<p>I am a cs major and i need to purchase a laptop the catch is i have a 400 - 500 dollar budget
i just need it to software dev or any thing that may come up in my courses, i do not need it for entertainment( video games, movies, pictures, music) only for cs course work. Could some one please let me know what the processor, ram and hard drive i need, may not need a dvd using a flash drive.</p>
<p>For CS work, you can get a decent laptop for $400-500. The only thing you may wanna do is instal Linux on it. I hope all CS departments recommend/require to instal Linux.
Just go to newegg.com and choose a good one. I prefer Dell, though. (With Linux on!11!1!1!)</p>
<p>Dell isn’t the best brand for laptops, but for $400-500, it might be the best you can find. As for specs, you could get by with 2 GHz processor, 1 GB RAM, 100 GB HDD. As it so happens, Dell has the Inspiron 14R which has 2.53 GHz, 2 GB RAM, and 250 GB HDD for $449.</p>
<p>You might also consider netbooks, which are even cheaper, or a netbook + desktop combination, which you could do with $500. I have a lot of friends who use the desktop for most work but use the netbook on the go.</p>
<p>For operating systems, it’s true that UNIX-based ones are easier to work on for CS, and if you have Windows, you’ll have to use PuTTY or some other terminal emulator to remote into UNIX clusters at some point. I prefer OS X over Linux, though, because the latter has too many options/toggles/switches/stuff I don’t want to bother with, and OS X has an amazing interface. So I dual boot with Windows and OS X. You might think about dual booting, because sometimes there are applications that work on one but not the other, and on the whole you might find you prefer to use OS X (or Linux, whichever).</p>
<p>thank you i really needed the advice</p>
<p>A dvd slot comes in handy from time to time. It is still quite common to burn things onto a CD/DVD :]
Anything that works is fine. If you carry it all the time, find a light one.
If you want to last for a few years, get one of those Lenovo ThinkPad. Dells are good choice. HPs… I always avoid HP because they are so pricey and heavy as hell. They make the look nicer? I beg to differ. Just personal rant. LOL
Warranty, weight, reputation, you have to consider those.</p>
<p>There are student and holiday discounts. Check them out. If you can wait, wait until the end of the summer</p>
<p>I dual boot Windows and Ubuntu at home, and only run Windows on my laptop because I kind of hate writing codes on a laptop, and sometime Linux don’t have compatible drivers. The Keypad was a major problem and I decided to remove the Ubuntu from the laptop consequently.</p>