Laptop...

My inner Mac user wants you to get an Apple MacBook or MacBook Pro (both of which have the option of booting into Windows for your Windows apps), but if you want to stay on the Windows side I recommend a Dell laptop.
 
lol... I second Michaelpi's suggestion! Really it depends on what you want. I personally like the ABS Mayhem series, good basic gaming rigs for a decent price.
 
I have an Alienware Area-51m 7700 laptop. It's very high-performance but it sacrifices in portability (45 minute battery life-- 15 minutes if you're running something video-card intensive), and it weighs 16 pounds if you include the AC adapter. I like it because it's powerful enough to replace my desktop but portable for LAN parties. If you want something to sit on your lap and surf the internet while you're on your couch though, I suggest something else.

And the something else I suggest, is a Sony Vaio or MPC TransPort (mpccorp.com). Dell makes good stuff too, but to be honest I've had widely-varying experiences with their tech support. Sometimes they can help you out a lot, and sometimes they can only frustrate you.

I don't recommend Mac laptops at all. My brother has a MacBook Pro, and while it has some nice features, it also has things that get on his nerves-- like the one-button touchpad mouse, the heat (it gets REALLY hot) and the poor wireless NIC reception.
 
I love my MB, apple has nice quality gear and OSX is a refreshment from windows. I would recommend whatever the heck you want besides dell and gateway. hp is ~ok, viao laptops feel like toys.
 
I've been using Dell's for years at work and they have been great. They do get quite hot on the bottom, though. I can't really use one on my lap.

I had been looking for a Dell to replace my failing desktop and ended up with an HP laptop (about 3 weeks ago), due to a great deal through Costco. So far, so good. I really like the screen and the wireless card can pick up my router even in the farthest part of the house.
 
My friend has been using a HP for 2.5 years now, so far it isnt falling appart. Dell is trash in my eye, I expecially hate the keyboards, if a key falls off, good luck getting it back on...
 
Looks like you got lots of advice...

I would add get the desktop replacement with the largest screen you can buy and the biggest graphics card.

Do not get into smaller is cooler... it breaks too easily.
 
i would suggest a compaq/hp becuase they actually use amd and dont allow intel to push them around like dell >.>
 
if a key falls off, good luck getting it back on...
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I've had one of my younger siblings pull some keys off, and they seem to go back on pretty easily.

unfortunatly macs are now jsut an intel machine(aka a fancier dell or ibm) running a bsd variant. YOu can buy a cheap dell and run bsd if you'd like or linux.
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While it is true that Macs have Intel processors, that does not mean that the OS is the same. You cannot compare a vanilla copy of BSD to Mac OS X; it's like comparing a mouse and an elephant.

Plus, what "average consumer" wants to figure out how to install BSD?
 
you apparently didnt have the wacko keys with the a-frame wacko thing. I tried to get a key back on for half a hour and just gave up. you get it on there almost, like 3 out of the 4 placements, then it falls right off..

you cannot(unless you had about 3 years and a team of programmers that were bored) make osx out of freebsd. It runs a seperate kernel, totally different renderer, and best of all, almost all of the options are in a nifty gui that is easy to understand...
 
tjguitarz said:
Now that we've given you a bunch of suggestions, how about you tell us what you're looking to do with your laptop?
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Exactly. That's the first question to ask when someone's interested in buying any hardware.

The second is: How much money can you afford to or want to spend?

I will say that I love my Dell Inspiron E1705, despite what vibrokatana may have said about it in past posts. It handles Half-Life 2 Lost Coast and other Source games like a dream, has a 17-inch widescreen display, and still gets 2.5 hours of battery life (which isn't bad for a performance machine). The video output feature is super-cool when I want to hook my notebook up to the television. If you're looking for a desktop replacement, I would recommend the same model but with a TrueLife screen (my notebook has the regular screen).

If you want to save big bucks and are willing to skip the games, I'd recommend the Dell Inspiron E1505.

Oh, and a piece of advice if you decide to purchase a Dell: Don't bother calling them for tech support. Use their chat or e-mail support only. Now if you have sales questions, then yes, calling their sales department is the way to go.
 
I'm just looking for a 'toy' something to like starta book on and then when I get thoughts and I'm out - I could like add on to it...

I enjoy using my graphics tablet but the only time really to use it is the evenings and then I don't get as much time as I would like to use it...so I'd love to get a laptop that I could use with my graphics table and have it an on the go type thing....

I also do power point presentations at the school I work for...

So those are kind of my needs...

And truly just looking at what I've seen so far I am confused, to say the least...all these different proccessors....everything else pretty much is straightforward...

oh and thanks for the suggestions...
 
Have you thought about a tablet PC?

For what you want, I would focus more on graphics quality and portability, you don't really need a big desktop replacement notebook. Personally, I'd get the AMD 64 Turion or the Intel Core Duo processor. You don't need anything blazing fast, the Turion will get you better power management, although the Duo is a good balance. Look for a dedicated graphics card if you can. There is not a lot of things that you can upgrade on a laptop, but this is one part that many manufacturers are working towards. 512MB of RAM is good, 1 GB is better, try to find a free upgrade. 60-80GB hard drives are the norm, if you can get a free upgrade to a 120GB, awesome, but not worth the extra money. Odds are if you get into your laptop a lot you'll get external storage or network storage anyways. For a tablet PC, you usually find a 12.1" screen. Not bad for a portable computer, the 15.4" is good as well. Neither one is really a power hog.
 
Sounds to me like you don't really need anything fancy at all... if you're just worried about typing and powerpoints.

Try something like this.

Sounds to me like that's something you'd like. It's fairly fast, decent graphics card, good hard drive, good RAM, upgraded display. The only problem is the MS Office Suite thing. That's pretty expensive. I'd try borrowing it from a friend and loading it on your computer. LOTS cheaper that way.
 
tjguitarz said:
Sounds to me like you don't really need anything fancy at all... if you're just worried about typing and powerpoints.

Try something like this.

Sounds to me like that's something you'd like. It's fairly fast, decent graphics card, good hard drive, good RAM, upgraded display. The only problem is the MS Office Suite thing. That's pretty expensive. I'd try borrowing it from a friend and loading it on your computer. LOTS cheaper that way.
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That's the one Tek suggested. =)

Tek7 said:
If you want to save big bucks and are willing to skip the games, I'd recommend the Dell Inspiron E1505.
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