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Buying Branded Notebooks
Buying branded notebooks
or laptops or mobile computers, whatever may
be the term, needs meticulous understanding
and study. This is because presently the market
offers a wide range of products in the branded
notebook segment. It is critical to get the
right branded notebook for your optimum return
on investment and utilization.
There’s a lot of difference
in what is being heard about notebooks about
their performance and what actually is getting
sold. What people like to buy, and what they
actually buy is often different. Finding out,
which was the best-selling notebook is an
ambiguous task. However, we can always get
certain of the fundamentals right before embarking
upon buying branded notebooks. A few key points
for buyers are -
Connectivity Options
– Wired or wireless Ethernet is virtually
included in all notebooks of today. The most
important connectivity option is 802.11a,
802.11b and 802.11g. Every notebook should
be ordered with built-in wireless connectivity.
If you need to add wireless later, it is advisable
to do so in this order - MiniPCI card (internal),
PC Card or PCI Express Card (external), wireless
USB adapter, wired Ethernet to wireless bridge.
Bluetooth Technology for wirelessly transferring
data short distances (up to 30 feet) among
notebooks, cell phones, Palm or Pocket PC
handhelds, and printers is also an emerging
fascination. Bluetooth is not a competitor
to wireless Ethernet and can be taken as an
option to add value to your notebook.
Customization –
Most vendors of branded laptops (especially
those selling online) allows one to customize
the product. You need to remember that this
is a good option and can add to value for
money. You should think about the processing
speed, the hard disk space and graphics options
specifically when you plan to customize.
DVD-CD-RW drive
– The most popular optical drive for
notebooks is the DVD-CD Combo drive. It reads
DVDs and CDs and writes CDs. Buying a read-only
DVD or CD drive saves, at most, $50 to $75.
Hence it is clever move to go for the combo
drives. However, adding a writeable DVD is
costlier, sometimes about $250 extra. Users
who upgrade should consider multiformat DVD
writers that write both minus (DVD-RW) and
plus (DVD+RW) discs.
Bay –
In a notebook these days is appreciable to
look for Bay - a cavity used primarily for
accessories and removable drives. 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. Some
manufacturers use the term spindles.
PC Card slot
– This refers to a space where you can
insert small (credit card-size) accessories
such as, network adapters, security cards,
wireless network adapters, modems, and memory
cards, as well as connection points for some
external disk drives. One PC Card slot is
adequate and you should ensure that it is
there.
It is probably impossible
to know the exact number of notebooks sold
of a particular brand. Various stores and
shopping search engines will give an idea
but it is wrong assume about certain notebooks
as best sellers. Decision should be independent
and taken by the buyer on basis of whether
he is getting what he is looking for.
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