Young Writers Society

*blinks* Wow, all, thanks for the helpful posts!

Actually, I decided to get a Dell Inspirion. A couple of my friends have them, they let me use it a bit, and I really like the way it's set up (and yes, the way it looks). I wasn't looking for one just for writing, but one that had versatality. Thanks for the helpful replies!

Which Inspiron? When you get it, can you tell me how awesome it is? *is considering buying an Inspiron*

EDIT: I just now noticed the last little bit of what you said "Versatility". I've picked through dells website and here you go:

A 15" Screen Inspiron starts at $599 so that's what I'll use for the basis:

The processor is fine as is being a Celeron and a Pentium there really isn't a noticeable difference between the two (one of my friends is an engineer for INTEL).

If you plan on downgrading to XP from Vista, which I personally would, then don't go over 3GB of RAM as XP can't use/recognize more. If you are going to keep Vista then I'd get at least 4GB.

I personally wouldn't pay for a hard drive upgrade since you can buy external hard drives at Fry's Electronics that are 500GB to 1TB for $120.

With the Inspiron I looked at you're stuck with the video card, which really isn't a big deal.

A 9-Cell battery is worth it period.

Personally I like an external mouse instead of a touch pad and you really want one for anything dealing in Graphics, but you can buy an awesome "Micro Mouse" at Walgreens for $12 and $5 for a pack of AAA Batteries and they'll last you at least a year even using it constantly (mine was on 24-7 and a single set of batteries lasted 18months).

If you are downgrading the software packages aren't worth it as they'll get erased during the downgrades, also you void your warranty for installing XP on a Dell. A friend of mine was going to do it, talked to Dell about it and here's what you need to know:

It voids your warranty.
You'll probably have to browse the net (on another PC) and download the drivers for some of your components, because Dell is Microsoft's love toy so they want you to have to use Vista (don't worry all Major PC manufacturers are).


If it's just for writing then just go with the cheapest version of whatever. The standard cheap Dell, if that is the brand you want, will do. Writing programs aren't really intensive in any way.

If you want a mac (which I personally despise) I'd go with the Airbook. Provided you're ok with not having a CD-rom. A friend of mine has one and they are kind of cool. Just be careful you don't sit on it!

The Mini9 is only $274 on dell (granted it only has a 9" screen).

If you're wanting a standard sized LPC they start at $399 on Dell's website.

The higher the "RAM" on a computer the faster it will run and load applications. Processing speed is great, but really you're computer relies on RAM.

(Don't get me wrong processors are great, but really its not worth an extra $600 for an extra .01GB of processing speed even for rendering graphic intensive projects like 3D modeling)

--If you are planning on using it for graphics, just keep in mind what type of graphics you want to do. Graphic Art like in Photoshop a standard video card and some extra RAM will do fine. If you want to get into animation or video editing an upgraded video card is a must--

I can't comment on what makes a good Mac, as I don't pay attention to them, because they just aren't used for what I do.

(I've built my own PC's for 9 years now--of course this doesn't really mean that I know what I'm talking about )

If you have any questions that I might be able to answer feel free to PM me.