computer advice needed

[CrustyOatmeal]

so my sister is going to college soon and she has asked me for some advice on what kind of computer she should get. she already knows she wants a laptop (not a netbook) and she mainly plans on using it for school stuff and for music. i was thinking ASUS because they have never let me down but i figured their computers are a little bit more gaming oriented. i know a little about computers but i figured i would open up this question to those much more knowledgeable than me.

so what kind of specs should i look for in a laptop for her? she has a price range of around $500-$1000

 

[thejdcole]

It really all depends on the type of work she intends to do, if it's literally just school work like word editing etc. then you really only need something with about 3-4 Gb of ram, a 2.2 GHz processor, and you dont even need a gfx card, the onboard gfx will be just fine. something like this will suffice (my apologies for the currency being in pounds, it's all i know ). http://www.ebuyer.com/251331-asus-x52f-laptop-x52f-ex570v

 

[alj]

It all depends what you want to do with it.

Personally for just office work i would go for a AMD fusion based laptop they are low wattage CPUs like the atoms in netbooks, your battery will last longer this will be godo for lectures ect when you will be away from any power points.

something like

http://www.okobe.co.uk/ws/product/Toshiba+Satellite+Pro+C660D+185+Laptop+15.6+AMD+Fusion+E+350+1.6+GHz+4GB+RAM+320GB+HDD+with+Microsoft+Windows+7+Pro+64+Bit/1000053275?ref=1q4bs

and for the SSD

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/128gb-kingston-ssdnow-v100-25-ssd-flash-memory-read-250mb-s-and-write-230mb-s


If you want a bit more kick the new Macbook Air is outstanding.

Whatever you get i would upgrade it with a solid state drive, this will improve performance massively and save lots of battery power. they are also lighter and are not effected by shock.