Good day, experts. I'm in the market for a new notebook to replace my heavy old one. I don't have the time to navigate vendor sites to come up with my various options, so I'm willing to trade my points for your time and expertise in this area.
To participate, please help me find a suitable Windows notebooks that meet my criteria:
Must-haves:
- It must be relatively light, i.e. 5lbs max. (My current one is more than 8 lbs!)
- It must have an Intel Core 2 Duo CPU. Generally I don't care which, but any with the 4MB cache are preferred to the 2MB cache, but don't rule that out.
- It must have at least 1GB RAM, but 2GB is better.
- It must have decent graphics e.g. for Vista's Aero Glass UI, with minimum 1280x800 or 1368x768 wide-screen resolution. Screen size of 12"-15".
- It must have integrated 10/100/1000Mbps (Gigabit) Ethernet.
- It must have an integrated wireless adapter supporting 802.11g and WPA.
- It must have a touchpad pointing device. It's OK if it also has a nipple pointing device but I don't want only one of those.
- It must have an integrated 56K modem.
- It must have at least an 80GB hard drive.
- It must have USB2, speaker/headphones line-out, mic line-in, VGA out.
Nice-to-haves:
- It would be nice to have an integrated DVD-RW drive, but an external connecting DVD-RW is acceptable.
- It would be nice to have an integrated SD/MMC card reader, but a PC Card slot is acceptable since I have a PC Card card reader in my current laptop.
- It would be nice to have a Firewire/IEEE1394 port, but none is acceptable.
- It would be nice to have Bluetooth, but none is acceptable.
I am located in Canada. I definitely have access to major vendors (Dell, Toshiba, HP, Sony, Lenovo, etc.) but I am also willing to entertain other vendors that will ship to Canada (Gateway?, etc?)
Please provide specific model numbers and a brief summary of features. It's absolutely OK to suggest a base model that is customizable *when ordering* (but not after the fact), however please mention what components would need to be customized to get it to match my needs.
Try not to repeat a previous expert's suggestion unless you would like to strongly "second" the recommendation among yours, or if you have additional information that either eliminates it as a possible choice, or reinforces it as a possible choice. For instance, if you prefer/dislike the quality/service/etc. of a given vendor, do say so.
My generous points will go to the answer(s) with the best options listed and likely to lead me to a specific purchase, but I will award the points to the best answer(s) before I buy, on the merit of the answer(s).
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