Drew39k

Well, Im looking at getting a new laptop to replace my current Gateway laptop.

When I went shopping for my first laptop I didn't do much research at all, and while i don't hate the computer, i could have gotten a better deal. The primary thing I failed to realize, was how close the dual core tech was.

This time around i'm trying to future proof my laptop a little better. Im thinking at least 3gigs of ram, maybe the t8300?, and a blu ray drive. I don't think i will be writing any blu-ray discs, so read only works. Size wise, i don't want bigger then a 15.4, I think 17 might be too big.

One of the downfalls of my current laptop is battery life. It is terrible(i literally get 45 mins off a full charge)

So some of my questions:

How far off are we before Blu-Rays drives become less rare?(right now only select HP models, and viao models have them)

OS? I've heard a new OS is around the corner(vista becoming the new ME?) I did some checking around and It seems windows 7 is coming late next year? and "Singularity" is also moving along. Would getting a comp now(probably with Vista, i should get it over XP right?) hurt me when Windows 7 and or singularity comes rolling around? Would I be better off waiting? Or could i upgrade later without much system reqs issues?

Is it better to take the standard 2 gig of ram and manually upgrade it to 3/4 gigs? Or is it better to buy it already upgraded? New Egg had ram upgrades for 40bucks, so it would only cost 40 to upgrade it from 2-3 and 80 to go from 2 to 4, where as they want like 150 bucks to have it built with 4. Is there a quality issue going thru and doing it manually? Is their a large difference between the ram i'd get on newegg versus what they would install?

As for the company, I did not like my experience with Gateway. The screen wobbles, and the back light flickers. It also gets very hot. and has slow start up.

Im looking primarily at HP or Sony any recommendations?

Budget is pretty open, i don't really want to go over 1500 but a liitle over could be doable(the custom built i did up at sony came to just under 1600)