Buying a Laptop...
 

I'm buying a laptop for wifey and haven't got the slightest idea of what direction to head in with it. I'm not a hardware guru so I'm lost here...

She doesn't need a MONSTER laptop so the XPS and what not are a bit of overkill. It also has to be a Windows based since she loves her video games (sims, shockwave games, etc). She'll be using it for class work (research papers n shit), light gaming, surfing, watching dvds, etc.

Anyone have an suggestions? Trying to keep it under $1k btw

I would just go to Wal-Mart or Best Buy and pick something out.

Here's a good one for your wife (btw, it comes in other colors, but the pink was the first link I found for it).

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....2180419 98232

It's 729 with a good amount of RAM and such and has the big 17" screen. If you need a smaller screen or something, let me know.

yeah? I briefly checked out the best-buy laptops a few weeks back and most had shitty video abilities.

thanks I'll check it out

The video on that one is integrated (crappy), but with the games you listed should be fine. If you want something with a bit more oomph in the video card department I'll find ya one.

Windows 7 is coming soon so I would be careful in that I heard that Vista Home Basic wouldn't be a free upgrade to Windows 7

not sure on the details but it would be worth checking into at this point, not sure if I would wait or install XP on a new laptop if I were doing it right now

yeah good point... not a big fan of Vista... might just buy an empty laptop and install XP on it from new egg then

get a mac.. :thumbsup
pre-owned units should fit your budget..

apparently you didn't see my original post ;)

I like gateway and I buy them at best buy . If you don't like screen res just get a monitor That is what I do.:2 cents:

Take a look at the Vostro 1510 by Dell, I just bought it a little over a month ago and it is amazing. It is currently only 479.00 I can do lots of gaming, and research and work papers on this and its cheap and runs great with no problems what so ever. i have never been a fan of dell and I am really happy with this product.

http://configure.us.dell.com/dellsto...~vostronb_1510

oh hell yeah... ty :thumbsup

That other dell is a 15.4 inch screen 2 Gigs of RAM and a much smaller hard drive...but you can add a good graphics card to it as well, and more RAM so it's a good choice as well.

I currently have 15.4 inch laptops, and for my next laptop I want to move up to 17" screen. RAM and Hard drive space are the next key issues, followed by your graphics choice.