Important Factors: When Planning to Buy a Laptop

Buying a new laptop is an investment for sure, and you can make the best possible choice only by thoroughly assessing your requirements. Whether you're buying a laptop for the first time or have been using one for ages, before venturing on a new purchase, there are several factors that need to be considered. To make things easier for you, we've listed here the most important factors:

Processor (CPU)

The first bullet point in all those "specification" handouts that a laptop salesperson will show you would most likely mention the processor in the system. The processor is one of the main components in a laptop and directly affects performance as well as battery life. Over the past years, laptop processors were comparatively slower when pitted against desktop alternatives, but not anymore.

Today, faster multi-core processors are common in laptops. The processor type differs depending on size, purpose or area of application of the laptop. Most laptops come with Intel or AMD processors, with either single- or multi-core architectures. Considering average applications such as MS Office or other applications like Photoshop, a processor with a minimum clock speed of 1.6 GHz is essential. Unlike desktops, laptops cannot conveniently be upgraded, and so it’s always better to choose a faster processor with the future in mind.

Memory (RAM)

Once you’ve decided on the processor you require, you need to do justice to it by letting it perform to its full potential by providing adequate system memory. RAM, the random memory needed for your operating system, running programs and their data, contributes to the overall system response time. Consider a situation where you have one of the fastest computers around, but not enough memory to hold the programs and their data that you wish to run. Much of the program code and the data will have to be held on disk and brought into memory when needed. At the same time, data that is not currently being worked on will be stored temporarily on disk. As the time taken to move data to and from a disk is much greater than moving from memory to the processor, this will slow the system down considerably.

In case this stretches your budget, find out if it will be possible to upgrade later, or if it has to be done by a technician. These days, with resource hungry applications, we advise a minimum of 2 GB RAM as standard.

Display

The display abilities of a laptop are determined by the screen itself, as well as the graphics processor.

Screens come in standard sizes and resolutions. Typically, larger displays have a higher resolution, but then this impacts the portability of a laptop. Wide screen displays are also gaining popularity as they help with better viewing and comfortable working.

The graphics processor, on the other hand, determines performance that is visible when it comes to 3D graphics and gaming. Laptops come with onboard as well as dedicated graphics solutions. The difference between the two is that while onboard solutions provide low end or very basic performance, dedicated graphics solutions from NVIDIA and ATI significantly enhance performance and allow hi-end applications (newer generation games) and other 3D-intensive applications to run more smoothly.

Ports

Every now and then, we have to connect additional peripherals to our laptops. These may be wireless cards, USB drives, printers, mice or other gadgets. An adequate pool of available ports is very useful both for desktops as well as laptops. Most modern day devices are designed to connect to USB ports. If you have devices which use FireWire or other connections such as Bluetooth or infrared, like many mobile phones, PMPs or video cameras do these days, make sure your laptop supports them by having the right connectors.

An expansion slot for PC cards is also a good idea. This comes in handy to accommodate an internal modem, wireless card, additional Ethernet ports or a better sound card. With high definition video and audio coming to laptops, an HDMI port is also becoming common these days. HDMI replaces the old S-Video port and gives advantages such as single cable connection for both audio and video. Headphone and microphone jacks are common, but some laptops come with dual headphone jacks that can be used to connect your laptop to different devices or even to utilise its multi-channel output.

Drives

Hard drives can be broadly classified into two different categories:

1. HDD (Hard Disk Drive)
2. ODD (Optical Disk Drive)

Your storage requirement entirely depends on your usage. A hard drive’s configuration is fairly straight forward in terms of size. These days, laptops come with 250 GB storage on a single HDD, but still you have to decide whether you really need all that space. Another critical factor that determines your overall system speed is the drive’s rotation speed — a drive with a higher spin rate yields faster data access times. However, these are more prone to damage as well. This is one factor you must keep in mind while arriving at your decision. Try and assess how much space you will need in your system, and then multiply by three.

Optical drives have evolved considerably over the years. You can either have a simple CD-ROM drive for installing software, all the way up to the latest high definition Blu-ray DVD burners as part of your configuration. In most cases, laptops now come standard with a dual layer DVD burner. Blu-ray drives are starting to show up, but are extremely expensive.

Networking

One of the basic reasons to have a laptop is to be able to carry out all your tasks while on the move. This involves your work for which you need to send/receive emails. Connecting to the internet or a local network is a crucial function that you need to have f6r your laptop. Most laptops today include a built-in 56 kbps modem and Fast Ethernet (RJ45) port that handle data rates up to 1,000 Mbps. WiFi has now become a common feature in laptops. There are several standards for wireless connectivity, but a very basic connection would require 802.11b/g support having a data rate of up to 54 Mbps.

Size and Weight

You can add up the best of everything and arrive at a monster of a laptop! But then, that’s what portability is all about — balancing your configuration for optimal performance and capacity on the one hand, and portability on the other.

Although ultra portable laptops offer light weight solutions and a smaller size, they also sacrifice on processing speeds, ODDs, expansion slots, etc. Therefore, when looking for a laptop, consider these factors before making a final decision. Also consider the weight of the accessories, especially the AC adapter, because at times, laptops are light but after bundling accessories, the whole package can become quite heavy to carry. If you travel frequently, or carry a lot of heavy things while on the move, a lightweight laptop with a small form factor is what you need.

Battery Life

The best looking laptop is no good if it doesn’t offer you adequate battery time. This holds true even if the product you are considering is an Apple Macbook Air. Try to find the listed battery life for the standard battery, and see if it suits your needs. It would be wise to look for a system with at least two hours of battery life under normal conditions. If you need extended battery life, then look for larger battery packs or media bays that can double as extra battery slots when required.

Warranty Plans

Laptops are more prone to breakdowns due to their portability. When buying a system, make sure to get at least a year’s warranty from the OEM. If you’ll be using the system heavily, a system that comes with a three year warranty is ideal.

Consider several models while you are out there shopping. Consider all models that meet your buying criteria, and compare them on features and prices. Your decision should not depend on someone else’s preferences, but on your own. After all, it’s you who is going to use the laptop — don’t be shy to call dealers and customer support of the OEMs to find out more about their equipment. Check out the model physically whenever possible. Ask your friends who may have bought laptops recently or are currently using the one you wish to buy. Narrow your choices down to a few models, and then seek the best deal before finally buying your dream laptop!

Laptop Components and Features

You’ve found the perfect laptop that you need, but you surely don’t want to be illiterate with the associated jargon that is going to come your way. So what do terms like AGP, BIOS, RAM, Ethernet or even hyper-threading mean? In case you’re not familiar with these terms, read on for better understanding.

AGP (Accelerated Graphics Port)

This enables the quick display of 3D graphics on ordinary computers. Just as modified bikes and automotive engines deliver increased power, AGP results in a significant increase in processing speeds by channelling the graphics information to the on-board RAM, rather than system memory. The result is improved texture mapping, buffering and shading.
A few years ago, graphics systems used the standard PCI bus and slots. AGP was developed in order to provide the higher data transfer rates that graphics requires. Most motherboards now have a standard AGP slot. In fact, some motherboards come with built-in AGP graphics.

Bandwidth

In computing terms, bandwidth refers to the data transfer capability of a channel (physical media for interconnectivity) within a specified duration. By convention, this time duration is one second. Consider a typical example of a 2 Mbps leased line. Here, 2 Mbps signifies that the line, with a bandwidth of 2 Mbps has the capability to transfer 2 Mb of data per second.

BIOS (Basic Input Output System)

The BIOS is a set of software routines that enable data to be input to the system and also output. This includes, for example, routines for keyboard and mouse input and input via ports - serial parallel, USB, and so forth. For output, it provides routines that send characters and graphics to the screen or to a printer; also output to ports, and so forth. The BIOS also includes routines for reading and writing disk drives. The BIOS is held in a ROM chip in the computer, and is loaded into system memory at the time of power-up. This is immediately followed by the POST (Power On Self Test) routines that check out the system. If there is a problem with memory, the BIOS cannot be loaded and so characters cannot be sent to the display. For this reason, memory errors are indicated by the machine beeping.

Bit (Binary Digit)

The bit is the fundamental unit of digital information. With computers being digital systems, all information is represented in bits. In digital logic systems, there are just two states — the supply voltage Vcc that is commonly +5 V or ground voltage 0 V. This means, information is represented as a combination of voltage highs or lows, where a high (1) is +5 V and low (0) is 0 V.

Byte

A byte is made up of 8 bits, and is the measurement unit used to describe the storage capacity and transfer rate of digital systems. One kilobyte is 1,024 bytes. Similarly, one megabyte is 1,024 kilobytes and so on. A byte is the basic unit of information processed by computers, and can have numeric values from 0 to 255. It is for this reason that the basic character set consists of up to 256 characters.

Cache

Pronounced 'cash', this refers to space used to temporarily store data, for rapid access. The word is used in three main contexts: a memory cache, which sits between the main CPU and system memory; disk cache, which sits between a disk drive and system memory; and an internet cache, which is a store on disk of the web pages that have most recently been accessed by your web browser.
If your CPU is processing a set of data that is held in memory, the system starts to bring this data into the cache. The data can be quickly accessed from there by the CPU, and while the CPU is processing a small amount of data, more data can be accessed from the slower system memory and brought into the cache, from where it is rapidly available to the CPU when required. This can speed up over-all processing quite considerably.

Cookie

Many websites store a small file of information on your PC when you access them. This provides certain information that the owners of the sites consider helps them to provide a better service. For example, with Yahoo!, all your preferences are stored as a cookie text file on your system. The next time you access Yahoo!, you don’t have to set your geographical location, or content preferences. The web site just refers to the cookies stored on your system and sets itself to suit your needs. It’s through the use of cookies that each time you browse Yahoo!, it directs you to in.yahoo.com, rather than the US or Australian version of the page.
Web sites often use cookies to collect demographic statistics, decipher your shopping basket when you shop online or find out your frequently visited sites.

CPU (Central Processing Unit)

This refers to the processor in your computer system. Its main components are as follows:
·         CU – The control unit sequences, controls and times the other functions of the CPU. The control unit ensures that all operations are carried out in a coordinated manner, and can be referred to as the 'brain within the brain' of the computer.
·         Registers - These are temporary memory locations, which hold binary data and store the results of ALU calculations and digital logic states. In a 32-bit processor, the registers are 32 bits wide.
·         ALU – The arithmetic logic unit performs basic calculations on data, either accessed directly from memory, or from registers. It performs, for example, additions, subtractions, etc., also logical functions such as AND and OR.
·         BUS - This carries data between memory and registers.

Random Access Memory (RAM)

RAM is an acronym for Random Access Memory and has this name because the CPU does not have to read through the data sequentially, but can access any of the data held in memory; at random. This contrasts with older systems where data was held on a medium such as magnetic tape - with such a system, the machine had to work through all the data preceding it before it found the item it needed.
The RAM holds both the program code of any application (including the operating system) that is running on the PC, together with data that is needed by the application. These are then accessed directly by the CPU. If not all of the required program code and data can fit into the available RAM, some code and data has to be stored on the hard disk and brought into RAM when required. As accessing data from the hard disk is much slower than from RAM, the quantity of RAM in a machine can significantly affect performance - too little RAM, and your PC will run slowly, no matter how fast is your processor.

SDRAM (Synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory)

This refers to a type of memory (DRAM) that can synchronise itself with the processor's bus speed and can run at much higher speeds than its predecessors.
DRAM (Dynamic Random Access Memory)
DRAM works differently from SDRAM as it needs to be refreshed to continue holding the data. This means a slight loss of speed as the memory refreshes.
DDR (Double Data Rate)
DDR refers to a specification of RAM. With DDR, you can transfer data at double the rate of normal SDRAM. This is possible by transferring data twice per clock cycle, once on the rising edge and once on the falling edge of the cycle.
DIMM (Dual In-line Memory Module)
This is a type of memory module commonly used in modern laptops and computers.
DIMMs have a 64-bit data path, and are widely used in laptops with 64-bit processors as they don't need to be doubled up, unlike SIMMs.
"Dual in-line" refers to the way chips are mounted on the module. They come in either a 144-pin or 168-pin package. The 144-pin module is commonly used for laptops.
DOS (Disk Operating System)
DOS was the first widely used operating system for IBM PCs. Unlike its successor, Windows, DOS is a command line oriented operating system. The first version of DOS, called PC-DOS, was developed for IBM by Bill Gates’ Microsoft, after it had bought the predecessor QDOS (Quick and Dirty Operating System) from Seattle Computer Products. Later, Microsoft, by exploiting a smart loophole in the agreement with IBM, retained rights to distribute a version of its own. This version was named MS-DOS, which was later replaced by Windows. The first versions of Windows used DOS as their base and were launched from DOS in the same way as an application.

Ethernet

Ethernet is a basic LAN architecture developed by Robert Metcalfe and his Xerox Corporation colleagues at PARC in the early 1970s. Ethernet supports data transfer rates up to 10 Mbps. A newer implementation of the Ethernet specification, 100 Base-T, supports data transfer up to 100 Mbps. The latest standard (Gigabit Ethernet) can support data transfers up to 1,000 Mbps (1 Gigabit).

Firewall

This is a security program that protects your computer from unauthorised access through a network and/or the internet. A firewall is very important to have if your computer is connected directly to the internet.

Graphics Card

A graphics card controls and reproduces text and images to be displayed on your screen. These may either be still or motion pictures. Graphic cards come with various specifications, and unless they are built-in to the motherboard (main board), they have their own RAM. Some models are equipped with a TV-out feature that lets you connect the graphics card to your TV/VCR. This is useful if your laptop has a DVD player and you want to watch a DVD on your domestic TV.
Graphic cards also come with different slot types, although the most common one is the AGP (Accelerated Graphics Port). You can still get PCI (Peripheral Component Interconnect) graphic cards with older motherboards.
Built-in graphic cards use the system's RAM for their functioning. You can assign the amount of RAM that is allocated for this purpose from your BIOS setup. Laptops have either a dedicated graphics card or on-board (on the system board) graphics.

Hard Disk / Hard Drive

This is your computer’s main storage device. This is where you would normally keep your programs and files. These devices contain magnetic platters (the disks) that rotate at speeds of 5,400 rpm and above. An actuator (similar in structure to an arm) moves across the platters and reads / writes the information with READ/WRITE heads. The size of the gap between the READ/WRITE heads and the platter is typically that of human hair.

Hyperthreading

Hyperthreading refers to a technology developed by Intel that is incorporated into some of Intel's Pentium 4 and later processors. Hyperthreading extends the multi-tasking capability of the processor by allowing more than one instruction thread (stream of instructions) to be processed at a time. Most processors can only process one instruction thread at a time. With hyperthreading, this is extended to two threads resulting in a significant increase in processor performance. This is a half-way step between a single processor and having two cores - two processors - on the same unit. Certain resources are duplicated to allow the processing of two threads.
IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics)
IDE (also known as ATA, AT Attachment) refers to a hard drive standard, in which the controller is integrated into the device. This standard ended the need for separate disk controllers.

Ilink/ Firewire

A fast digital link for transferring video, audio and other data between two devices. IEEE 1394 (Firewire) refers to the IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) digital connectivity standard, commonly referred to as Firewire. Apple Inc., Sony Corporation and a few others helped to develop the IEEE 1394 standard, and this interface is now gaining popularity. Some common devices using the IEEE 1394 interface are digital video cameras, hard drives and storage devices. It offers real-time, bi-directional, fast data transfer along with plug-and-play compatibility for ease of use.
IEEE 1394/Firewire characteristics:

• IEEE 1394a - Firewire 400
  • Data Throughput: 400Mbps
  • Maximum Cable Length: 4.5 metres
• IEEE 1394b - Firewire 800
  • Data Throughput: 800Mbps
  • Maximum Cable Length: 100 metres

Firewire is the registered trademark of Apple's IEEE 1394 digital connection. iLink is the registered trademark of Sony's IEEE 1394 digital connection.
Internet Service Providers
An internet service provider is a company that provides you access to the internet, and all other associated services, which may include voice over internet facilities to place calls using the internet (VoIP).

Modular Bay

A cavity in a notebook used primarily for removable drives, but also for accessories. A two-bay notebook has an internal bay for the hard drive and a second bay for a CD-ROM, DVD-ROM, floppy disk drive, or a spare battery.
Modem (MOdulator DEModulator)
A communications device used to connect to a network, e.g. the internet. The most common type is the internal modem that uses a PCI interface to connect to the motherboard. Another type of modem is the external type, and has its own power supply. It is connected using a serial or USB cable. These days, most laptops come fitted with internal modems.

Motherboard/Mainboard

A motherboard (mainboard) is the main circuit board within a computer/laptop. Most modern motherboards come with the following features:

• A processor slot (type will depend on the board specifications)
• Memory banks
• AGP slot
• PCI slots
• IDE interface
• USB ports

Operating System

This is the main software that drives a computer system, for example, Windows. All installed programs run under the control of the operating system. It provides more extensive services for applications than the simple BIOS (described above). Simple operating systems load and execute programs, providing them with input/output and other services. More advanced systems use graphical user interfaces to give the user much easier control over both programs and data.

RAID (Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks)

RAID refers to a hard disk technology that uses multiple disks to speed up data transfer and/or provide disk redundancy through disk system fault tolerance. The concept of RAID is generally implemented on servers, and is not required for home PCs. There are several variations of a RAID configuration referred to as levels. RAID configurations are commonly found in data critical applications.

Serial Port

A communications port that connects the computer to other peripherals such as printers and modems. A serial port transmits data sequentially (one bit at a time) as opposed to parallel ports that transmit 8 bits at a time. The use of both serial and parallel ports has largely been replaced by USB.

Sound Card

This is an internal device, which controls and produces sound and drives audio devices. Sound cards come with various specifications. For example, some have more outputs than others, allowing for 5.1 surround sound. Similarly, others have a higher sampling frequency to give better sound recording.

USB (Universal Serial Bus)

This is a fairly recent feature in newer computers that simplifies adding peripherals (mice, printers, scanners, etc) to your laptop. Most laptops come with built-in USB ports. The number of USB ports depends on the manufacturer and the model. USB 2.0 is a newer implementation of the USB standard and was jointly developed by Hewlett-Packard, Intel, Lucent, Microsoft, NEC and Phillips. It provides a higher data transfer rate of up to 480 Mbps.

Widescreen display

An LCD display with a width-to-height ratio of 16:10 or 16:9 instead of 4:3, is classified as a widescreen display. These are more suited for video content.