If anyone is looking for Laptop computers....
Here's an example, just come through my email.

eg:

ACER TravelMate 2434WLMi - S Celeron® M Value Mobility Portable
• Intel® Celeron® M Processor 380 (1.6 GHz, 1MB cache, 400MHz FSB),
• Genuine Windows® XP Home Edition,
• 512MB DDR-SDRAM,
• 60GB HDD,
• DVD Dual (Dual Layer),
• 15.4" WXGA TFT,
• 56Kbps, 10/100 LAN + 802.11b/g Wi-Fi,
• 1 year Pickup and Return Service

$1,199 inc GST

http://www.acer.com.au/hotbizoffers/index.html

Is that a good price ABC? First born badly wants a laptop for her birthday in September (14 yrs) and as it's either that or a one way flight back to UK which she is not having!! am trying to price stuff up. Seems like a lot. She needs wirefree internet but not much else but if it all comes as is, I guess she could always have this and we could have the new one.

I'm actually a bit out of touch on prices. I've seen some laptops for $999, but not sure of the specs.

Actually I have a Good Guys leaflet here now..
Toshiba Celeron 1.4
15.4" Screen, 256mb ram, 40Gb HDD CDRW/DVD combo with XP Home for $999 or "less for cash" (probably about $875)

Too many options available, but those two for named brands look reasonable, I think.

I think the main thing with laptops isn't so much the CPU, as the amount of memory and the graphics. All of the cheaper laptops have graphics chipsets that are on the motherboard and don't perform nearly as well as the real deal. Look for things like ATi Mobility and Nvidia Go. That said, if all you want to do is word process and surf the web then the vast majority of lappies will do the business. :)

Mine's an Acer Aspire 3023WLMI, bought off e-buyer about 3 months ago for about £500, I have to say it's brilliant, it probably does a lot more than I use but it's wireless and the screen is cystal clear.

I've noticed they're using Acers at my daughters school, so they must be pretty tough too.

They use Acers in many schools. Acer have a special education sales department, and are well recognised by these schools. I was talking to one school IT department head once, and he said that Acer were very good with service.

That particular school had 454 computers, (mainly Acer), 383 for kids and 71 for staff. The school had about 1200 kids (year P to 12) and 59 teachers.

im not sure if acer is included as an item that could be salary packaged as a form of benefit but nonetheless its durable since we use acer travelmate also at home. do you guys have any idea about mac book? how much does it cost? i plan to purchase a laptop there in oz when i get there by october..

would it be worthwhile bringing over a couple of laptops? Can get them quite reasonable here, am also using an acer a travelmate 2201LC. would they work over there?

Don't forget you can "salary sacrifice" a laptop which for many people means you can get whatever your top rate of tax is back on the price. 40%, say, is a lot of money.

We bought a tower when we first got here and I couldn't work out why so many shops had loads of laptops and few PC's. This is the reason.