Folks, I have to purchase a new laptop for work. I’ve listed below the minimum specs needed. Can you guys please help me out with some recommendations? I need to to be sort of lighter, since I will be taking it on appointments. No need for me to get an extra workout carrying it around. Thanks.
Operating System
Windows XP Professional SP 3
Windows XP Pro Tablet SP 3
**This is the only thing that I MUST have. All below can be ‘higher’/better. XP is a must.
Hardware
Processor- 1.6 GHz Pentium Duo Core or higher
Memory (RAM)
2 GB or higher
Hard Drive
80 GB
Internet Browser
Internet Explorer 7.0 (again, a MUST)
“Office” Suite
MS Office 2003 or 2007 (I think I’ve got '07 at home on a disk)
Adobe Reader
Acrobat Reader 9.0
Email
Lotus Notes (this gets added onto laptop when I bring it in, I believe)
Anti-Virus
Norton Anti-Virus (Recommended, I can probably get what I want here.)
Again, thanks for help on this. And come someone tell me the difference between XP Professional and XP Pro Tablet?
I’d upgrade the hard drive speed from 5400 to 7200 if possible and get as much memory as you can stand. Since you have a requirement for XP you may need to get a custom build anyway. The rest of the stuff they put in Laptops/PC isn’t really important unless you’re using hogs like CAD or are gaming.
I’m using an HP Pavilion dv2 loaded with Vista Business 64bit. It isn’t a dual core (single core Athlon Neo 64bit), but the performance is very good unless I am running a lot of apps all at once, then it slows a bit compared to a dual or quad core machine.
it was inexpensive (about $600 or so last year), reliable, and because it has a smaller screen (12") and no internal cd/dvd drive, very light and portable.
Win 7 runs pretty sweet for me. And there’s an XP virtual machine you can run if you’ve got some really old pre-2000 stuff or something. But even my old vb6 apps work fine in 7.
I’d get whatever size Dell latitude you like with the 3 year on-site warranty. A lot of times you have to ship HPs away for 6+ days. Ok for home, not so ok for business.
I do not know what you mean by “work” i.e. small business, corporate? but I would assume the software would come from “work” and actually you would an antivirus “server” so you would not have to worry about and only have to install the client to connect to the server.
You can easily build one to the specs you are looking for. They aren’t much to look at, but they are easily the most robust, well designed laptops that I have ever used. They are designed to get the job done. The only caveat is that you can’t get XP on them anymore, but they do have a tablet version with windows 7 tablet. I do believe you can order them without an OS though, so you could install your own copy of XP.