1. Product Survey: Laptops

This roundup includes products released within one year preceding the publication date of this article. The product selection consists solely of review units made available to Tom’s Guide by vendors. While the products listed here do not constitute a comprehensive listing of all products in the category, they do represent a broad range of what is available to consumers in this category. We will quickly update this roundup with new products as they become available to Tom’s Guide, and soon add data relating to product specifications and test dates. In other words, these roundups are a work in progress. Please check back frequently to see what’s new.

Everybody has their own definition of the perfect laptop computer, but it often boils down to the age-old compromise between performance and portability.

Laptops -- or notebook computers, for some -- are veritable wonders of modern engineering. Manufacturers take a collection of components, often made in factories spread across the globe, and cram them into tiny cases to create very powerful machines that are often ready to compete with the computer sitting on your desk.

The very limited amount of space inside a laptop creates two problems, however. It's hard for suppliers to innovate -- there's only a certain number of ways you can pack all of that electronics into one box, after all. Secondly, because of the of the highly-specialized components designed to maximize efficiency, it can be hard to upgrade laptops or replace faulty parts with spares.

Your best bet is to make sure you choose the right product from the get go, ensuring you have the right combination of components to do everything you want to do with your laptop. When you're shopping around, you'll probably want to look at the following parts, all of which will affect the performance of your laptop, but there's a more detailed list of what to look for here.

• Processor

The brains of your laptop are in the processor, or CPU, which performs all of the calculations it needs to keep running, and has a direct bearing on almost everything you might use your laptop for, from controlling the Artificial Intelligence engine in a game to providing the computing power needed to run advanced image editing software. 

A general rule of thumb is that you'll want the fastest processor you can get, although speeds are increasing all the time so there's no need to get hung up about having the very latest processor out there.

• Hard Drive

This is where all your data will be stored, and, naturally, the more space you have, the more you'll be able to save.  Most of todays laptops come with at least 160 GB of space, but don't be surprised to see 200, 250, or 320 GB offerings.

If you do run out of space and are using your laptop in a (relatively) fixed location, you will be able to add an external hard drive further down the line…not strictly an upgrade to the computer itself, but worth considering if you're worried about storage space.

• Memory

Your laptop's RAM, or memory, will store the programs and the files that are currently being used at any one time. 

Naturally, then, the more likely you are to need to multitask, the more likely you are to need plenty of RAM. 

Just typing a few documents and surfing the web won't take up much space at all, but playing games or editing photos, audio, or video will require something a lot more powerful. 

For Windows Vista, you'll need at least 1 GB, but we would strongly recommend 2 GB. 3 and 4 GB of memory in a laptop is quickly becoming the norm.

• Graphics Card

Not just a concern for avid gamers, the quality of the graphics card in your laptop will affect how responsive it is in general. 

A lot of laptops integrate the graphics onto the general processor without including a dedicated device to control what's on screen. 

While this often saves space and money, resulting in a smaller, cheaper laptop, it does result in lower quality graphics.

• Screen

Ultimately, the size of the screen on your laptop will determine how big the whole computer is and how easy it is to carry. 

Measured diagonally from corner to corner like TVs, laptop monitors go from 7 inches on netbooks all the way up to 20 inches on the biggest "desktop replacements". 

They're perhaps the best example of the tricky compromise between size and power: the smaller your screen, the easier it will be to move your laptop around, but the harder it will be to use for extended periods of time. 

Conversely, a larger screen will be a lot easier to use when at a desk, but will be a lot less portable.

As we mentioned above, apart from the RAM and the hard drive, many laptop components are very difficult to replace.  Even if it is possible to swap in a spare part, their delicate construction often makes repairing laptops a costly affair.  A year's guarantee, which is what's usually offered, is often less than adequate.

Misleading Statistics

Putting blind faith in manufacturers' claims can often get you into trouble.  Reducing the quality of components to try and save on power consumption or reduce heat is one widespread practice.  That's why it's important to check our reviews of each laptop to make sure that the performance that's advertised is actually available.

Using Your Laptop

How far can you go on a laptop?  In theory, absolutely anything you can do with a desktop computer is possible on a laptop, but where you position yourself on the classic compromise between size and computing power is up to you.  

Any laptop on the market today will be capable of getting online and running simple office software. Editing videos and photos should be possible on the majority of models, as long as you have 2 GB of memory. However, playing the latest games is going to require a little more "oomph", and a careful choice of screen and graphics card will be needed.