Just to provide some re-assurance on your choice of Dell (that is if you need any) - my first laptop was a Dell. It was a dream, worked wonderfully and got me through my Grad school years until the built in mouse buttons broke. It was well used though and that's part of the downfall of a laptop (all components in one neat little box). Then I went to IBM, well you don't care about that really. But the important part is when I was back in the market for another laptop I went back to Dell.

I love my Dell products!

About what you are getting, I have no real suggestions other than after going through a desktop and being on my third laptop in about 12 years, I finally did the "smart" thing with my most recent laptop purchase a year ago. I upgraded the processor, the RAM, the hard drive, and the CD Rom. Through my experience these are the things that if you buy on the low end or "today's standard" you will find your machine being a slug in a couple of years as the technology moves and yours becomes obsolete.

I haven't looked on Dell's website lately, but my guess is Vista is your only option. From my persepective you don't have a lot of choice. In the coporate world we don't rush to anything new from Microsoft we wait for at least the first service pack to be released. This allows most bugs to be worked out and they don't have to deal with 4,000 buggy machines around the world. I went to XP shortly after it was released, mostly because that's all Dell had available. Short story, I think it's likely your only option. Just make sure you keep current on updates that come out. If you are on DSL this will be much easier to do than on dial up.

Lastly, on dial-up vs cable. I've had both and DSL is certainly the cheaper option to go. I had two problems with DSL, my phone lines in my house were hinky so even though I applied the filters to all the necessary phones, I still got bumped off the net everytime the phone rang. Second, it was sluggish at times because our phone lines weren't the best. They were in the process of upgrading all the lines when I moved. I have cable now and have not had any issues. The only reason I have it is because I refuse to pay for a landline phone just so I can add DSL on top of it. So my cable is more on the surface, but I really had no reason to have a landline phone.

Good luck, and I'm certain you will be thrilled with whatever you get.

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