Lappy 486
From Homestar Runner Wiki
The Lappy 486 is Strong Bad's third and current computer, manufactured by Compy, Inc. It utilizes a more modern email client that includes a subject line, a reply panel, and the following easy-access buttons: Reply, Forward, Delete, Save, Computer, and Image. (Delete, Save, Computer, and Image are usually hidden behind Strong Bad's head.) However, all of it disappears when Strong Bad clears the screen to continue typing.
The Lappy seems to be Strong Bad's favorite computer to date, as evidenced by how highly he speaks of it in animal. Strong Bad describes its startup noise as "classy" (though his attempt to repeat it is out of tune).
In animal, it is revealed that the Lappy is male, as Strong Bad says, "Let's see if this bad boy can check some emails," and tells The Paper to "come and meet [his] new brother". Despite this, the Lappy tends to appear in female form much more often.
In addition to the usual DELETED! feature, the Lappy can also flash a "DO OVER!!" screen with an explosion effect, as seen in do over.
Despite its excessive weight, Strong Bad has been seen carrying it on various occasions.
Contents |
Quick Facts
Debut: First seen in "animal." First mentioned by The Brothers Chaps in the "invisibility" DVD commentary.
Interactive Feature: Clicking on the Lappy's screen simulates the effect seen on LCD Monitors: applied force bends the polarizing filter for the display within the immediate vicinity of the force, causing varying distortions of light and dark. Whenever the Lappy 486 is seen in an email or toon, the screen can be clicked to get the effect that is similar on most LCD flat panel monitors. The circle matches the color of what is in the reflection (i.e. red for Strong Bad's head, green for Strong Bad's eyes, etc.). If you hold the mouse button or move it slightly while clicking the Lappy's screen, the effect won't move with the mouse; it will go away if you leave its circle of effect. This is also Strong Bad's first computer without contrast buttons besides the Polish Block.
Operating System: In an interview with Strong Bad on The Screen Savers, Strong Bad states that his computer runs on an operating system known as "2S-point-Cynics 5, The Upgrade". The spelling of this was guessed, so it is not completely accurate.
Font: Glitch0
Screen Ratio: 1.67:1 (width:height) or 5:3, as opposed to a normal screen of 1.3:1 (4:3), a high-definition screen of 1.78:1 (16:9), and a widescreen of 1.85:1.
Emails checked on the computer so far: 82
Features
- 42 pounds!! (19 kilograms—"Extremely portable" according to Strong Bad in animal; he later describes it as "allegedly portable" in technology.)
- 2MB Hard Drive! (Later said to be 5MB, as of retirement)
- "Several" Color Monitor
- Warning: Five Minute Battery Life (Strong Bad said it is "One half of ten minutes"—evidence shown in part-time job)
- In Homestar Ruiner and Strong Badia the Free, Strong Bad claims the Lappy's battery takes five to seven business days to fully charge ("The Lappy don't charge on weekends.")
- 512K RAM (0.5 MB)
- "Finally, a computer for your lap!"—Compy
- Although never mentioned, the Lappy may support a wireless internet connection. In part-time job, isp, Happy Dethemberween, licensed, rated, your edge, and email thunder, it can be seen that Strong Bad does not use the Lappy's Ethernet socket.
- In the email environment, claims made about the Lappy include:
- Every time the "enter" key is pressed, everyone else in town will temporarily lose electricity.
- When the Lappy runs on battery power, 45 acres of rainforest are burned to the ground.
- An "Undelete" feature, shown in Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People.
Colors
The screen boasts "several" colors in the email animal. The number of colors present suggest that the Lappy 486 uses at least a VGA display.
- Black: background color
- White: text
- Blue: email client title bar, shortcut keys, and rolling over emails titles on the menu, Edgar's Baby's Daddy
- Magenta: (pink) Lappy 486 logo
- Dark Magenta: Lappy 486 logo (outline of magenta)
- Cyan: (aqua) Lappy 486 logo, mini-golf
- Dark Cyan: Lappy 486 logo (outline of cyan)
- Yellow: Lappy 486 logo
- Dark Yellow: Lappy 486 logo (outline of yellow)
- Gold: encore Easter egg in the email rock opera
- Puke Green: "bread sing-alongs" in the email origins
- Red: new emails, do over, Edgar's Baby's Daddy, mini-golf
- Dark Red: Edgar's Baby's Daddy (outline of red)
- Peach: Edga Jr.'s face, and Trogdor's beefy arm in concert
- Orange: Edga Jr.'s hair, mini-golf
- Sky blue: Edga Jr.'s shirt
- Gray: scrollbar color, Edga Jr. picture table outline
- Salmon: the words 'a girl', 'really', and 'relatively' in bottom 10
- Dark Green: the "de" words in death metal, and Trogdor's body in concert
- Video colors: the explosion effect in do over, the webcam in death metal
- Cream: the computer on the downloading screen in isp
- Light Brown: the "not really break dancing" rat, also in isp
- Teal: The background of the "Teal Screen of Near Death" in retirement
- Turquoise: 'flavored water' in rough copy
Programs
Some of the programs Strong Bad has on the Lappy 486, most of which are started by typing the filename only after the prompt:
- strongbad_email.exe — (Used in emails 119-current except for email 142 (secret identity) (see below), email 159 (retirement), which had two emails checked on the Tandy and the Compy, and email 169 (from work) which was checked on the Corpy NT6.)
- run "Edga Jr." (long pants) — filters emails with indents
- run "webcam" (death metal) — initiates live video chat with Larry Palaroncini
- strongbad_email.wad (secret identity) — Strong Bad inexplicably types this to access his email (DOS usually does not recognize WAD files as executables).
- screen_savior.exe (technology) — runs an infinitely repeating 3D Maze screensaver with poor graphics
- Edgar's Baby's Daddy (filename unknown) (candy product) — Filters emails from Homestar Runner
- karatecar.exe (the movies) — an ASCII art movie played on the Lappy's screen
- strongbad3Dtotal.wad (SBCG4AP Advertisement) — A simple 3D game featuring Strong Bad and Homestar.
- Some type of voice synthesizer.
- CG4AP101.wad (Homestar Ruiner's Wii Channel) — displays the logo for Homestar Ruiner, and flashes up a "PRESS START" notice after a couple of seconds. Presumably also used for Strong Bad to run the game.
- other_gems.exe and more_other_gems.exe (being mean) — displays other emails this email's sender, Nice Dad, has sent.
- CG4AP102.wad (Strong Badia the Free's Wii Channel) — displays the logo for Strong Badia the Free, and flashes up a "PRESS START" notice after a couple of seconds. Presumably also used for Strong Bad to run the game.
- CG4AP103.wad (Baddest of the Bands' Wii Channel) — displays the logo for Baddest of the Bands, and flashes up a "PRESS START" notice after a couple of seconds. Presumably also used for Strong Bad to run the game.
- CG4AP104.wad (Dangeresque 3: The Criminal Projective's Wii Channel) — displays the logo for Dangeresque 3: The Criminal Projective, and flashes up a "PRESS START" notice after a couple of seconds. Presumably also used for Strong Bad to run the game.
- CG4AP105.wad (8-Bit is Enough's Wii Channel) — displays the logo for 8-Bit is Enough, and flashes up a "PRESS START" notice after a couple of seconds. Presumably also used for Strong Bad to run the game.
The Real Computer
The 486 was actually a real processor made by Intel. It was quite similar to the 386 processor from a software standpoint, but was considerably faster.
The Lappy seems to be inspired by the Mac Portable, a 16-pound transportable Macintosh that sold poorly.
The "real" Lappy (pictured) is an old Compaq LTE series laptop.
The Lappy 486's prompt, a closing square bracket, was also used by the Apple II series of computers, although MS-DOS could be configured to produce this prompt.
Lappy-napping
At the end of cliffhangers, the Lappy was stolen. The perpetrators left behind a ransom note stating "i got your Lappy" along with the Lappy's severed "toe" (the "< ," key). After searching for his missing computer in Lappynapped!, Strong Bad discovered that the Tandy 400 and the Compy 386, or what was left of them, had kidnapped the Lappy so that he would answer one last email on each of them. Strong Bad answered the Tandy's and the Compy's last emails in retirement, and in the process destroyed both of them and retrieved the Lappy. Strong Bad took his favorite "portable" computer out to get hushpuppies with the restored, at-peace ghosts of the two other computers and The Paper following along in harmony.
Female Lappy 486
The Female Lappy 486 appears in Strong Bad's dream email in dreamail. She's basically the Lappy 486 logo with blonde hair and makeup. She appears when Strong Bad starts up the Lappy, telling him that he's "looking prooty hot". Female Lappy 486 fawns over Strong Bad for his reply to an e-mail ("Well played, Strong Bad. Those ladies are sure to be all up ons."). After Strong Bad flies away at the end of the e-mail, she appears in an Easter egg, telling Strong Bad not to fly, that's she's worried about him, and that she can see the strings which are holding him above ground. Apparently, she seems to rely on Strong Bad.
The monitor of Female Lappy 486 is bordered with a gold chain bearing the phrase, "MY LAPPY ATE YOUR DOG" inscribed on top.
It has since then appeared on the normal Lappy, suggesting that it is an actual feature of it.
Female Lappy 486 frequently makes spelling and grammar mistakes, such as "prooty hot", "one unread messages", "is understairs", "I'm hate hushpuppies", and "tell whim I love", and speaks with a voice that sounds somewhat like a computer speech synthesizer.
Takeover By The KOT
In Strong Badia the Free, after the King of Town succeeds in tricking Strong Bad into taking his castle, he uses the Lappy to check his very own emails. He has gotten quite popular and, according to Strong Sad, Fark links to him every single week. Strong Bad was infuriated by this, especially when the King didn't even make fun of the email senders' names.
After finding out the King's plan, Strong Bad sends a tax via email on Creamy Ding Snack Cakes, causing an outraged King to abandon the Lappy and prepare to take his castle back. It works and the Lappy was once more in Strong Bad's possession.
Appearances
- Debut: Email dreamail
- Email rock opera (voice)
- strongbad_email.exe Disc Four Main Menu
- Sbemail 150?!?
- Lappynapped!
- Email retirement (voice)
- strongbad email.exe Disc Five Main Menu
- Homestar Ruiner
- Strong Badia the Free
- Baddest of the Bands
- Dangeresque 3: The Criminal Projective
- 8-Bit Is Enough
| Strong Bad's computer equipment | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Computers | Papers | |||||
| Current | Lappier | CGI Paper | ||||
| Previous | Tandy 400 · Compy 386 · Lappy 486 · Compé | The Paper · New Paper · Compé-per | ||||
| Other | Block · Zappy XT6 · Terminal D6 · Corpy NT6 | Other Papers | ||||
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