Don't know how you feel about the whole Apple thing, but I absolutely LOVE my 15" G4 Powerbook.

I would forget about power and go strictly for weight (and maybe battery life if you might be away from power?). Unless you are planning on spending the Con playing Doom III or something, any new machine will have all the power you need.

Well, it'll have to be powerful enough to manipulate a lot of photography, and Apple is out of the question.

My buddy bought a Sony Vaio (can't recall the model) that is light (5 1/2lbs) pretty powerful with a 3.2 MHZ P4, and the nifty addition of a physical switch to toggle the built-in WiFi off and on.

I've bought a Dell about 8 months ago but if I had to do it again I'd probably go with Toshiba...the keyboard is very noisy and Dell only tells me it's normal.

If you're looking for light you don't want a desktop replacement as they're fairly heavy.

RAM at least 512MB (make sure you can expand)
Video RAM 32MB at least (64 if you can get it in a small and light laptop)

The hard drive...well the bigger the drive the more porn you can hold.

I'm not sure about the speed...Intels done something with a new chip since I bought mine at 2.2 GHz...I think the new chip at 1.5 GHz through some...hell I don't...is actually faster.

Only buy Apple if you are 1) a trend freak 2) have too much money and 3) don't know crack about pooters. Before you think about buying a laptop consider... a Tablet PC. Toshiba has some sweet models that function both as a tablet and as a regular laptop via a screen that turns 180 degrees. The price is higher than you'd spend on an equivalent laptop, but once you start working with the pen you won't want to ever go back to a regular laptop. The Tablet PC OS is laid atop XP Pro, so you get a better system than those XP Home machines. And when you install Service Pack 2, you'll essentially have Tablet PC 2005, since MS is including everything you need for it in the service pack. Run down to your local Best Buy and play with a tablet. You'll love it.

Oh, and F Apple and their high-priced crap.

Oh, yeah, one last thing... If you say no to the tablet, get a Dell. I know the guy above doesn't like the loud keyboard, but face it -- he's got an older model. Dell has the best service ever. They will replace your system in a heartbeat if it doesn't work right. I dropped my PPC in a mud puddle and they had another one to me within 48 hours. They have a great warranty, and for only a couple bucks more you can get the extended warranty where they'll replace your laptop no matter what happens, even if you stomp on it after reading a post on andrewsullivan.com.

Just got a Dell 8600 a few months ago. Funny thing, it was in anticipation of convention access. My luck paid off.

Don't stress memory and speed too much. If you are not into this stuff hardcore, go with a typical Dell setup. They will include a wireless card now, so double check that.

Advice, the larger screen of the 8600 sucks to lug around, but I have only done so once. 99% of the time it is at home, so the big screen there is nice.

Ask away anything else to me privately if needed. I *ahem* might know where to get good deals on software...

McGurk--
Let me be clear..I like my Dell and to expand I've gotten very good service except for the keyboard issue. But if I did it again I'd go with Toshiba, the grass is always greener I guess.

As far as the warranty goes I've got the same coverage through my homeowners ins. at no extra cost. That may or may not apply to this situation.

I blog with a Dell Inspiron 600m. It's very light, quite compact, and reasonably priced. It comes with the whole wireless thing ready-to-go. Boot her up and she'll instantly tell you what wireless networks she can reach.

McGurk is an idiot and you shouldn't listen to a word he said.

(I say this with love.)

When it comes to hassle-free computing, you simply cannot go wrong by buying a Powerbook of some kind and putting it on AppleCare. It will do everything you ask of it, and if you have any problems Apple will bend over backwards to take care of you.

Keep in mind, on most models the only upgrades you can perform will be memory and (maybe) Hard Drive. So buy a model with more Disk space / processor speed that you think you will need.

Unless you are doing video or high end graphics (gaming), you can't go too wrong as processors go, just dont go for the absolute cheapest. Still photography isn't too much of a challenge for todays processors.

The major concerns should be of what size screen do you want, and comfort of use (especially on the smaller models).

I'd reccomend looking to have your laptop replace your desktop as well, as synchronizing two machines can become a genuine pain in the ass. Most models these days can be attached to an external monitor and keyboard, so you don't have to sacrifice a larger screen and more comfortable keyboard at home or the office if you go this route.

Do not go for the "Tablet" computers... Too much of a premium price for too little added functions.

A word of defense for Apple and photos. Yes, iPhoto didn't handle large libraries well in earlier versions, but currently it handles enormous libraries well. It was a problem with the program itself, not the platform, as other Mac photo programs exist to manage photo libraries.

I understand you're sticking with Windows, no problem. Just keeping the information accurate.

If you get a notebook with wireless. You will definitly want to get a wireless router for your home. I enjoy being able to go anywhere in the house, or even out in the yard, and surf the web.

One more thing... as far as wireless is concerned it is a hardware thing. Windows handles wireless networking just as it would an ethernet port (with a few differences).

I would do some research to see which models get better reception, as some cases inhibit reception, internal antennas could be poorly placed within the machine.

Thinkpad... because it's black.

Bill, don't write off Apple. File compatibility between Microsoft Office on Mac or PC is seamless, and Adobe Photoshop works great on a Mac, and again file compatibility is seamless. Aplle's AirPort hardware is WiFi, and works great. With WiFi, you can connect to wireless networks at home, at work, or in public places (my local Panera Bread Company has free WiFi, so I bring my PowerBook with me to lunch to read blogs) Connect an Airport wireless base station to your cable modem and your laptop can be anywhere in the house and have high-speed Internet. I have wireless at my office, adn the PowerBook automatically switches to the law office network and Internet when I open up the computer at the office. I don't know your reasons for avoiding Apple, but the prices are pretty competitive, if you compare laptops with matching features across platforms. I use both Mac's and PC's, and In my opinion, Mac software and the recent versions of the operating system are superior to the PC versions. A G4 PowerBook or iBook in the 12" sceen version is a pretty light laptop if you do a lot of traveling. I've owned five Macintosh PowerBooks, all of them used, bought on eBay, and they all worked with no problems (one of them was a dead maching sold for parts: I replaced the hard drive and it worked fine after that.)

Digital photography with a Mac is sweet and simple, and iPhoto (free with the computer) is very useful and easy to use. You don't nee to install drivers for your camera, you just plug it in by USB or FireWire and hte Mac OS recognizes the camera and opens iPhoto and lets you easily transfer the photos to the laptop. Digital video is just as easy. I can edit digital video on my PowerBook (which is a four-year old model), and using an external FireWire DVD burner, I put together a pretty professional-looking DVSD project.

Go to a local Apple Store and try one out. Then go look at some PC laptops at a different store and carefully compare the features, and buy what you feel comfortable with.

I recently got a Dell Latitude D800, and I can recommend it highly. It's got a 60GB hard drive, 1GB of memory (you may not need to go that far, though), an NVIDIA GeForce FX Go5200, and, most importantly, a 1.7 GHz Pentium M processor. Weight? I don't notice it, so it can't be that bad, although I don't know exactly how heavy it is.

Check it out. It may be worth your while.

Bill, I too would encourage you not to write-off Apple. But if you insist on a Windows machine, check out an IBM Thinkpad. Sony makes sleek laptops, but service can be an issue. Dell makes affordable laptops, but you ultimately get what you pay for. Thinkpads seem to be rugged and reliable, and IBM's service gets high marks.

Any new model should have decent specs to support what you want to do. Although I would encourage you to go for a business-class machine and not the consumer-grade types. Good processor, XP (Pro), and 512 MB RAM (at least). Also look for Firewire (sometimes called i.link or IEEE-1394) for maximum compatibility with digital cameras and dv equipment.

Still, I would get an Apple PowerBook. :)

I need a weight Boyd...throw it in some water and let's see how much it displaces.

I would also advise you to not rule out Apple's Powerbooks/iBooks. Just go to an Apple Store, and tell them about whatever concerns you have about Macs, and they can help you out. The coolest thing for me is the support...you can bring your 'book right into the store to have it fixed. I have a 12" iBook, it does photos fine. Before that, I had an HP Pavillion laptop...it was good, but it broke (after two years) last December.

(In the interest of full disclosure, I work for Apple...but I also have a PC for playing games.)

Powerbook, baby ... POWERbook. I never shut mine off ... and it NEVER CRASHES (OS X) ... and is barely inconvenienced by the extremely rare flake-outs of other (3rd party) apps -- all you do is force-quit and move on. Rock solid OS.

Photos? I NEVER use iphoto -- GraphicConverter is all you need (uh, along with Photoshop).

... and I think (Bill) that you've been disabused of the power issue you commented on above. Where did you get that one, anyway?

Power issue? I don't know much about computers ...

Here, you can check out a few for yourself:

http://reviews.cnet.com/4521-6527_7-5021302-2.html?tag=subnav

Toshiba makes excellent laptops in my experience, and Acer seems to be a solid new face in this market. IBM does a decent job, but usually at a premium on price without any real difference in quality. As far as specs, you want a minimum of:

1.6 GHz processor
512 MB RAM
40 GB hard drive (higher if you can)

You want Windows XP Professional (not Home Edition), Office 2003, and probably an extra battery plus any travel power packages you can find (car adapter, maybe a portable charger, stuff like that). If you find a good one that doesn't have built-in wireless, remember that you can always buy a wireless PCMCIA card that will work just as well.

Good luck to you at the convention, even if I fervently hope your candidate loses (which is not the same as saying I fervently hope the guy who is supposed to be my side's candidate wins - I mean, are these two really the best we can do?). If you have any questions about specific models you look at, I'd be glad to try and answer them for you.

Don't buy an HP. It took me months to get it set up to run adequately. It comes loaded with so much crap I'm surprised that it runs at all.

And remember, digital pornography.

Bill, with all the field work you do, I'd recommend an IBM ThinkPad. The T Series is the most rugged machine out there; it will take quite the beating, but is rather heavy. The A Series gives you more "features" with less heft. The ultraportable X Series is the lightest of the batch, but you have to get a lot of peripherals in order to do much.

These machines take the pounding.

Full disclosure: The company I work for is the contractor that runs IBM's Customer Demo Program, so I know these machines fairly well.

And as Jim H said above, they're black...

Head out on I-66 to Nutley Road--Micro-Center is where you want to shop.

I've been buying computers there for more than 10 years--my latest purchase was a laptop. They have a variety, and usually a few on sale. Their prices are the best in the area (trust me, I'm cheap) and the service department is great.

To follow others:

You really, really want to reconsider your "no Apple" stance.

The only reason to not buy Apple: You need software that doesn't run on Apple. That and they cost more; but you can use them for longer, so that evens out.

With a Windows laptop you get to look forward to reloading the OS on a semi-regular schedule, spyware, viruses and general nastiness and instability.

No, I don't work for Apple and yes, I do own both types of machines. Use Microsoft at your own risk (and the risk of your data - and sanity).