Thread: I need a New Laptop

Some questions you should ask yourself before you shop:

How mobile do you want this thing from 1 - 10, 1=desktop, 10=pda

The size will be determined by the size of the screen you want. Widescreen? Tiny?

Do you need firewire, hdmi, bluetooth?

How many of your applications have support for multiple processors. Video editing software and 3d modeling software I think generally support multiple processors, but many other things don't. Also, your OS needs to support the multiple processors to get the most use. A typical user doesn't need more than a dual core. Get the fastest processor only if you really need it, otherwise, buy the slowest dual core and never buy a celeron.

Will you be playing a lot of graphics intensive games, you'll need a fast gpu with lots of video ram
Otherwise, an integrated video card should be fine, you can save a lot of money and battery life.

Gaming aside, will you be working with very large files regularly? Like uncompressed video or audio, databases, archival data. 2 gb of ram should be a minimum, more than 2 if you're doing video editing. If not, 2gb is more than enough, and may be overkill

Will you be burning CDs/DVDs from this machine or do you have another machine for that. Or will you be watching DVD's on this machine? Eliminating the optical drive will save you space, weight, money, and battery life. A lot of ultra portable mini notebooks don't have an optical drive.

If you'll be out with it for more than an 1 or 2 hours, you should get the bigger battery. The battery is bigger and has the added benefit of elevating the back of the laptop as to allow more airflow to come through it.


As for specific laptops, I have no opinion for gaming machines, but I do like the Lenovo (IBM) Ideapad S10

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16834146453