Need laptop advice please?

[VivaLeBeaver]

I'm looking at getting DD a laptop, budget up to approx £350. She'll use it mainly for internetting/homework, facebook, youtube.

What do I need to be looking for in way of the processor? Am I right in thinking that processors affect the speed of the computer? I think I read somewhere that Dual Core processors are better as they can do 2 things at once? Comet are selling a laptop in my budget which is an Intel dual processor but its made by Lenovo that I've never heard of. The Toshiba laptops in my budget have an AMD-V processor.

So am I better off going for a brand I've not heard of with a better processor or a more well known brand with a not so good processor?

Lenovo is a brand name of IBM so if they're both within budget it is a reasonable choice. The other machine is unlikely to be much different in terms of performance, depends really on what is being used, and you have to remember that Intel spend millions in TV ads (all those old Pentium and now i3/i5/i7 dum-dum-dummm ads) and bump up the price sometimes by 100+ pounds on a similar spec laptop when all that is different is the CPU.

For word processing the speed is more limited by human ability to type, and for simply watching (rather than creating CGI or editing) video the CPU is unlikely to make a difference.

I'm guessing these have Windows 7, so would suggest you look at main RAM size (2 GB, 3 GB etc) and choose whichever has more, as that will improve performance if DD is using browser, media player, and switching from browser to some editor where she is writing home work... More RAM will help when running multiple applications.

Also may be worth checking Asda Living - a few weeks ago when I asked about the price of a machine on their shelves (they had a couple of Compaq, one at around 350 the other unmarked), the chap went into the store room and came out with a Lenovo with 4 GB RAM, which was 299 and if I had had the cash available at the time, would have bought it on the spot.

"Am I right in thinking that processors affect the speed of the computer?"

Yes, they're the bit of the computer that does most of the "work".

"I think I read somewhere that Dual Core processors are better as they can do 2 things at once?"

Well there are two processors, but they connected to the rest of the computer by one pipe. So yes they can kind of do 2 things at once, but that shared pipe gets in the way a bit, so you don't get double the performance.

Intel and AMD are meant to be very similar at the low and middle end of the market, it's only at the high end that I think Intel begin to pull away slightly. I think it's best not to worry about it :)

Thats really helpful, thanks both of you. Will definetly keep an eye out in Asda.