What Should I Carry in My Laptop Bag

Posted on by SQLAndy

I have a tendency to carry more than I need, the equivalent of the Batman Utility Belt. I just went through and did some pruning, tried to get back to the basics:

  • Laptop. My E6500 for now. Love the machine, wish it was lighter. Looking with awe at the ultrabooks coming out, debating how much horsepower I really need. Probably less than I think I do.
  • Charger for the laptop. Wish it was smaller and lighter.
  • Business cards in the leather holder from SQLSaturday #21, plus extras
  • Earbud headphones
  • Laptop cable lock. Cheap one from Belkin, works ok. I don’t use often, but hate to not have it.
  • USB cable with micro/mini option. Use to charge my phone and bluetooth headset.
  • 110V USB adapter. Just added this one, so I can use the same USB cable above. Like the pivot feature.
  • 8G Flash Drive. It’s tied to the bag with a small lanyard, trying to lose fewer of them.
  • Notepad
  • Extra pen
  • Aspirin and assorted vitamins in a small bottle

All packed in my Maxpedition bag, which so far is living up to the branding of being hard use gear!

For trips I usually also have a book and some magazines, and a bottle of water. I’ve debated adding a 110V splitter plug,sometimes power at airports is hard to find,but mostly I’ve gotten by and hate to add one more thing.

Anything I’m missing? What should I remove?

5 thoughts on “What Should I Carry in My Laptop Bag”

  1. Interestingly, this comes at a time when I”m switching from carrying around my 15″ MacBook Pro (which isn”t terribly light) to a 13″ MacBook Air (which seems to weigh nothing). I bought a tiny laptop bag for the Air that forces me to carry nothing more than a power supply, pen, notebook, presenter doodad, and the laptop. I resisted getting the Air for a long time because I figured that I need a lot of horsepower for whatever it is that I do. Turns out, I don”t need much horsepower at all.

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