Laptops are now essential accessories for business executives. For employers they simply mean increased employee productivity. Combining portability with the 'anytime computing' factor, laptops are hugely popular amongst the mobile workforce in particular. This buying guide will come in handy for anyone shopping around for a laptop.

Buying a laptop

Buying a laptop can be a daunting process. The first step in deciding which laptop to purchase is analysing your personal and business needs. Is this for your home or business and will it be used daily? Is it for when you are travelling? Is it within your budget range?

Laptops come in different flavours, weights and for range of user types. In India the players include MNCs like IBM, Compaq, Toshiba and Sony. Plus home-grown vendors such as ACI and Cerebra. The specifications to look for when buying a new laptop are:

Weight

"Anytime you are going to carry a notebook for an extended period of time, weight becomes important," says Compaq product manager Andre Breynard. "There's always a toss-up between weight and features: the more features, the heavier the notebook.

The weight plays a very important role as lighter the piece, the easier it is to carry. The more you're on the move, the less your laptop should weigh--3.5 pounds is light; more than 7 pounds is heavy. The ideal weight is between 3-4 pounds. Models in this category include IBM ThinkPad 240, Toshiba Portage 3025 and Compaq Presario 305.

Screen

The quality of your experience depends on the quality of the screen. You have a choice between a more expensive active matrix (or TFT, for thin-film transistor) screen and a cheaper passive matrix (or dual scan) screen. If you are making presentations on the go, you need to have a screen that's at least 15 inches wide. These are available for high-end laptops. The standard size is 12-13.5". Whatever the size, make sure the screen has a resolution of 800x600.

Battery Life

"For people who are commuting quite a lot or spending long periods away from an external power source, long battery life is the main criteria," says Breynard. Lightweight machines usually have a battery life of 2 hours. The exception is the Toshiba Portege whose life extends to about 3 hours. Lithium-ion batteries are the most sought after. Avoid those that advertise less than 2.5 hrs. per charge. A tip to extend battery life is to recharge the battery only when the available power is between 1-0 percent.

Memory

The best way to improve your laptop’s performance is to add more memory. The catch being the laptop’s RAM is expensive. The latest notebooks ship with 64 MB and this is sufficient for most jobs. High-end laptops require at least 128MB, which can support design or multimedia development.

Hard Drive

The present day laptops come with storage capacity of 2.1 GB. It can go up to a staggering 25 GB. It all depends, however on the applications you are running. Heavy processing would require bigger storage capacity and vice-versa.

Processor

Chip manufacturers have different chips for desktops and for laptops. The laptop version is designed for more efficient heat dispersal in a smaller area so beware an assembled no-namer that carries a fast desktop chip at half the price of a regular laptop with the same speed chip. Windows-based laptops typically have Intel Pentium, Intel Celeron or AMD K6-2 processors onboard. More megahertz means faster programs with fewer crashes. The ideal one is 350-400 MHz and don’t opt for less 250 MHz.

The other factors are USB ports and PC-card expansion slots to plug in printers, modems, etc. A built-in Ethernet adapter is handy for quick plug-ins into hotels or company networks.

Finally, read the small print in the advertisements. Know your vendor and ensure that he supplies the configuration you want. Be clear on the service agreement and also go through the maintenance and replacement policy with a magnifying lens.

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