Palmtops, desktop PCs, laptops and a wide variety of different pieces of state-of-the-art technology may confuse prospective buyers, as the massive amount of available offers may be overwhelming.

As an attempt to make some things clear, this article will highlight many different features of the two most widely used kinds of computers: desktop PCs and laptops.

Everybody knows what a desktop computer is. However, not everyone knows a laptop, and frequently people mistakenly think that laptops and notebooks are the same thing. Well, the truth is that although notebooks are a kind of laptop, not every laptop is a notebook.

This distinction is made for two reasons: weight and peripherals. While notebooks are lighter, usually about four or five pounds, they not always include disk drives such as floppy drives and CD-ROMs. Bulkier (six or seven pounds) laptops include these drives.

But let's go back to laptops vs. desktop computers; which one is the right one? Well, this should be decided by you, but if you need portability you should choose a laptop. With normal size of 8.5?? x 11?? (although some new models are bigger, to include 16?? screens), these beauties are ready to be packed and carried with you all day, giving you the possibility to work while you travel, take notes while taking classes, or just make annotations while in the library. They offer you the convenience of saving space.

However, if you will be using your computer only for 3D gaming or setting up a powerful workstation that will be on most of the time, then the best choice is probably a desktop PC. They are cheaper to buy too.

The reason of laptops being more expensive than desktop computers is not, as many people think, that desktop ones are better or more reliable (in fact the majority of computer failures have been reported to happen on desktops), but resides on the laptop's need to be manufactured with components that must be small to fit into a small case, and at the same time be resistant to high heat levels and reduce power consumption to a minimum.

Finally, I'd like to say I own both a laptop and a desktop computer, and although this last one was cheaper to buy and its nominal speed is bigger, it failed some times for apparently no reason, while my faithful laptop has never had any problem and is just as fast as my desktop PC with a lower CPU speed.