Re: Attention comp. geeks, Laptop purchase pending.
The company I work for has had good luck with Apple
iBooks and
Powerbooks for $1300 you can get a very nice iBook with the 40gig and 128meg ram, and if you can go up as high as $1700 you can get one with the very nice 15" screen and faster processor. If you're strapped for cash you can get one for under a grand, but it would be worth it to get the faster chip and more memory is you can afford it.
As far as software, everything you need for day to day is included (email, word processing, mp3 playing, cd burning (yes it has a cd burner and dvd player combo drive standard on all models) They are even shipping them with AOL and Quicken now I think if you're into that. Add 802.11 for $99 and blue tooth for $49
They claim a 6 hour battery life for the iBook, but realistically with the hard use that most people put to them you'll get 4+, but you really will get that much time and thats a major selling point to me. Even without dropping your processor speed and dimming the screen, if you're willing to do that (say while playing a DVD) you really can stretch it out another hour. The screens they use are top of the line too, very bright, very high contrast and very viewable from even steep angles.
There are regularly refurbished or leased ones available from companies like
Small Dog which is where I purchased my last one from. Very nice folks there I recommend you check them out.
Good Luck