New Laptop

[robertgrumbles]

Hi everyone,

I am thinking about buying a new laptop during the holiday season to take advantage of the sales. I use excel extensively at my job (financial analyst - use multiple linked spreadsheets etc.) and think that I will probably need to work at home at some point. I was wondering what I should be looking for in the way of hardware. I am on a budget, so what's the slowest cpu, ram etc. I can get away with? I don't anticipate using the laptop for anything more than excel, office and surfing the net, so don't need anything fancy.

Thanks!

 

[robertgrumbles]

Thanks for all the replies!

I ended up going with an ASUS that has an i7, 4GB RAM. ($599) I upgraded the RAM to 8GB for the extra $40. Hopefully I can remember how to install...it's been a while.

Also, I upgraded to professional, thinking this would include office, as was done in the past. Come to find out that's not the case and need to buy office seperately.

Is professional worth the $90 I spent to upgrade, or should I just return it? What are the advantages/disadvantages?

 

[RonaldD]

Thanks for all the replies!

I ended up going with an ASUS that has an i7, 4GB RAM. ($599) I upgraded the RAM to 8GB for the extra $40. Hopefully I can remember how to install...it's been a while.

Good for you, to me that's a great buy. That's quite cheap for a laptop with an i7 processor.

 

[SydneyGeek]

Windows Professional has a few extra features. Whether it's worth it for you depends on whether you would use them.

Virtualization with Windows XP Mode. You could also use VirtualBox or VMWare
Ability to connect to a business network (domain)
System backup utility

See... http://windows.microsoft.com/en-AU/windows7/products/compare

Denis