Simple request

truescot

I know there are trillions of posts on here of the "tell me the laptop I should buy" variety, but I am more than happy to trawl the internet and my favourite websites till I find the best deal.

However, I just want to know what to look for.

I currently have a 5 year old emachines desktop which I use every day and performs perfectly well, however I want a laptop for portability and to store my ever increasing itunes library (about 600cd's so far). Plus its a bit noisy now!!

I want a laptop for:

Internet (I use the interent for nearly all my shopping andother purchses, banking, work and personal email/social networking, academic work, some music donloads, but not too much cos I love CD's!)

basic office functions, mainly word and some excel/publisher.

Importing and Storing CD's on itunes and playing them through hifi amp/speakers.

Storing ALL our family photos.

Thats about it.

I have never done any photo editing/gaming/fancy stuff.

But I do use it constantly for the above mentioned.

What specs should I be looking for - operating system/processor/memory.etc etc.

Bit clueless there you see:(

Ta muchly...

23n1th

I'd consider buying a laptop and a massive 2TB external hard drive for storing your media. There are laptops avaliable with huge storage but they are rather expensive.

Also you need to figure out if this laptop will replace your desktop, I know you said portable but with the ever increasing media you have you might be better placed building or getting a new desktop/media centre PC.

truescot

I just feel a laptop is more convenient when I dont need a really powerful machine. I was planning to use the laptop to replace my desktop, but then use an external hard drive for music/videos and photos. At present my ituens is 35gb, and my phots about 5gb

Still would like to know what the best specs for this sort of usage would be.

Bearing in mind my PC was cheap as chips, and I have been more than happy with it.

23n1th

Spec wise your wallets the limit, set your limit.

truescot

Well, just don't want to spend loads on a machine which is far higher spec than I need. I am sure I could get something adequate for around £350, no? Anymore may be wasted features for what I need?

JasX

Hop onto the dell website and look what their bog-standard £400odd offering is, you can then benchmaark any other deals agains that one to determine if its markedly better/worse value.

I echo the suggestion of getting a separate external drive for storing/backing up media files and photos to, just need to choose between a 3.5" or 2.5" model (larger one will be cheaper hold more but need a mains connection to use and not be easily portable, smaller one will be more expensive, hold less but be pocket size and not need a mains connection to use)

For office type stuff I suggest giving the free 'open office' a try.

Avoid shoddy bundled anti virus you might get with a 1 year paid for license and download one of the good free ones (Avira, Avast or Microsoft Security Essentials)

Avoid vista or unusual versions of Windows (eg 'starter' edition)

use benchmarking sites to directly compare things like "how powerful processor X is compared to processsor Y" like http://www.cpubenchmark.net/ or http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark-List.844.0.html or http://www.notebookcheck.net/Notebook-Processors.129.0.html

Be aware with some of the cheaper/downmarket brands you might be taking a risk with component/build quality (eg Acer, Advent, Packard Bell etc)

http://www.squaretrade.com/htm/pdf/SquareTrade_laptop_reliability_1109.pdf

look at page 6, (but don't get an extended warrranty)

-or a bit out of date:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/08/28/which_laptop_survey/

Donnie

As you allude, your usage doesn't point you toward a high specification. 40 GB of music and picture is nothing compared to the capacity of modern machines.

For instance, this MSI CR500 at £264 has a 500GB HDD capacity. More than enough for your needs.
Intel Celeron dual core T3100.
1.9GHz processor speed.
3GB DDR2 RAM memory.
500GB hard drive.
Display features:
15.6in display.
Resolution 1366 x 768 pixels.
DVD optical drives:
Dual layer.
Graphics:
Dedicated nVIDIA GeForce 8200M graphics card with 256MB memory.
Interfaces and connectivity:
4-in-1 media card reader.
Secure Digital (SD), Memory Stick (MS), xD, Multi-Media Card (MMC) compatible.
3 USB ports.
1 Ethernet port.
1 HDMI port.
B/g/n wireless/WiFi enabled.
Multi-media features:
1.3MP built-in webcam.
Operating system and software:
Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium.
Software included:
Microsoft Works.
Adobe Reader.
General features:
Up to 3.5 hours battery life.
Size H3, W37.4, D24.7cm.
Weight 2.5kg.

Donnie

Another good value option is this Toshiba Satellite L450D-11V for £274. Either machine will comfortably exceed your requirements.
AMD Athlon dual core QL65 processor.
2.10GHz processor speed.
3GB DDR2 RAM.
15.6in screen size.
Resolution 1366 x 768 pixels.
250GB SATA hard drive.
Multi format dual layer drive.
ATI Radeon HD 3200 graphics.
Multi card reader.
3 USB ports.
1 Ethernet port
HDMI.
Integrated speakers.
0.3MP webcam.
802.11 b/g/n wireless enabled.
Windows 7 Premium operating system installed.
Toshiba User's Manual, McAfee Internet Security (includes free Internet updates for 30 days -trial version), Microsoft Works, Microsoft Office Home and Student 2007 (free 60-day trial) and Toshiba utilities and drivers.
Up to 2.5 hours battery life.
Weight 2.9kg.