How to find the best laptop buy for you

Now that the holidays are over, it's an excellent time to go shopping for that new laptop. Most retailers didn't enjoy a booming sales season, so now is when you're apt to find the best prices. The problem for most of us is being able to discern just what we need, in terms of memory, disc space, features and the built-in applications we'll actually use. Now, there's also a tendency for manufacturers to include trial versions of some of the most used applications, such as malware, virus and spyware protection, as well as the big-name word processors which incidentally carry a hefty price tag which you must pay after the trial period expires. (Unless you pay, the software becomes basically read-only.) If you're not yourself a geek and worse, don't know one, how are you to determine which machine constitutes the best laptop buy? Here we've got some guidance to help you get the best value for your purchase.

First, you'll want to get online and do a little comparison shopping between websites. Most online electronic shops show the most expensive and feature packed units on page one of the results. However, they also usually have a 'sort' button, somewhere at the top right hand section of the page, which gives you a number of choices in the way you'd like your list sorted. For example, by price, high-to-low or low-to-high, by manufacturer and so on. You may find your best laptop buy on page one then again, the super deal, at the perfect price and with just the applications you're looking for, may be way back on page 5. Start saving the web pages (in a separate directory on your hard disk), which look like the qualifying best laptop buys, in terms of price and features. This way, you can go through each and compare descriptions and prices at your leisure.

When you do start reviewing these pages, make notes of features you're not familiar with, or aren't even sure you'd use. List the manufacturer, price and model number, along with the descriptor you're puzzling over. You may find that you end up with several potential best laptop buys once you've defined exactly what those strange features in your notes mean!

Take your list to one of the big local electronic stores and ask to speak to a staff person who can answer your questions on a few different laptops. This approach gives you an advantage, in that the sales person is going to skip the hard sell, assuming you know what you're talking about, as well as perceiving the whiff of a sale coming his or her way. Go from machine to machine and get all your questions answered. If a particular salesperson can't answer your questions, ask for someone who can.

If the online shop which stocks your final choice of the best laptop buy offers free shipping at a certain price ceiling, then you'll want to ask the local shop if they can match the online shop's price. You can be assured they'll certainly try!

Once you clearly understand all of the features on your question list and have decided which manufacturer and model best meets your needs, you're ready to buy. Your best laptop buy is the one with the features you'll need and the best price.