Dell Inspiron vs Acer Notebook thingy...which would you tecchy lot recommend?

[PussinJimmyWhoooos]

Have posted before in products but thought I would try here too.

Want a lap top for mnetting in the living room! Doesn't have to be mega fancy with tons of storage or fab music sound (am deaf!) but I do need it to be fast...

So......suggest away please

Oh and the best wireless router??

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I have had 2 Dell Inspirons, one in 05 and another this year.
The 05 one has been great, the 08 one was troubled from day 1 - and is currently with the IT guy at my work and I am back on the 05 one. I did rather overload it when setting it up, and it crashed and didn't really recover. I am hoping that the reinstallation will solve things as it was alot faster than the old one.
No experience of Acer.

oh - but I am not techy or geeky.

I have an Acer aspire one netbook which I bought with Linux loaded instead of Windows (because I'm that kind of geek!). It's teeny tiny but it's pretty good for keeping in the living room because it can just sit on the mantlepiece or on the bookcase. It's good for checking email or mumsnet, or for watching things like iplayer. Not so great for word processing etc as keyboard is tiny.

I'm happy with it though - much cheaper than a bigger laptop and does the job I want it to do. Also good if you use the train to take with you and use free wireless.