November 15th, 2009 
asuslaptop 
I am usually startled to witness people purchasing laptops from high end stores and spending large amounts of money on laptops with functions they will never probably make use of. It is pitiful to observe sales representatives trying to sell you the most expensive laptop you are prepared to buy just to make the heftiest commission they can. Perhaps that’s a failure in capitalism but it certainly doesn’t mean that you need to fall for their tricks every time. Choosing the ideal laptop for your needs need not be hard provided you are aware of some of the fundamental factors effecting laptop performance. To start with, let’s discuss various brands of laptops available. You might notice yourself being sold a Sony laptop over an Acer laptop and end up paying hundreds extra for the Sony even if the laptop’s specifications are almost similar. Does this mean you have gotten a faster or more reliable laptop but going for the premium brand? Does it imply that by going with the finest brand you have gotten a faster and more dependable laptop? Unluckily no, well done you just spent a few hundred on a brand name. In the laptop world, the components that make up a laptop are made by a hand full of suppliers which are then bought by your laptop brands such as Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, Sony etc. and put together only to add a different badge on the case. So next time you are looking to purchase a fresh laptop disregard the brands altogether. Instead, focus on the requirements of the laptop and if possible try them in the shop before buying. The next biggest downfall for laptop buyers is either buying a laptop that is way too powerful for their needs or lacking in performance stopping them from using the laptop for what they intended. For those of you looking only to utilise your laptop for surfing the net, chatting with pals, emails, office programs, and watching videos, the low-priced laptops on the market will have more then enough power for these needs. Simply select a laptop that looks nice, has enough hard drive space for your needs and forget about processor speed or graphics card performance. For those of you looking to play games on your laptop be ready to shell out a fortune for your laptop. The graphic card is the only vital component for a gaming laptop. Traditionally laptops have terrible graphics as manufacturers try to cut overheads hence any gaming laptop will set you back at least £500 or $700. While opting for a gaming laptop you should only take into consideration the kind of graphic card it has. Get the laptop with the most powerful graphic card in your budget and forget about the rest of the requirements as if the graphics card is powerful the rest of the system will be too. The easiest way to make sure the graphics card is powerful is to search the internet for reviews of the specific card that a laptop has as this will easily tell you kind of performance levels to expect in games. My last word of warning will be to look out for the in style small notebooks that are 10 inches or lesser. Typing on these is incredibly difficult as the keyboards are just so small. Several do not have a Microsoft Windows operating system you might be used to and hence appear much inexpensive but a lot less practical as a result. Finally watch out for their hard drive size as some cheaper models don’t have a hard drive only a USB memory stick with 2-8GBs of space which will not be enough for the average user. Personally their substantially lower performance and identical price tag to inexpensive full sized laptops leaves me confused as to why anyone would buy them apart from for their small size making them very portable. It seems to me that these have become more of a fashion statement then practical laptops.
Posts Tagged ‘Buying A Laptop’
How to pick your perfect laptop
Posted in 
Tags: Gaming Laptops – Four Factors To Check Before Buying
ght (c) 2009 Titus Hoskins
Gaming laptops are becoming more and more popular with the computer buying public. Once a true gamer wouldn’t dream of buying a laptop for gaming, but now that laptop performances have increased a hundred fold since the first laptops came on the market, even some die-hard gamers are switching over to the other side.
Even so, many gamers still favor Desktop PCs for gaming, mainly because they’re cheaper but mostly because PCs are much easier to upgrade. Notebook computers are not very suitable for upgrading so your system can go out of date very quickly.
Regardless, if you’re in the market for a gaming laptop, there seems to be new systems coming on stream almost daily. So you shouldn’t have a problem finding a laptop that will meet your needs, as long as you keep a few factors in mind.
Here are four major features you should check before buying your gaming laptop:
Graphics Card
Besides buying the most RAM you can afford, you must check your laptop’s GPU (graphics processing unit) since your gaming system will be handling heavy visuals, graphics and 3D video you need a very robust video card that can get the job done. Many recent laptops now sport dual graphics with either SLI technology (NVIDIA) or CrossFire technology (ATI). Regardless, you should check to see if you have at least 512MB of video RAM, many now have 1 Gig of RAM or more. Most gamers go with NVIDIA GeForce 8800M, 9800M and ATI Radeon HD3870 or higher ones as they hit the market.
Some recent laptops now sport 3 GPUs such as the Toshiba Qosimo X305-Q708 which has a couple of GeForce 9800M GTS cards via SLI configuration, plus it also has a GeForce 9400M for quieter operation.
Processor
You need a powerful processor to perform all those applications with ease, we now have dual-core processors in most gaming laptops. Higher end models now sport quad-core processors which will deliver more than enough power to handle most games. You should get at least 2GHz processing speed, and many processors go higher such as the Intel Core2 Extreme X9000 processor which has 2.8GHz. Keep in mind, some systems can be overclocked, such as the Asus W90Vp-X1, at an amazing 3.28GHz.
Display
Another consideration for a gaming laptop is the all important display, native resolution and sound quality. Obviously, you want the best display so check the actual quality of the images on your laptop. Is there any glare? Are the colors brilliant and true? Are the images sharp and clear? Many gamers now go with bigger displays of 17, 18 or even 20 inches and look for a system that gives HD playback. Note if you have 1080p display which will give you true High Definition. Many high end laptops come with WUXGA (Widescreen Ultra eXtended Graphics) 1920×1200 with 16:10 screen aspect ratio.
Sound is also important in gaming so you want the best speakers and sound quality. Many systems are now sporting HD or Blu-ray Drives so this is something to check for if you want superior viewing visuals and sound.
Hard Drive
Since games, videos, music… all take up a lot of space, most gamers go with as large a hard drive as they can afford. At least 200GB of space, and many go for even more up to 1 TB terabyte of space. Solid State Drives are not yet common in gaming laptops but it is something to consider since these can last longer because you have no moving parts like you have in a hard drive. Higher end gaming laptops now have Solid State Drives but cost is still an issue.
Also remember to check the speed of your hard drive, 7200 RPM is faster than a 5400 RPM system. Since top performance is your ultimate goal, getting the fastest hard drive speed is essential. For this reason many gamers go with a SATA hard drive(s) which gives the best performance.
There are a few other things you might want to check out when buying a gaming laptop. One being style and looks; most of the higher end laptops will have plenty of style and pizzazz. If the style and flash of your rig is important to you, than it is something to consider when buying your system. Perhaps, another less shadow and more important issue is warranty. Does your spectacular looking rig have a good warranty should things go south? The more expensive the rig, the more you should check the warranty, even buying an extended warranty for your brand new gaming laptop. Years of happy worry-free gaming should be your ultimate goal.
