Laptop for Grandma

mags16

My mum is of advanced years but is pretty "with it". She goes to the library to check emails and look things up on the internet. Now that my brother is newly married in London and there may be more grandchildren on the way, we think it is a good idea for her to get a new computer of her own. To keep in touch, to look at photos, to email, to use skype and word. She is unlikely to be into gaming or suchlike. Or to need a huge memory. We would like to spend under €500. I fancy a laptop but she says she would like larger keys on the keyboard. And a larger screen. Any ideas? (Btw, reading my post up to now, you'd swear she was a doddery old lady with a blue rinse. Believe me, she's not!)

watty

Acer

mags16

Thanks Watty.
Does anyone have any opinions on the fujitsu siemens v5535? You can get it in Dunnes for €549 and €490 online.

TerrorFirmer

Not great. Old hardware coupled with Vista is generally not a great experience. With XP that laptop would have been fine. Acer do make generally decent laptops at affordable prices. Like this

Much better processor, bigger hard drive, double the ram (essential for Vista) and a much better video card (while this may not matter to your grandmother, it will make a difference to the features you can use in Vista)

Another example, a Fujitsu Siemens laptop for close enough to the Dunnes price, yet is infinitely better. Though it's video card would not enable you to run Vista to it's full ability. But that's an asthetic thing mind, it won't impede the capabilities of the OS in a working sense.