Computer geeks.....

[K. Lane]

The bride is in dire need of a new laptop. I am ABSOLUTELY SICK of hearing her ***** about her current one. So I figured I might ask Santa to hook her up.
She does just the basic stuff, nothing fancy my question is
How much memory is good enough?
4gb?
How much is common in hard drive ?
500gb?
Good Lord, the processors!!!!!
Which of the common processors should I look for?

[TornadoPod]

It really depends on what she wants to do with the laptop. If you are just doing basic internet searches and FB, you don't need a lot of memory or processor speeds. HOWEVER, my view is to buy the most you can afford. Does she carry it anywhere, does it sit in the house most of time, does she use any of the Office tools like Word, Powerpoint, Excel? The answer to those questions will tell you what to look for. You can buy the generic brands or marketing supported ones. I prefer to purchase big name brands like Lenovo, DELL or HP and always INTEL processors, at least 4 GB ROM and 1TB hard drive. If she puts lots of pictures on it she will need the space.

[TornadoPod]

Here's a good review article. Hope this helps.
http://www.laptopmag.com/articles/laptop-buying-guide

[K. Lane]

It really depends on what she wants to do with the laptop. If you are just doing basic internet searches and FB, you don't need a lot of memory or processor speeds. HOWEVER, my view is to buy the most you can afford. Does she carry it anywhere, does it sit in the house most of time, does she use any of the Office tools like Word, Powerpoint, Excel? The answer to those questions will tell you what to look for. You can buy the generic brands or marketing supported ones. I prefer to purchase big name brands like Lenovo, DELL or HP and always INTEL processors, at least 4 GB ROM and 1TB hard drive. If she puts lots of pictures on it she will need the space.

Thanks brother
Too answer your questions
She never brings it anywhere
Mostly internet shopping (Amazon,eBay,etc...),Facebook, helps the kiddos with homeschool stuff, uses all of the Microsoft Office software.
As far as the picture thing is concerned, yes, she takes a lot but I also have a 3TB external hard drive that she puts the pics on

[demtx]

Getting my laptop upgraded right now. They are doing a reinstall of Win 7(saved all pics and documents to external hard drive), adding 14g memory chip(ram), ms antivirus. They ran diagnostics and said hard drive was ok. So for a couple hundred bucks should have a clean computer running better than new. If I got a new hard drive also, said would be around $350 total. There is new style hard drive out doesn't use a disk(SSD?), supposed to be super fast. My point is don't chuck the old one, can probably get it fixed up and have equivalent of one costing way more.

[BrandonH]

Getting my laptop upgraded right now. They are doing a reinstall of Win 7(saved all pics and documents to external hard drive), adding 14g memory chip(ram), ms antivirus. They ran diagnostics and said hard drive was ok. So for a couple hundred bucks should have a clean computer running better than new. If I got a new hard drive also, said would be around $350 total. There is new style hard drive out doesn't use a disk(SSD?), supposed to be super fast. My point is don't chuck the old one, can probably get it fixed up and have equivalent of one costing way more.

Great advice on upgrading the old one. I had an SSD put in mine along with more memory and it's like a new machine for a lot less $.

[In-Yo-Grill]

If you're just trying to put a bandaid on it then just do as the others said and fix the old one. If you have your heart set on a nice Christmas gift then I'd consider a Mackbook Air. Bought the wife and I Macs earlier in the year and they have been great.

[14JKURX]

Who would you use to update a computer?

[wsteffen]

If it's going to have Windows 10, touch screen is almost a must. You can use just a mouse, but not near as good as a touch screen.

[JANSLEY817]

If you're just trying to put a bandaid on it then just do as the others said and fix the old one. If you have your heart set on a nice Christmas gift then I'd consider a Mackbook Air. Bought the wife and I Macs earlier in the year and they have been great.

I agree with this fella. I bought a MacBook Pro a few months back and love it. It took a couple weeks to get used to though.