Holiday Gift Guide: Laptops for Every Type of User

Is your old laptop dying a slow death? Is it banged up? Starting to fall apart? Has it gotten too slow with the demands of current software? With a little help from Tech Savvy Daddy, we’re here to assist you in navigating the confusing world of laptop purchases in order to find the best one to give or get this holiday season.

Maybe it’s time to dump old your old XP machine move up to something new- a better laptop with Windows 7 for the holidays.

While Windows 7 came out in time for the holidays last year, after a year of experience in the wild, it’s now ripe for the picking. The PC makers have a fresh batch of machines out there with impressive specs and at good prices and we’ve put together a laptop round-up to show you some good selections in just about every category.

All of the machines come with a version of Windows 7. Tech Savvy Daddy recently upgraded his work machine to Windows 7 after being promised, “it works better than XP at this point.” He was highly skeptical, but once he gave it a try, he was pleasantly surprised. It has been as stable as XP, and he’s enjoying the new features quite a bit. XP, you are dead to me.

The laptops we looked at ranged from tiny ultra-portable to a humungous Blu-ray HD video powerhouse. If you are in the market for a new laptop for yourself or a loved one, here are somequestions to ask yourself:

• What are you going to use it for?
• Are you looking for a machine to take everywhere?
• Do you plan on using it a lot on the plane?
• Or do you want a laptop that will spend most of its time sitting on your desk or kitchen table, and only occasionally leave the house?
• Do you want to watch DVDs on it? Blu-Ray?
• When at home, will you plug it into a big monitor, or use it with the built-in screen?

ASUS Eee PC 1008P Karim Rashid Collection ($499)

Basic specs:

• 1.67 GHz Intel Atom Processor
• 2 GB ram, 320 GB hard drive
• 10.1 inch LED backlit LCD (1024×600)
• 1.3 megapixel webcam

Pros:

• Lightest machine we tested, 2.5 lbs
• Battery life of up to 6 hours
• Hot Pink stylish case
• Would fit in a decent-size purse

Cons:

• Netbooks sacrifice performance for portability.
• Screen can be too small for some work like spreadsheets.

Best choice if you…

• Are looking for a machine to take with you to meetings, conferences, or the coffee shop.
• Plan on using the wifi at Starbucks, places you hang out, and at hotels.

T-Mobile Dell Inspiron Mini 10 4G ($229 w/ 2 year T-Mobile data contract, $449 without contract)

Basic specs:

• 1.67 GHz Intel Atom Processor
• 1 GB ram, 160 GB hard drive
• 10.1 inch LCD (1024×600)
• 1.3 megapixel webcam

Pros:

• Lightweight, 3.06 lbs
• Battery life of up to 8 hours
• Would fit in a decent-size purse
• With integrated 3G data service from T-Mobile, you have Internet access practically everywhere.
• No jumping through hoops to connect to sketchy Wifi networks wherever you go.

Cons:

• Trackpad buttons seem awkward. If you like “tapping”, you can work around it. Consider a travel mouse too.
• 1GB of RAM (adequate, but not great)… but it does NOT seem to be upgradable.

Best choice if…

• You need internet access wherever you go. If you want a machine you can take anywhere and just pop open and use, consider this cellular-enabled Netbook. Pull it out and start working instead of unpacking your full-size laptop and then wasting time fiddling with wifi.

Toshiba Satellite T235 ($599)

Basic Specs:

• AMD Turion dual-core 1.5 GHz Processor
• 4 GB ram, 320 GB hard drive
• 13.3 inch LED backlit LCD (1366×768)
• 0.3 megapixel webcam

Pros:

• Ultraportable PC with impressive features
• Weighs 3.8 lbs
• Battery life over 6 hours
• Stylish red-cover, shiny but fingerprint-resistant metal keyboard and trackpad
• HDMI out port to hook up your TV or a large monitor

Cons:

• 640×480 (0.3 megapixel webacm)
• Not much else. This is a great little machine!

Best choice for…

• Someone who wants a powerful laptop but doesn’t want to lug around something heavy. This Toshiba packs an impressive punch inside a tiny package. Its 13.3 inch screen has the same screen resolution of some larger laptops. It has 4GB of RAM, which I consider to be happy-medium for a Windows 7 machine. You could hook up the HDMI port to a large monitor and add a USB keyboard and mouse for when you’re using this machine at home.

Lenovo IdeaPad Z560 ($699)

Basic specs:

• Intel i3 2.27 GHz processor (as tested), now selling 2.4GHz at same price
• 3 GB ram, 500 GB hard drive
• 15.6 inch LED backlit LCD (1366×768)
• 0.3 megapixel webcam
• Weighs 5.6 lbs
• Battery life up to 4 hours

Pros:

• Dolby Advanced Audio and high quality speakers (See below for more details)
• Dual-layer DVD burner
• Full-size keyboard with a number pad
• HDMI out port to hook up your TV or a large monitor

Cons:

• 640×480 (0.3 megapixel webacm)
• Screen resolution. This has the same number of pixels as Toshiba’s LCD which is 2 inches smaller.

Best choice for…

• Someone who wants a powerful laptop with a good size screen that they can work off all-day.
• Someone who wants to watch DVDs on the computer. The Netbooks and ultra-compact machines don’t have DVD drives.
• The large screen and keyboard place this machine at the high-end of the “typical laptop” category.

Dell Inspiron N7010 ($899)

Basic specs:

• Intel i5 2.53 GHz processor
• 6 GB ram, 320 GB hard drive
• 17.3 inch LED backlit LCD (1600×900)
• 1.3 megapixel webcam
• Weighs 6.7 lbs
• Battery life up to 3 hours, 37 minutes

Pros:

• This is a workhorse machine with the fastest processor we tested.
• Spectacularly large screen 17.3 inch screen
• Blu-Ray player and dual-layer DVD burner
• HDMI out port to hook up your TV or a large monitor
• Includes Intel Wireless Display feature to stream to an HDTV (See below for more details)
• Integrated 4G WiMAX broadband internet. (See below for more details)
• Available in several colors. The one tested had a bright red lid– clearly the “fastest” color.

Cons:

• This won’t fit in a typical laptop bag or sleeve
• Almost too big for coach air travel.

Best choice for…

• Someone who wants a powerful laptop with a big screen, but doesn’t travel too much.
• An at-home laptop to sit on your desk because it’s less bulky than a desktop. You get desktop-like performance with a 17 inch monitor and full-size keyboard. This machine isn’t that heavy (6.7 lbs), and would travel well for trips, but unless you’re flying in Business Class, it could be hard to work with such a large machine in a middle-seat when the guy in front of you puts his seat back all the way.

Overall laptop trends:

• Every laptop tested, except for the Dell T-Mobile netbook comes with Windows 7 home premium. They all have SD card slots. Everything had at least 2 USB ports.
• Everything that wasn’t a netbook came with a VGA and HDMI port.
• CD/DVD drives used to be standard in laptops for software installation. But with everything downloaded over the internet or transferred via flash drive, the need for a CD/DVD player is diminishing. DVD drives can be useful for watching movies in the car, on the plane, or at a hotel. With streaming Netflix, Hulu, and iTunes, the DVD player could be on the way out completely soon.

Interesting Extras:

• Dolby Advanced Audio: The Lenovo IdeaPad Z560 comes with Dolby Advanced Audio and upgraded speakers. Dolby Advanced Audio software improves your sound quality through several different technologies to compensate for the challenges faced with laptop sound. An audio optimizer is calibrated and tuned by Dolby Engineers specifically for each laptop model. A high frequency enhancer improves the quality of your compressed MP3s and other audio files. A natural bass technology extends bass response up to an octave. What does all this mean to you? The Engineers at Dolby Laboratories have worked hard to improve the sound quality, and it shows. The sound quality on the IdeaPad is much better than you’d expect from a typical laptop.

• 4G Wimax Broadband Internet Access: The Dell Inspiron N7010 comes with integrated 4G Wimax broadband access. This can be used to connect to high-speed broadband networks from Sprint, Comcast, Time Warner, and Clear. You can purchase day-passes or a monthly service. If you’re a Comcast or Time Warner customer, you can add wireless broadband to your current bundle of services. At the moment, 4G Wimax service is available in many major cities. For coverage, please see http://www.clear.com This Holiday Season, all Intel i3, i5, i7 laptops at BestBuy will come with built-in 4G wimax capabilities. See BestBuy for more details.

• Intel Wireless Display: The Dell Inspiron N7010 comes with the Intel Wireless Display feature. This allows you to stream your display your HDTV via a NetGear Push2TV adapter. The contents of your laptop are sent via WiFi to an Intel Wireless Display receiver box. The small receiver box sits next to your HDTV and connects to it via HDMI. You can sit on the couch, controlling the laptop, with the display streamed to your HTDV across the room.

Summary:

We tested laptops from the smallest to the largest. The maturity and performance of Windows 7 is far superior to Vista, and it’s a very suitable replacement for Windows XP. The configurations reviewed here all serve their own purpose, and which one you should choose depends upon your intended use and personal preferences. Watch out for under-powered or end-of-life machines being sold as door-buster specials this holiday season. All of the machines tested here performed their intended functions well.

Disclaimer: Prices and specs came from manufacturer’s websites and sometimes individual retailers. Battery life estimates are from manufacturers and were not tested. Some PC manufacturers make hundreds of different models and configurations, so you may have a hard time finding the exact same model we reviewed. Not responsible for typographical errors. Check with PC manufacturer for complete specifications of any of these laptops.

All laptops were provided for review purposes. Images provided courtesy of the companies. No compensation was received for this post however, Intel (#IntelUpgrade) and AMD (#AMDMoms) covered travel costs to attend events associated with their products.

Original post by Tech Savvy Mama
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