Organising new laptop and broadband connection for sister

[sunsocks]

My sister's hubby has broken his leg and she wants me to organise buying a laptop and getting them broadband to keep him occupied. Their budget is around �400 ish. However having gone on one of those broadband speed test sites their postcode is coming up with download speed of up to 512kbps - is this really slow (they live in the middle of nowhere) or at all workable?

So if any of you can advise on best laptop buy and best way to get a reasonable broadband speed it would be much appreciated. They dont like Vista - would prefer XP and will be using it mainly for internet purposes.

Thanks in advance (none of us know much about computers and internet)

[vehelpfulguy]

There is a website called HotUKDeals that people use to post good "deals" (for all sorts of products) including laptops.

http://www.hotukdeals.com/

Someone posted a Dell laptop that is available with XP (Dell are pretty good at still offering XP).

Here is the link to the laptop on the HotUKDeals site

http://www.hotukdeals.com/deal/56567/dell-vost ro-1000-notebook-turion-tl

Here is the laptop deal direct on the Dell site.

http://configure.euro.dell.com/dellstore/confi g.aspx?b=&c=uk&cs=ukbsdt1&l=en&oc=n1210005&dgc =AF&cid=5212&lid=122756

Reduce the warrenty to "Base Warrenty" to knock �69 off the price.

When you add it to your basket VAT is added and you should get the �386.58 price. I have just tried it and it did for me.

This is a pretty good laptop with 2Gb of memory and a 120Gb hard drive.

[vehelpfulguy]

Here is another Dell from HotUKDeals that also offers XP.

http://www.hotukdeals.com/deal/56561/dell-chea p-vostro-1500-notebook-1-4

Here it is on the Dell site

http://configure.euro.dell.com/dellstore/confi g.aspx?b=&c=uk&cs=ukbsdt1&l=en&oc=n1215002&dgc =AF&cid=5212&lid=122756

Again, reduce the warrenty and choose XP Home to get the �410.08 price (XP Pro is �50 extra)

This laptop has less memory than the other one, and a smaller hard disk, but has a better CPU.

Being a Vostro 1500 it is a "better" box than the Vostro 1000, so which one you choose is swings and roundabouts.

[vehelpfulguy]

While researching for your laptop I noticed some of the Dell laptops come with "Mobile Broadband" built in (including the Vostro 1500 I listed above).

It seems the mobile phone "sim" is built into the laptop.

Now I have no idea how fast it is, or how much it costs, but it may be a way of getting round your broadband problem.

Maybe phone Dell and ask for more details.

More here:

http://www1.euro.dell.com/content/topics/topic .aspx/emea/segments/bsd/site_vodafone?c=uk&cs= ukbsdt1&l=en&s=bsd

[vehelpfulguy]

There is more on the Vodaphone site about this mobile broadband, see here:

http://online.vodafone.co.uk/dispatch/Portal/a ppmanager/vodafone/wrp?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=t emplate09&pageID=BS_0043&tabIndex=0

[sunsocks]

vehelpfulguy - thanks very much for your responses - they are really helpful - suppose they should be considering your name .......... much appreciated - should be able to look into this further tomorrow - not sure how to give you stars so *************