Laptop virgin here ready to buy........HELP!!!

You can pretty much forget about the post about getting the best notebook now for a pass me down to your son in 3 years. In 3 years Windows Longhorn 64bit will be out and the entire windows PC market (desktop and notebook) will be turned upside down.

You can buy an Athlon 64 notebook (from only HP/Compaq -- 1 model each --- same company) or E-machines now and that will work better in 3 years (as the cpu is 64bit) but it will still not have everything that will appear when Longhorn 64bit replaces Windows XP. And, the Athlon 64 notebooks are a bit heavier then the Pentium M (Centrino) notebooks that would be the lightest and have the best battery life available for the LCD screen size you want (15.4 inch Pentium M Centrino in 6-6.5 pound range -- Athlon 64 15.4" notebook about 7.8-8 pounds).

You don't want a Pentium 4M (Pentium 4 desktop equivalant) if you want to use the notebook unplugged (wi-fi at home or Starbucks) as it will only get 2 hours (or sometimes less as in with a 17" LCD) bsttery life.

You can easily get 3.5 - 5 hours battery life with a Pentium M Centrino notebook (3.5-4 hours with wi-fi turned on and longer with it off or LCD screen dimmed somewhat).

Most quality consumer notebooks have 3 USB 2.0 ports (for optical mice, your GPS receiver, external hard drives, a flash card reader to input your photos, etc). Many also have a 4 pin firewire port which is used to input Digital camera video (not analog) for video editing.

If you are going to be driving around and having vibration while the computer is running (causing stress on the hard drive especially) you might want to consider an IBM for its particularly strong case integrity, self-parking hard drive (parks itself if it detects a fall or a sudden change of notebook angle) and better service (as IBM mostly sells to business). There is a Citibank credit card offer I just got (in the statement) giving 15% off IBM notebook orders via the internet so look for that if you have a Citibank card (they have many different cards).

If you won't be playing many games (which requires dedicated video memory like on the HPZT3000 / Compaq X1000 I have -- see X1000forums.com - 15.4" Pentium M widescreen -- 6.5 pounds) you may want to look at the brand new HP DV1000 -- it is a 14" widescreen LCD with the slick new Briteview LCD.

If you are going to be playing DVD's you want a widescreen LCD and these two LCD sizes are your choices. The HP DV1000 weighs only 5.3 pounds, plays the DVD's and CD's with the computer operating system off (which saves battery life and turns on or off instantly like a consumer DVD device) and has a built in remote control that fits in the PC card slot to control the player (also a boon if you want to switch tracks while in the car).

The only drawbacks of this model is that it has no dedicated video RAM (necessary for many games and better for video editing like Photoshop) but this is not needed for DVD's, internet surfing, Microsoft Office, etc.

Also, keep in mind that a widescreen does not use the entire screen when displaying a square website image that does not adapt to widescreen so you end up seeing a 13" or so image of a square webpage (on my 15.4" LCD Compaq X1000 you would see about a 14" image of a webpage on the 15.4" widescreen).

There are tons of discounts for both of these if you order them custom at hpshopping.com -- see X1000forums.com for details on best specs and ordering discounts --and the general section has a thread that indicates the DV1000 dedicated website if you do a search using DV1000.

Both of these come with the full Pentium M Dothan Processor -- get the 1.6 Pentium M 725 as that is the lowest offered with the full 2mb L2 system cache and higher mhz (up to 2.0) just add cost with little extra benefit.

You can see the new DV1000 at Best Buy (I was just there Sunday) -- try the keyboard on the DV1000 as the notebook is much smaller (in width) than the X1000 /ZT3000 so the keyboard may be a bit more cramped (the keyboard is outstanding on the X1000 / ZT3000 but IBM's are better still).

Some of the cheaper in store DV1000's and HPZT3000's and Compaq X1000's don't have the slick new Briteview LCD so be careful -- you only have to pay $50 more online to get that option on nearly any HP/Compaq notebook.

I suggest you look into an HP dv1040.
Its about the right size for what you will be using it for, its light (5.3 lbs) and has a 3.5 hour battery life)

has a bad graphics card, but then you are not planning on playing Doom 3 on it right?
it can play DVD fine, and the screen is widescreen format which is great for DVD watching.

One final word of advice, I know you think the more power the better, but keep in mind that most machines are far more powerul then you think, and that you will use only a fraction of the features.
For your type of work, the things you need most is a good screen (for indor and outdoor environments), light weight so you can carry the sucker around, and long battery life. Power and storage capacity should come a distant 4th, 5th place to these 3 major aspects of a laptop. Don't bother buying anything heavier then 6 lbs, or you will be sorry. 6 lbs does not sound much, but when you start carrying that thing around you will notice that weight. I suggest you aim for between 5-5.5 lbs.

Keep in mind that the HP DV1040 is a prebuilt version of the HP DV1000 series sold custom at hpshopping.com

Lower priced models of the DV1000 series in stores don't have the wonderful XGA Briteview LCD -- and higher priced models with the Briteview LCD also have a DVD burner (at Best Buy).

So, look at the pricing at hpshopping.com for exactly the options you want and remember you can save $ by ordering 256mb 1 stick RAM only and adding your own 512mb PC2700 RAM stick later to the slot under the notebook.

There is a $100 custom order rebate through 12/1/04 (any HP/Compaq notebook -- see X1000forums.com) as well as other discounts -- also free shipping and even no tax to states that don't have nexus (you will pay tax in CA and some other states either way).

Finally you can easily get either of these 2 notebooks (HPDV1000 or HPZT3000/Compaq X1000) for between $1,000 and $1,500 depending on options.

Other advantages of ordering custom at hpshopping are 12 months no interest financing, full customization (you can get 5400 rpm hard drive which is faster than 4200, you can specify which LCD resolution you want (and Briteview XGA or non-Briteview XGA) and you can specify a DVD-ROM/CD-RW drive or a multiformat DVD burner (some retail models are only DVD+ which you don't want as most consumer DVD players won't play DVD+ but rather DVD- multiformat burns both types).

Also, you can order just 256mb RAM 1 stick and put your own 512mb PC2700 RAM stick yourself into the open slot under the notebook for less than getting 512mb from HP/Compaq -- but you can only do this if you custom order (you will pay for 512mb RAM in most prebuilt store models and sometimes they fill both RAM slots so you can't update RAM without wasting RAM).

The HPDV1000 will be a much better size for putting on a platform between the front car bucket seats if in fact you can get a platform like the cops use.

The HPZT3000/Compaq X1000 will have the larger 15.4" widescreen for displaying inside real estate properties but both will look great.

A realtor I saw had a 17" LCD notebook but they are heavier and get much worse battery life as many of those are Pentium 4M based although Dell does have a Pentium M 17" LCD model and so does Sony -- but they are very expensive and won't fit between the car seats either. He was using that for display purposes only though inside houses plugged into A/C not for car use or travel beyond the car trunk and the sale property.