Advice on Laptop/Music Downloading

Ok. I've decided that I want to save up and buy myself a laptop. Mostly I want to use it to download music, as my parents won't let me download music on our home computer, and to store all my music and my photos, plus play around with photoshop. Our home computer is waaaay slow when i'm using photoshop.

So does anyone have any reccomendations of what systems/requirements will work best for fast downloading and good storage? Any good music download programs? And any reccomendations of super good virus protection, because I know that's a big risk with downloading music.

Any help would be appreciated!

Everyone uses limewire... but everytime I download it my computer crashes. And now all the songs I downloaded got messed up and I can't listen to them

I've used Morpheous before, but I don't really have an opinion yet

I've also heard a lot of people use limewire, and i've also heard a lot of bad things about it... So i'm not sure on that one.

I've read somewhere that Ares is a good program, but I don't really know.

Never heard of ares... so I can't really help you much more

Thanks anyway!

Morning, I don't think you need a big heavy duty laptop for the purpose (infact I don't think you need a laptop at all).

Firstly I would recommend you to buy an external drive (perhaps a 500GB one) which will do the trick for storing music files.

Secondly for the downloading speed it all depends on how much Mbps you are getting from your ISP (Internet Service provider), 24MB line will give you quite fast internet (one file can be downloaded in few seconds).

Additionally, it also depends on your router, which you are using at home to get the internet. The router should be able to transmit enough data across to your pc. In addition it also depends whether you are using wireless or wired connection. Generally wireless connection may loose the strength while you downloading music however wired connection would not.

To download music that depends if you want to download it for free or paid. For free download you can use bittorrent program and use websites like mininova or isohunt to download music. However you need to open a port on your router to download the music otherwise your router will block the traffic.

As far as Antivirus is concern I would recommend to buy an AVG Antivirus, along with Malwarebytes.

Hope this helps

Many thanks

Regards

Thanks Jehanzeb!

I want a laptop because my parents don't like me storing all my music/photos on their computer.

We have an external hard drive on our home computer for photos, however I think we bought a crappy one caue it makes noises! But it works.

The rest sounds good, if a little confusing for a computer illiterate person like me :]

Thanks!

AVG is good. I use the free edition and it has always kept viruses at bay.

I have never had a problem with limewire. I update it regularly tho, and only run one or two other programs at the same time.

What I have had issues wih is Itunes!! It freezes, you can't play music while running background programs (or run it in the background while using other programs), and updates are slow and take up lots of disc space. I've also been told that you can pick up viruses with it, although I havent had that happen yet.

If you do get a laptop, bypass on vista

Generally there is no problem with itunes, it must be something else or perhaps the software you have downloaded and installed didn't install properly. Perhaps you can check the file types it is using? It might some other program like Media player, Real Player, Winamp etc might be conflicting with it.

In my opinion laptops are used when you travel allot, regardless of what needs to be saved on them, they are mobile machines and are not suitable for home use (they are not same as PC's in other words).

However saying that if you still need a laptop then please do let us know your budget and I am sure everyone will be more than happy to help you out

Regards

Yeah, Im pretty sure it is conflicting with something. It works fine until I try and play a song while at the same time downloading with limewire or a web site, or try and do to many things at one.
My laptop has low memory, which could also have something to do with it.