Need advice on buying a laptop for a mix of business/personal use. Please help!

I unexpectedly need a new laptop ASAP. I've only used IBM/Lenovo Thinkpad laptops for work which seemed to have worked well for me in the past, although the last one, the T43 w/ 40GB memory seemed to be a bit slow IMO.

First question is, what brands are best and which ones should I stay away from? Both my sisters have had bad luck with Dell, but someone else I know who runs a business uses nothing but Dell and likes them. He also has an account with them and gets about 20% off most computers, so that's one advantage for me to use Dell. He also suggested I look at their refurbs which are substantially cheaper than getting a new one, although they may be a year old.

The main use of this laptop will be to browse the internet A LOT to do research for my website, administer it, post on it, download information, backup my website's database etc.

I never play video games and do not plan on doing so ever, however I do watch media on the internet once in a while including an occasional DVD, and listen to some music which I would store on there as well.

I do own a cheapy base model Maxtor 160GB external hard drive which I can use for extra storage if need be.

I think the biggest needs for me are a fast internet browsing speed and downloading speed, as well as a good amount of storage. I do take my laptop with me outside of the house, and may have to travel with it, however, I would sacrifice portability for better functionality. Good customer service is also very important to me. If I have a problem with my CPU I'll need it taken care of ASAP.


So what types of things should I be looking for? What processor and processor speed do you recommend? How much memory? How big of a hard drive/hard drive speed? What type/size monitor? Software? Warranty/Protection services? I'm kind of clueless when it comes to building a cpu, any help would be greatly appreciated.

Of note, I've never used apple my entire life, so I'm not sure if there would be a learning curve for that.

 

I was just looking at the IBM T61 .....I added the options I think I would need.



The options I weren't sure on were whether or not I would need protection warranty or customer, whether or not I needed to buy an external battery charger (I wasn't sure if one came with the CPU free), whether or not I should upgrade to the Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T7700 (2.4GHz 800MHz 4MBL2) from the T7500 with 2.2GHz 800MHz 4MBL2 for an extra $330. Is an extra .2GHz worth $330? I also wasn't sure if getting the WSXGA+ TFT monitor was worth an extra $75 and potential longer shipping time, or if 3GB total memory was worth an extra $330 or if 4GB total memory was worth an extra $680 since I opted for the 2GB option. There's a $50 option for "1GB of Intel Turbo Memory" which I didn't select either. For the same price as the 100GB 7200RPM hard drive I can get a 160GB 5400 hard drive. Not sure if the extra speed is worth the loss of 60GB of hard drive space.



Thoughts? Yay? Nay? This price is before coupons or expedited shipping.

 

My recomandation go on hp.com and make a custome laptop 2k asures you like 2 g.b 240 g.b etc etc

 

Well, first you should set your budget. If you are not planning to game on it or run applications like CAD, video editing or other demanding applications I really recommend you look seriously as some of the smaller laptops in the 12-14" screen size. You'll find that because of the small size you will take it with you around the home as well as traveling more often.

If you are going with windows XP make sure you have a minimum of 512 Meg of Ram. If you are going with Windows Vista, make sure you have a minimum of 1 Gig of Ram.

 

I don't have a budget per se but don't want to spend money on stuff I don't need.

Vista for sure, and not running video editing software or gaming. I figured a bigger screen would save me time from having to scroll as much or help my eyes if I decided to make the font a bit bigger. Since I do watch movies from time to time as well I figured that would be another advantage of getting a slightly larger screen. I thought a 15" would be good, but I will also consider your screen advice.

 

Unless your going to travel with it I suggest a desktop but thats just me

 

yep, i travel

 

Dell XPS M1210

Bought that a few months ago - it's perfect. Visit my homepage if you need my review