Laptop PC connection

If you mean adding a laptop to your home connection then no, your ISP typically doesn't need to know or be paid for it.



You can share a folder over your home network and then move them, but if that is complicated a very simple solution is to get a usb flash drive (you can get one for under $10) and use it (when you plug it into your computer it will show up as a new drive letter).



The printer can be shared fairly easily but that is not usually the case with other peripherals.


About 20" is the largest I've heard of in production.



Depends on what you want to do with it. If you just mean brands I've always liked Toshiba laptops myself but I'm not loyal to any particular brand and will have a look to see what's on the market whenever I'm buying.

Amazon is usually the first place I search, then smaller stores like tigerdirect.com. I'll usually also check out the manufacturers themselves (especially Dell and HP, Toshiba and others often have bad deals when buying direct).

If you want to get very cheap, ebay is another good place to go, but I don't really like Frankenstein (parts bought cheaply and assembled by some guy at home) laptops.

Take a look at newegg.com as well as big-box retailers like Costco and Sam's.

The thing you need to think about is whether you want a desktop replacement, or just something to access the Internet while you're traveling. A $300 netbook might be enough for occasional or casual use.

A full-time desktop replacement will cost considerably more.

Thanks to you both, but Robert Gentel - why do you say they often have "bad" deals - is there a problem with delivery or what?

Is a laptop larger/heavier than a notebook?

Laptop, notebook, netbook, etc. are all pretty broad terms. "Netbook" is a new-ish buzzword for a very basic, cheap laptop where the primary intended use is browsing the Internet. No heavy graphics capabilities, fast processing, large storage, etc.

With a laptop, you have to trade off weight for functionality. For a little bit of money, you can get a light weight netbook with the ability to surf the Internet and do a few other things. For a little more, you can get a notebook with a decent amount of functionality and a small screen. For more money, you can get a large screen laptop with a lot of functionality but it's going to be heavy. For more money still, can get one of the above but with more functionality or less weight. If you don't need something to carry around, you will do better with a desktop.

For everyday use, a laptop with a docking station and external monitors works great. (If you're cheap, and willing to connect cables every time you sit down, you can eliminate the docking station.) It costs a little more than a comparable desktop unit, but you can take it on the road.

There are a few uses where this does not work, mostly related to high-end graphics applications (and games).

Toshiba, as one example, is a better manufacturer than retailer, so buying their laptops directly with them has always cost me more than buying the same laptops on Amazon.

Others like Dell are much better when you go to them directly.

Over the weekend I ran into major difficulties with accessing the newsletter I edit. Several hundred people depend on it for information about scheduled activities and other information, and I can't afford to have it in trouble. The problem eventually seems to have resolved itself, but it made me twitch quite a lot for a couple of days.

I was thinking in terms of something which would be used mainly as a word processor and that leads me to another question: I use Adobe Acrobat to upload the newsletter to an Internet site. Can a 2d computer use the same Adobe program or can it be copied onto a 2d machine? I'm trying to cover various possible evil eventualities...

Further note: I would like a machine with XP, even if it's a discontinued model, given how unpopular Vista seems. I know people who wouldn't have Vista as a gift..

Speaking of XP, does anyone know when Microsoft is coming out with the next OS, the post-Vista one that's in the works?

It depends on the terms of the license agreement of the specific version of Adobe Acrobat.

You can find all of the license agreements here.

Windows 7 has reached the point of being released to manufacture (RTM). I believe some partners can already download and install it.

DrewDad: I tried the help link you provided but Adobe is pretty stingy with information. I just kept going in a circle without being able to ask anyone anything!

Was I doing anything wrong and if so, What?

You need to find your product, then look to the right to find the version, then click the link to download the license agreement in PDF form.

It used to be that companies licensed the installation on one desktop system and one laptop system, provided that the systems were used by the same user.

DrewDad -I did all that, but the EULA is so complicated that I had hoped someone at Adobe could translate it into language I could really understand. I can't figure out from the EULA whether my version is indeed permitted to be installed/copied for that purpose.

"It used to be that companies licensed the installation on one desktop system and one laptop system, provided that the systems were used by the same user."
I simply cannot figure out whether this applies to my version (and I don't view myself as particularly stupid).

I do wish that EULAs were written in plain English instead of such dense legalise.

Try searching the license agreement for "laptop".