mac, you just need a dew shield for it. If you use a table, get a cardboard box of the right size, cover it with some clingwrap to keep the cardboard dry and place it on it's side on the table with the Mac inside. And if you use it at a star party it doubles as a light shield so that you can avid discommoding the visual observers present.

Usually the heat from the laptop tends to prevent dew from forming but otherwise the covered box suggestion is a good one. I've used my Compaq a few times and not had any issues.
You could run a laptop using an inverter and a 12V portable power supply. Halfords sell one with an inverter and ciggie socket together-however-they are very inefficient and will drain a battery quickly (might get a few hours plus what is left in the charged laptop battery)

Fintan, for years I used a brand new dell laptop without even a cover over it. The heat from the laptop keeps the dew away. I'ver never had any problems with dew. When I bring it inside I just leave it out of the laptop bag overnight just to be sure. Some nights when everything else is absolutely soaking, the laptop would be bone dry.

However you may want to consider that (like it or not) a lot of the free software for astrophotography is windows based. For that reason you might wanna consider a cheap laptop. I guess you could pick one up on buy and sell for next to nothing nowadays.

As far as the min spec. I ran everything off an old Pentium 233Mhz with 32mb RAM with no issues. That included CCD capture programs, autoguiding software etc. It was dog slow for everything else but was fine for astrophotography. So basically anything above that spec will do.

USB 2.0 ports are a good idea to have. Having a bit of diskspace is good too as you don't have to be constantly clearing stuff off it. If you have broadband at home consider a wireless card/ It's great having access to the internet by your pc to check satellite pictures etc.

For that reason you might wanna consider a cheap laptop. I guess you could pick one up on buy and sell for next to nothing nowadays.

Some friends have bought from and recommend www.laptopsdirect.ie/

Never used them myself so can't comment. But if you are looking to buy it's another place to compare.

Cheers,
~Al

Some friends have bought from and recommend www.laptopsdirect.ie/

They look like good prices AL, especially for a new laptop. One thing Fintan, steer well clear of Windows Vista for the moment. I've heard too many horror stories about driver issues with vista. Stick with XP.