Advice sought - laptop

[Phage]

Hi All,

I've been approached to help out the in-laws with a laptop purchase to replace their aging Dell desktop. The budget is around £300 to 400 and the spec is wide open.
They will need a new OS, Office suite etc and will not be doing any gaming. Surfing, Office work and DVDs are the most likely uses. The machine should not look intimidating or be too heavy for the older citizen. It should have a largish screen for easy viewing of photos.

What should I be looking for in terms of brand and/or spec ?

TIA

[snail]

Just go for one of the big names, £400 is quite alot of money to spend on a laptop that you don't even really need to have good specs even if you include microsoft office into that mix as most retailers do discount on it when you purchase a laptop.

Check what is on offer and just buy the best specd you can

[scaryjim]

Athlon II Mobile processor, 4GB RAM, HD4200, 320GB Hard Drive, Windows Home 7 Premium?

Only issue might be weight, though at 2.68kg it's about average for a full size laptop really. Performance should be pretty good though, and the price is good @ £387.79

[dirky]

key thing about laptops is size, and size related to price. for under 400 new you are looking at 15.6"+. Office costs ~£150 min (unless student version?), so you might need to consider openoffice.. depends what sort of physical size of laptop you are after