How to buy a laptop

I am prefectly aware that the title of my essay doesn’t include PC. My opininon is that PC’s are starting to become out of date and most people would prefer to buy a laptop rather than a home computer, therefore I’ll help you buy your laptop in an easy way.

First of all, I wouldn’t buy a laptop from online but I feel its a good start to look at what you’d like, since they can be seen and all of their most important information is explained perfectly. I would start looking at them from laptopsdirect.ie because they have all the trusted brands on their website. I especially like that website because it tells you in two ways about its product if not more. When you find a laptop you like the price and look of, you can see a product summary which is for people who has little knowledge of technology within computers. This summary consists of a brief summary of convincing you to pick their product and then the essentials that every people looks for in a laptop in the first place;             screen size is given in inches and milimetres which lets you know how big your laptop is. Usually I wouldn’t suggest any size since everybody prefers something different. As I am a college student I would require a smaller one around 14” that can be easily brought into college and still can beautifully see the images or movies scenes you need. Unfortunately those tend to cost more than the larger ones.

The next is the Processor. Basically it only means that the better it is the faster your computer runs. Intel’s new “i” series procesor is at the top end of the performance market. Using the latest technology in, low power consumption, multi-core and new supersmall chips. That is why I wouldn’t advice a mini laptop. They usually only have single-core pentium which means that the more applications you’re using, the slower you’re laptop gets. If you don’t care about this because you’re only using your laptop for a few things or you don’t have enough money then AMD based processors are the cheaper alternative that use slightly less high tech ideas and processes in ther chips. They use more power that the equivalent intel ones and are not as powerful. I just call them the cheaper student laptops.

                                The RAM is the Random Access Memory. This is the short term memory that helps open programs faster and has information on hand for the processor to read. DDR2 is the standard type of ram that runs our computers. Windows 7 requires at least 1GB of RAM, but in my experience, you need at least 2GB if not more. DDR3 is the new type of ram that is twice the speed of the DDR2 RAM. This means that it can transfer data more quickly between the RAM and the processor but it’s used in more top spec computers.

                Then there’s the hard drive. The standard type is a 7200 RPM spindle hard drive. This uses a small disk that is spinning inside the hard drive. This disk holds all the information. They are relatively fast and cheap to produce and they can range from 120GB to 640GB in a laptop which is more than enough for the average user. From this all we really need to know is that the sellers try to make the space available look bigger and use the number of GB’s before all the programs such as Windows 7 would be installed on it. Also this number tells you how much room will you have to download or keep your personal data. Solid State Drives (SSD) are the new cutting edge in technology, with blazing fast speed that leaves even the best spindle hard drive in the dust. They are very expensive and the GB/ euro is very low. They have no moving parts which means they last longer so if you have the money for it, don’t hesitate for even a second.

                The Graphics Card have two main companies making them; ATI and Nvidia are high quality, high performance graphics cards. One of these cards are essential if you use your computer for multimedia or gaming. Even business computers require a certain level of graphics power. There are a lot of factors that determine how good a graphics card is but generally, the more dedicated the RAM on the card, the better. Intel also have their own graphics cards but they are nowhere near as powerful as the ATI or Nvidia ones. They are cheaper solution used in computers where the user has no real desire to play demanding games or multimedia editing. They’re also much cheaper so usually depending on what’s in your pocket you’re allowed to be picky with them.

                The Optical drive is only where you put your DVDs and CDs. Nowadays loads of them can read and burn both CDs and DVDs. The new HD technology is Blue Ray, which you only have in more expensive laptops.

                Then the operation system isn’t so hard to figure out either. The two main ones are Windows 7 and Vista. I never tried Vista, but I heard very bad things about it so try to avoid it if you can.

This was the summary with a little bit of salt. If you’re even more into computing, then you’re better off looking at the Tech Spec information on the website.