So I need to get a laptop for college, anyone who knows a lot about computers wanna suggest some good ones?
I'm not exactly made of money so nothing too ridiculously priced.
I've been using Windows my whole life and I'm kind of prejudiced against Apple because of bad experiences with their products, so all you Mac fanboys might have a hard time convincing me to switch from PC

Uh what's your price range under $1,000?
Dell might be a good option since they have good internet deals at times, also the more cells it's battery has the longer life span of the battery. Also steer clear of AMD processors and stick with either Intel Celeron 1.66GHz or above will run vista good with a celeron or Intel Core 2 Duo with a speed higher than 2.0 GHZ or is good. Also if it's going to be running vista a minimum of 2GB of ram.

I've got a HP 6910p model with all of the minimum specifications Marc listed above.
i use it for schoolwork.
and it is perfect for that.

OKAY! I need some computer smart people to help me out here.
Can anyone tell me the basic difference/which is better of the following:

Intel Core 2 Duo vs. Intel Pentium Duo Core
The Intel Core 2 Duo costs $50 more, wondering if its worth it at all.

And one of the choices (I'm doing that whole build-your-own thingy at Dell.com) is for "memory" and its 1 GB, 2 GB, 3 GB, 4GB. What exactly is this and what does it affect? I think it affects how fast stuff runs right? For the record I'm going to be playing the Sims on this computer.. so would having a higher number there make gameplay less laggy?

Intel Core 2 Duo- http://www.intel.com/products/processor/coreduo/
Intel Pentium Duo Core- http://www.intel.com/products/processor/core2duo/index.htm

and for memory that is the ram. The bigger the faster. go for 4gb if you have the money.

Why bother with 4GB unless she is running a 64BIT OS along with memory hungry programs... The max you can utilise on a 32BIT OS would be 3.5GB therefore it is not worth it. 2GB is plenty I run vista like lightening with 2GB DDR2 ram

I'd go with Core 2 Duo personal preference with me, they just perform really well, as for memory 2GB would be plenty unless you're going to be running memory rich applications such as video editing and such.. If not don't worry about more than 2GB of ram.

Don't get a Dell. In my experience, Toshiba makes a quality laptop for the average computer user (i.e. school and internet). If you want superior graphics and gaming (which is more reserved for desktops, imo) its probably better to look into getting one custom built by a computer shop.


Lie. I have a 3G ram and I can't even run The Sims.

Then it's not caused by small memory...
Depends on lots of other things as well - graphic card, cpu, system, drivers etc...

My graphic card is mediocre and I've got an intel core duo processor.

I got 2g of ram and it works great. Its something else, video card, or maybe you just have to much stuff on your computer. Take off that porn.

macs are really good laptops, same with gateways.
i have a gateway notebook, and it's really fast.
it has vista and i've had it almost a year with no problems.

haha. I have like 400 MB RAM (I know...) and I can run the Sims.

And what system do you have?
And which sims are you trying to run? 1 or 2?

Same here, I have 512 Mb and it runs perfectly.

400 MB? How'd you pull that one off?

haha. I don't even know. It's actually... like 384 MB. It's just what came with this craptastic computer.

Probably have a shit graphics card or something, there are a lot of different things necessary to run it.

And thanks for the help everyone

If you're going to be running XP, in saying you will remove Vista and or downgrade.

XP only takes a maximum of 3GB, so having 4GB would be a waste of time.

I have a Sony VAIO, I use it for everything.
Never had a problem with it.

Remember Mel, if you get a 64Bit version of XP you can utilise 4GB of Ram same with Vista!

I recently got an Acer Aspire notebook. This is the first laptop type computer I've had, I have always had a pc. But I absolutely love my notebook. So great!

It has a 250GB hard drive, Pentium dual-core processor, 2Gb RAM etc. Just sooooo devine!!! And it is really pretty too

How much that set you back Mari?

I wouldn't mind one of Eee PC's they looked wicked.

It was $897 at Dick Smith and then there is a $49 cashback offer so it becomes $848. Pretty good, eh? And currently they are giving a nice looking Notebook carry bag as a bonus. This Notebook is a real beauty. I'm very happy with it. I bought a cordless mouse to use with it, and that has been terrific. It's a Logitech and was $39.95.

That's not bad at all. Vista I am guessing?

Oh yeah hmmm, yeah it is Vista ... well on the Notebook Vista's great! On pc it's bleh! haha

Yeah most newer PC's can handle Vista really well, unlike older computers.

Get yourself I nice little Acer if you just want something to check e-mail, surf the web, do any other stuff that's simple. Acer is the way to go. If you want intense speed to game grab yourself a Falcon-Northwest, or if you just want a sexy OS to surf the web and just keep all of your personal shit on, get a MacBook or a MacBook Pro.

I dunno if they are available where u are, but i love Sony Vaio's, they they might be a british thing, my cost £399 so about $600, its absolutely useless if you have loads of info on it, i had to buy an external hard drive, depends what you want to use it for, its designed for heavy usage, but if you need big memory, you might be better with something else

My parents have an Acer laptop and it's kinda crappy.
I mean, I don't think it has the best specs, but still.
Logging on and opening Firefox takes quite a while.
But of course, that's compared to my iMac. heh

Anything labelled Vaio is the Mac of the PC, damn expensive. But still only PC laptop i'd get other than a Eee PC or Alienware tbh. But as everyone knows Alienware is just way to expensive.