How to buy the perfect laptop
Summary: It used to be hard to make a decision on which laptop to buy. But with all the new options available, it's even harder.
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Get connected
Make sure that you have enough ports on your laptop — at a minimum, look for two USB ports (although three to four is better). If you'd like to use a digital camcorder with your notebook, you may need a FireWire (IEEE 1394) port. Connecting a monitor will require a VGA port at minimum (if you'll be giving presentations, a VGA port is also where you'll connect a projector), but for extra image quality look for a DVI, HDMI or DisplayPort connector in addition to this. A lot of PC laptops these days also have a combined USB and eSATA port — eSATA allows faster connections to external hard drives, provided that your external hard drive supports it.
These days, there are two newer ports doing the rounds — USB 3.0 (often indicated by a blue USB port or an "SS" symbol above the port) and Thunderbolt. USB 3.0 can offer significantly better speeds than USB 2.0 (up to 254MBps in our tests so far), providing that what you're plugging in is capable of those speeds.
Thunderbolt is really only found on Apple computers at this stage, and is the fastest connection on the block; it's expected to hit Windows-based laptops in Q2 2012. It can also double as a DisplayPort connection, meaning that it can be plugged in to some modern monitors.
Thunderbolt's accessories are extremely few at this point in time, limited to some displays and high-speed storage applications. Cables are also expensive, at AU$55 a pop. For most users, it won't be important right now, but this may change over time.
Like a PCI-Express slot in a desktop, an ExpressCard slot provides expansion opportunities. Additional USB, FireWire, SATA and Ethernet ports, sound cards, wireless cards and TV tuners are all available in ExpressCard format. It comes in two sizes — 54 and 34, representing how many millimetres wide they are. Both sizes end in a 34mm connection, with the 54mm end of the bigger card used to store extra circuitry. As such, an ExpressCard 34 will fit into a 54 slot, but not vice versa.
These barely exist on consumer laptops any more, and are generally only found on business machines. These very same business machines may still have the older PC Card (or PCMCIA) included, as well. PC Cards and slots come in three sizes: Type I, II and III. Type I cards are normally used for memory, Type II for input/output devices and Type III for mass storage and firewalls.
Go wireless
Integrated wireless networking (Wi-Fi) has become an indispensable feature. Most notebooks ship with a variant of 802.11n these days, although some (such as netbooks) still use 802.11g. Public hotspots typically use 802.11g; fortunately, 802.11n is backwards compatible, along with 802.11b.
Most mainstream laptops come with 2.4GHz 802.11n, whereas the premium ones come with both 2.4GHz and 5GHz. The difference: 2.4GHz has greater range, but lesser throughput. It also has more chance of interference, either from your neighbour's Wi-Fi or from other implements that use the 2.4GHz spectrum, like microwaves and cordless phones.
5GHz has less chance of interference and higher throughput, but has smaller range. Your wireless router will also need to support it for you to take advantage of it.
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Talkback
Celeron? They still make those?
Where is text about RAM ?
*sigh*
Good article, but misses key points and is a little biased.
Also, there are more operating systems besides the M$ Windows monopoly or exorbitant Macs. Ever heard if Ubuntu? Fedora? Any Linux-based OS?!!
Misses the key points
My perfect laptop runs Ubuntu
The E series are excellent as the Hard drives is easy to snap in and out from the left side of the PC. SO I can have multiple harddrive with different OS's loaded if I need ful performance. Also great for testing new versions of Ubuntu.
I also have a MacBook Pro 15 that dual boots MACOSX 10.6.xx and Ubuntu.
"Mainstream" a good option for many
I don't agree - for people like me, their performance is quite ok. I have a 7/64 system with 4 GB ram. According to Revo Uninstaller, I have 98 programs installed, and it runs all of them fine, often 10 at a time. It weighs 5 lbs and cost $600 (in UK). Maybe if you're a graphics or gaming whiz, you need more performance, but for probably 80% of us, a standard 15'' laptop is entirely adequate.
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