Hi, Joel... A costarican here!! (You can call us "ticos"...).

There are internet cafes in all the main cities around the central valley, and you can count on them in every other big city, even those far away in the mountains... Or the beaches...

About the laptop... That depends! Are you coming for vacations in the naturegasmic rain forests, hiking near to awesome volcanoes, surfing at the beaches, lying relaxed in hot springs or... Some kind of gadget reviewing??

If you are coming for vacations, don't bring your laptop... Chances are that it will be stolen if misplaced! Even more probable if it has some kind of fruit logo in its lid!

I would recommend a camera, lots of flash memory cards (for backup!!), and nothing else... Except for comfortable clothes... And do yourself a favor, don't bring clothes that scream "I'm a tourist!"... Blend among the locals, jeans, cargo pants, tennis shoes, t-shirts and small backpacks/messengers are common among the people... Short pants, sandals, flower-painted shirts, sombreros and camping backpacks are just a way to scream: "Steal my passport!".

I can tell you about of a gadget company that works on embedded Linux, where I worked for a while, but apart from that, the technology scene here is more technical support than anything else.