Before you buy a laptop, you'll need to figure out what you want to do with it. Your notebook will differ depending on whether you're a student, home user, working professional or frequent traveler. According to your preferred usage, you will need to choose a laptop designed to be a workhorse fit for word or excel processing, multimedia performer suitable for gaming, watching movies, listening to music, storing and editing photos and other such applications.
You'll find laptops of all shapes and sizes in the market today. From the slim, ultra portable variety to the big and heavy ones – there's ample choice for you. So, you have to take your pick depending on your usage and the functionalities you want in your notebook. The categories available are – ultraportable (smallest, most lightweight), thin-and-light – portability and performance at a reasonable price, midsize – these are a little bit of everything, from word processing to multimedia to gaming, but aren’t too portable; desktop replacement – feature packed, bulky machines that can do everything your desktop can.
As a student, you will want a budget laptop, that's portable as well, so you can cart it around with you. If you're a frequent traveler then your prime criterion will be portability. You will want a laptop that is very light to carry. If you are a high-powered business executive, you will need a laptop that's high on performance while maintaining a slim body. If you are home user, you are looking at the laptop as a substitute for your desktop. Here you could be looking at either a mid-sized laptop in the budget range or a feature packed one that can outdo your desktop.
BUDGET
You can buy a laptop for as low as Rs 15,000. Of course, don't expect too much in terms of features. This one will be ideal for basic processing. More than sufficient if all you need it for is Microsoft Office applications, basic Internet surfing.
Then you have the mid range laptops of 60,000 to one lakh range. Now these give you more variety and are very good for multimedia applications and gaming.
The other important factors to be considered.
PROCESSOR
You are probably looking at Intel's Celeron processor in the budget level and an Intel for the mid and high-end. If you don't mind a little expenditure then Intel's Core2Duo should be your ideal choice.
