For $80 to $100 you can buy adaptors specially designed for auto and boats.
If my Notebook was new, I would probably buy it. If it was 3 to 4 yrs old,
I would assume the laptop is almost obsolete and say the money.

http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/p...refurbished=It is interesting to note, you can now buy basic laptops for $500." JimH" wrote in ... "Smithers" Yes, Smithers is not my real name. wrote in messagenews:OLOdnUCBorNaiTnenZ2dnUVZ_tGdnZ2d@comca st.com... Harry, Why don't you just use the built in battery, and then recharge it whenyou get home from your day of boating? "Harry Krause" wrote in ...I just got in DeLorme's new Street Atlas 2006 with the GPS puck for mylaptop, and I'm going to order some inexpensive NAV software right after thefirst of the year. My current laptop is a four year old IBM T23, which hasbeen more than sufficient for my use while traveling. It has a 12V "cigarlighter" adapter/inverter box, which I have used without incident on carsand boats. I'm assuming this device is sufficent to "clean" that raw boatbattery power so I don't fry the laptop. I haven't had any problems with 12Vpower glitches so far, but I don't know if I'm walking on the wild sidehere. Smithers, laptop batteries may give you 3 hours or so of power. You wouldneed to plug it into a reliable power source when out boating. Harry, I would think that you would be OK using the boat battery if younever had problems using the car battery.