ciao

Hi,

Would be really grateful to get some advice on buying a new laptop.

I recently 'electrocuted' my refurbised Dell D600 latitude from Ebay (when plugging in the power cord I touched one of the serial ports by mistake, suddenly I saw a spark, smoke and that was it...) and am now looking to buy a new laptop.

My needs are as follows:
will start a business and the laptop will be my only pc (i.e. needs to be sturdy, mobile and with long battery life (!)but still have a big enough screen and should be well-rounded like a desktop replacement etc.), not using it for games or advanced media, speed is important as is being able to use multiple applications, wireless connections etc. as my last laptops either crashed, were stolen or "electrocuted' I am also looking to get a reliable and strong machine with good warranty and insurance.

I am so far looking at 2.0 ghz, 2 gb RAM, 14 inch, 60+ GB (have extra external hard drive), DVD/CD burner, 9 cell battery,

but i still have a few questions:

intel core 2 duo or AMD athlon 64? read that the intel is superior, is that correct and how much of a difference does it make? also, how much will a 2.4 ghz processor increase speed (when controlling for RAM etc.) as opposed to a 1.8 for example?

vista ultimate or XP business?
hard to find a vista fan but am concerned that much software will soon be only available on vista? any thoughts? should i get a vista ultimate and put on a xp business (have a genuine copy) if its too slow or go with xp and update later if i have to?

i have mostly looked at dell for now but given the above I have a hard time deciding between a vostro, latitude or inspiron with the above specs, would be grateful for your thoughts. also, are there any other notebooks i should consider such as lenovo, acer or HP? i would love to keep the price below $1000 but would be ready to pay up to $1400 for a good machine.

and one more side question, how much of a difference in terms of performance does it make if i upgrade from 2 to 3 gb?

thanks so much for any thoughts!!!!

sobeit

you can find some pretty good laptop reviews here.

From my personal experience, price wise hp is the way to go. I have two hp laptops and never had a lick of problems with either - other than what I caused. Whenever I research for a new computer and start comparing features with pricing, HP seems to come on top.

That said, the reality is, just about all laptops are about the same. Unless you happen to get a lemon, and if you are careful what you install on it, it will last.

For good battery power, it depends exactly what you are running - even for business. Running Microsoft Office will cut battery power time to almost half.

As far as vista, it is the future. I have been using it since it came out without any major problems. I have had some but mostly drivers and such that I caused. If you decide you want xp, get it on the laptop, otherwise if you change your mind, the vista laptop you get may not have drivers available for xp. See the help forums because there are hundreds of users asking for help because they changed their minds after purchasing a vista computer.

As far as ram, 2 most likely will be enough for your plans.

CPU - I really cannot help with that one. Read this for some info

ciao

Thank you sobeit666, this is really helpful! Happy Holidays