The current crop of laptops in retail stores in my area are offering Windows 7. The very cheapest ones have Home Basic installed (I wouldn't recommend it, but it's an option) with very slightly more expensive ones having Home Premium.

I haven't seen anyone selling 32-bit versions preinstalled. You probably shouldn't consider anything but 64-bit.

All hard drives will be formatted NTFS (for Windows machines) and 64-bit Windows theoretically allows you to use up to something like a gadzillin TB of RAM, and the sales monkeys may brag about that number (whatever it is) BUT IT'S NOT ENOUGH THAT THE HD format or the processor has the capability.

The Laptop BIOS has to be able to handle the RAM, and you have to have slots to plug the RAM into. MOST OF THE LAPTOPS being offered now are using BIOS that can't support more than 6GB, with a very few able to go to 8 GB. The majority of the retail store laptops that have Windows 7 Home Premium preinstalled are carrying 3GB. Lower priced Desktops are seldom more than 6GB, and 3GB is common in the lowest priced ones. The 3GB probably is about all most laptop users will really need(?) ... and is about the Maximum 32-bit machines could actually use.

From retail stores here the best you'd likely find would be Windows 7 Home Premium, 64-bit, 3GB RAM, and 350 to 500GB Hard Drive - at about $500 - $700 (US).

You may be able to get a slightly better machine for about the same price via web sellers or from the factory, but some makers are quoting shipping dates about a month after you order. I don't know how prevalent the lag is, but I've seen similar info from 3 or 4.

If you order from the builders, you can get similar machines with Windows 7 Professional (previously called the "Business" version) preinstalled for close to the same price, and sometimes with a 750GB HD, for within about $100. The Professional/Business version has a couple of features I'd consider but they may not be worth the cost hit for most people.

To step up to anything much better than the "utility grade" (cheap) laptops, the jump is usually to close to $1,000 or a little more.

Note that many laptops now DO NOT have an optical drive (CD/DVD reader/burner), although a few in the price range do. Look before you buy, if it's important to you. You can get an external USB CD/DVD burner, probably under $50, if you get infatuated with something that doesn't have one built in. If you plan to burn a lot of disks, the external might be a better option, since you can replace it easier than getting inside to replace a built-in.

A few laptops, even in the cheap models, do come with a "full keyboard" that includes a NumPad and less "multitasking" of some of the other buttons. If you've been using laptops for a while that may not be a big deal, but if it's interesting you'll want to look at whether that's what you're getting. I've yet to see a "spec sheet" on any laptop that tells you which kind is on it.

Displays start at 14 inch and can be found up to 18 inch in moderately priced laptops; but there is a slight price difference for the bigger ones - from what I've seen. All of them are the newer "wide screen" aspect ratio, which takes a little practice to get used to; but since there's not much choice it can't be allowed to matter much.

Note: This is all opinion, with only what I see in the shops and poking around on the web for a pretense that it's even a little "informed." The lower (reasonably) priced machines seem to be all pretty much "cookie cutter copies" of each other, and finding "real specs" is almost as hard as talking to a car saleman about rear-end ratios and towing capacity. Useful info = ZERO in either case.

John