Hi,
First of all, let me explain why I'm here. This week, both of my systems (a desktop and a laptop) decided to past away. My desktop's motherboard is gone and my notebook won't recognize his hard drive. I know I could get the laptop a new hard drive, but I don't want to invest on this computer since I need a replacement for my dead desktop anyways.

Considering that I'm currently studying at college and always travelling to school on the week and back at my hometown in the weekends, I think I should get a notebook as my replacement.

However, I do not know alots in the notebook world, since I always used my desktop and I never really looked news and info about laptops. So I came here looking for some model recommandation.

Here is some info about my use:
I only bring an external storage drive to school (About 120gb actually), and all my files are kept on that. Storage is not that important on my laptop.

I often use software such as Vmware (running 2 virtual machines). I would like the laptop to be able to run that.

Basically, this is my needs. Screen size is not very important, although I would like 15.4" at least. Also, the operating system is not important.

Thank you!

there are lots of machines that satisfy those requirements. for about $650 you could get a nice machine with a 120GB internal hard drive 2GB of RAM and a dual core processor along with Vista. running a VM with the 2GB of RAM would be a breeze as allocating 512MB to the VM is perfectly acceptable my reccomendations and I may be a little biased but newer Acer Aspires are a bargain $750CDN gets a Turion 64 X2 TL-60 3GB of RAM and a 250GB SATA HD as well as a 17 inch screen not gonna beat that at $650 you'll sacrifice screen size hard drive and 1GB of RAM however you'll gain portability in not having to lug around 6+lbs of laptop so I guess it really depends on your preference. sorry for the CDN price quotes but i'm CDN here although with our $ being equal to the US prices will be about the same

For the basics I'd recommend, find a laptop with a Core 2 Duo processor, preferably one that's in the T7*** series at least. 2 gigs of DDR2-667 ram, along with a 7200 RPM hard drive. If you're not playing games, you won't need a good graphics card.

How much are you willing to spend?

overclockingrocks >> Don't worry for the price, I am also from canada . Thank for your recommandation, I am looking forward on the acer website at the moment. Could you tell me what model number you are talking about?

theworminator >> I was thinking , as a price range, something as up to 1000$. Yes, you are right, I do not need an awesome graphic card.

Thank you for your time.

My suggestions:

Model 6720-2A 17" model customized with 100 GB 7200 rpm HD and XP Pro comes to $1124
http://www.pro-star.com/index.cfm? [...] able#gotop

Model 6626-2A 15" model customized with 100 GB 7200 rpm HD and XP Pro comes to $1054
http://www.pro-star.com/index.cfm? [...] able#gotop

Both have pretty darn decent graphics cards and all the goodies you'd need

If ya really don't care about graphics performance:

Model 6625-1A 15" model customized with 2.2 GHz Core 2 Duo, 2048 MB RAM, 100 GB 7200 rpm HD and XP Pro comes to $964
http://www.pro-star.com/index.cfm? [...] able#gotop

I didn't source my quote from the acer website in answer to your question it was sourced from staples unfortunately their sale has ended so it's back up to $899 (also configuration changed to give more HD space so it;s worth it) but that gets you

1.67Ghz T5450 Core 2 Duo
3GB DDR2
320GB HD
17 inch widescreen

model is an acer aspire 7720-6208

for the money it's an amazing machine plays everything we've thrown at it

That pairing is a little odd......1.67 and 3 GB. With XP, I'd go with a 2.xx GHz something and 2 GB
With Vista 3 GB is kinda an entry point tho.

I assume that 320 GB HD is only 5400 rpm ?

I have 2GB for my laptop with Vista it flies just fine 3GB is if you're going to game and the 1.67 Core 2 Duo is mighty fast I'll admit that even as a die hard AMD fan. the 320GB HD I believe is 5400rpm but I could be wrong point is for the money it's still an amazing machine for about $100 more you could get an upgrade to the 2GHz Turion X2 and an 8600GT video card which might be well worth the money only things you'd sacrifice would be a drop to a 250GB HD and 2GB of ram but more processor speed and dedicated graphics make up for it

I wasn't thinking of gaming. Just using the programs I use every day. Just bumped my wife's machine up from 1 GB to 2 GB and she's really noticed the difference in XP. The 2-3 GB in Vista is equivalent.

The biggest frustration I have with "major brand" laptops is they always short ya on something to get to that price point. Get decent, CPU, memory and Video, then it's a 5400 rpm HD. Get a 7200 rpm HD then it's a crappy video solution. That's why I prefer to "roll my own" laptops.