- Wireless - I strongly recommend that you make sure that is has a wireless card. Most new units these days have one. Also, it is ideal if it is built into the system. It has been my experience that they have a better signal than the add-on PCMCIA cards. I also recommend 802.11g for speed purposes.
- USB - Make sure that it has enough ports (USB and firewire) available. Depending on your purpose, you may not need a whole lot. Keep in mind that devices like external mice and most modern printers have a USB connection.
- Hard Drive - These days I would not recommend a system that is less than 60GB in size. You will most likely find a minimum of 80GB on new systems. You probably will not need it all, but it is always nice to have a little more space.
- Memory - Running at 512MB is good, but it would be nice to have 1GB. Sounds crazy, but it will probably not be too long before 1GB will barely be enough.
- DVD/CD - Most new systems come with a unit that will read and write to both of these media types. Mainly be aware of its capabilities. It's nice to have a drive that can both read and write to DVDs and CDs.
- Reviews - Check to see what others are saying about the product. Maybe it looks good on paper, but perhaps there are a lot of people that have had problems with that specific model. Do some research.
- Price - Cost isn't everything although it does help. Don't spend more that you should. You should be able to find something decent for around $700. Again, it goes back to what you need.
- Card Readers - These are great to have built in. Keep in mind though that you can get an external USB device for around $20 to $40.
Most people use laptops for internet usage and a few programs like spreadsheets and word processing. For these purposes, a basic unit should be sufficient. For more heavy usage, you may want to spend a little more money upgrading things like memory and hard drive space.
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