Buying Laptop help

[whatsherface]

I need help! I'm trying to decide what laptop to buy. If you know a lot about them please help. I'll list them at the end of this thread thingy.
I want something that burns cds, dvds, plays them too, stores a lot of music and pictures, fast, and I need a quick internet serivce. I will be taking it from palce to place. And what is wireless?
Pick the best one for the buck.
Here is my list:
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?id=cat13504&type=page&pageIdentity=searchDriven&useProductString=true&productString=1158317339111*115832017740 6*1158319080507*1158320177474*1157067574 760&unProductString=1157067806469*1157067806 799*1157067806605*1157067818475&h=488

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=5192498

[Lord Dagoth]

Gateway Notebook with Intel® Centrino® MX6955 seems to be the best deal from BestBuy link.

Also, What is wireless? Seriously? Well...it's like internet without having to plug it in (this is the simplest way i can think to describe it).

[Jatz]

You know for a minute there I thought you were a spambot.
Let's go through these on at a time.

Any drive that burns DVDs will read them too. What you want is a DVD burner. The ones you list from Best Buy all have this. The one from Wal-Mart does not. It will read CDs and DVDs, but burn only CDs.

You said you wanted it to be fast. The Gateway (MX6426) seems to be the fastest, but I heard that Gateways are crap. Out of the two remaining Compacs the Centino may have a higher clock speed faster but there are differences in chip models so that one chip may be faster despite having a lower number. In other words the numbers don't always mean anything. To farther complicate things, if you want a faster speed it'll drain your battery quicker. As I understand it Celeron M chips are designed for laptops and would use less power. Watching movies also tends to drain the battery.

"A lot of music and pictures". What do you consider a lot? the 80 gig drives you have here could hold an awful lot, but if you can afford it get a bigger drive.

A quick internet service means nothing if you're carrying it around. Some computers come with trial internet, which is usually 56K (slow). Even if you get high speed internet it won't follow you. High speed internet probably won't come with the computer. You'll have to look in your area to see what's available. Stay away from 56K with "accelerators". These are not high speed.

Wireless: a connection to the internet through radio waves. You can set up your own wireless network in your house with a wireless router so you can walk around without dragging a line. Some businesses offer free wireless internet access in their building if you buy stuff. You have to be careful wireless is open by default. Which means anything you transmit can be seen by anyone within range. Always turn on the encryption.

Carrying it around may get heavy, but less weight equals more money.

Another thing to consider is warranty. Laptops are one of the few products that Consumer Reports recommends buying a extended warranty if it covers the screen. As they can be expensive to replace.

Out of those I'd say the Compac V6105NR, but I know nothing about Compac's reputation. Dell and Apple have very good records so they may be better for you.

[whatsherface]

Thanks for the help. I want the best that I can afford.

[Samourai]

i cant help a ton, but from my experience gateways are terrible, and i now have a toshiba and am very happy.

[jedisolo]

Go to this site http://forum.notebookreview.com/ and they'll answer all of your questions about laptops.

[Jatz]

Thanks for the help. I want the best that I can afford.

I went to Dell's site and selected components similar to what you have. The price is close. Dell makes good desktops, I don't know about their laptops.

[sailornyanko]

I went to Dell's site and selected components similar to what you have. The price is close. Dell makes good desktops, I don't know about their laptops.

My dad bought a Dell laptop from some office supply comapny in Los Angeles some two years ago. It's a pretty good machine but nothing spectacular (though this is to be expected considering the machine was relatively cheap). I find it to be a bit slow when turning on and my dad doesn't like the image quality of the monitor.

For some reason they didn't install Powerpoint on the machine (idiots) but it mostly works fine. I'm sad the laptop is using Windows in english. Windows XP kinda sucks in spanish, but it's a pain in the rear to do school assigments without being able to use Ñ symbols and accents.

Yes, buy a good warranty for your laptop, they are very useful. When my sister bought her Mac laptop (the ones that were popular a few years ago that were white with a little apple on the lid of a few select colors), I kinda jammed a CD-ROM in the drive without putting the laptop on a hard surface and screwed the drive up. Let's say there aren't a lot of official Mac repair shops in Mexico City (luckily one of the select few was just a 15 minute drive away). They kinda cheated to help us and claimed the drive was defective and didn't charge us anything.

From then forward I'm kinda neurotic about putting CD's and DVD's with care.

From the nerd point of view, are you sure you wanna buy a laptop now? Windows Vista is soon going to appear everywhere so all the laptops selling right now will plummet in value in just a few months. 5 months from now you'll probably be able to find the same machine for sale for a couple hundred dollars cheaper than they are now. Plus I bet their price will drop after the holidays.

[Jatz]

M$ sucks no matter what brand you buy. But Apple starts at $1,000.

[Tiiba]

For some reason they didn't install Powerpoint on the machine (idiots) but it mostly works fine. I'm sad the laptop is using Windows in english. Windows XP kinda sucks in spanish, but it's a pain in the rear to do school assigments without being able to use Ñ symbols and accents.

Can't you just change the keyboard layout?

[sailornyanko]

Can't you just change the keyboard layout?

I believe you'd have to change the settings of the machine to Windows XP in spanish for you to be able to use spanish characters. As I said before, Windows XP sucks in spanish. The OS crashes a lot and it's very unstable.

[Tiiba]

What are you talking about?

Control panel - Regional & Language Options - Languages - "Details" button - "Add" button. That's all.

[Haro!]

I believe you'd have to change the settings of the machine to Windows XP in spanish for you to be able to use spanish characters. As I said before, Windows XP sucks in spanish. The OS crashes a lot and it's very unstable.
No that's just windows regardless of the language. I actually don't mind Windows, its just fun to make that comment, especially in school where there are some serious MS fanboys that wet themselves when ever they see one of those ugly Dell XPS desktop or laptops. It was funny when one of the professors was having a problem with her laptop during class. I yell out "I know what the problem is!!!" and everyone says "what?" and I was like "Its Windows!!!!" and everyone gave (except the one linux fanboy) me dirty looks.

As far as the topic goes, I wouldn't bother buying something inexpensive when it comes to laptops. You might as well just get something a bit higher in price and just put it on credit.

[Tiiba]

Windows fanboys? I've never even heard of those before.

I mean, I know there are people who are okay with Windows, but fanboys?

(I myself am fine with Windoze. Microsoft is evil, but I have yet to hear of a Fortune 500 company that did something non-evil for a reason other than profit.)

[jedisolo]

You have to agree the founder of Microsoft Bill Gates isn't evil.