Laptop Check

Certain things to look out for while buying a laptop:

1. The best way to know about a laptop / any computer part is to read reviews in the web. Make sure you do that before you make your decision. Sites such as http://www.notebookreview.com should be a good start to understand about the most popular laptops.

2. Look for the laptop company support in you city of residence.

3. Look for atleast 512 MB RAM (if refurbished) and at least 1 GB (if new). Anyway, the amount of RAM should be decided on how memory intensive apps do you plan to run on your laptop.

4. If taking a DVD writer, definitely look for DVD double layer write support ... if possible look for DVD-RAM support as well .. using DVD-RAM u can use a DVD disc exactly as a hard disk. On a side note, I hardly recommend go for a DVD writer rather than a CD-writer.

5. My laptop comes with a TV-out (S vidoe port) ... so that I play DVDs in my laptop and watch in TV. If you don't have a DVD-writer this is a cool feature to look out for.

6. Certain laptops come with TV-tuner card .. if u r crazy about TV then it may be worth considering this .

7. Laptops generally generate a lot of heat ... many have complained about this problem ... try to find out if the laptop has a good cooling effect.

8. Laptops are cheapest in US ... if u know someone coming to India from US .. then I'd highty recommend that you buy there and get it imported to India.

9. The in-built microphone is something which I simply loooveeee in my thinkpad. Laptops also come with in-built webcam but they may be costly.

10. If buying refurbished laptops, I suggest you do not go for P3 or P4 systems as they generate a lot of heat. Instead, Pentium M laptops are a better choice. If purchasing a new one, look for Intel Duo Core 2 (the dual core 2 is supposedly better than its competitor AMD in performance).

11. Look out for coupons and gift offers (especially during festive season and Black Friday). Deals2buy generally has good offers on especially Dell laptops.

12. If you intend to have a good gaming experience or are likely to use any graphics intensive applications, a discrete graphics card is anyday preferred to integrated graphics. Also another thing to remember is that unlike other parts such as RAM, Hard Disk, in laptops it is generally not possible to upgrade to discrete graphics later if you have one with integrated graphics.