<p>Well, the first thing I tell people is generally, don’t buy a netbook. They’re getting to the point where they’re similarly priced to notebooks, just with less computing power.
When selecting a computer, the main three things you’d want to pay attention to are the Processor (CPU), Memory (RAM), and the Graphics Card (GPU). Most modern processors are quite powerful, and any new PC should give you great results if you aren’t planning on any extremely intensive programs. Memory is simple, the more you have the more ease you’ll have with multitasking and memory intensive programs (think programs like Photoshop). The graphics card is what you’ll want to pay attention to for things like gaming, video rendering, and movies. Without getting too technical, generally, you can just look at the memory included with the graphics card (Usually it’s 256 mb, 512mb, 1Gb…) to get an idea of how powerful it is. If it’s not out of your price range, getting one with 512mb/1Gb should be enough to handle any previous generation games. To give you an idea, my laptop has 512 mb, and it can run Call of Duty 4 rather well.</p>
<p>One other thing I’d make sure to look into is student discounts. For example, HP has it’s [HP</a> Student Academy](<a href=“http://hp.force.com/external/hpacademy]HP”>http://hp.force.com/external/hpacademy), which should get you a pretty decent discount.</p>