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I would suggest the following, if you read this before your trip is over.
1. Be totally honest with yourself. Why are you getting a Ph.D., and to what extent will the topic of your dissertation / area of your research be crucial to motivating yourself and to what extent will finding a good job be important. This strongly determines how important it is to you that you choose your advisor based on field or on indusrial / academic contact. Do you want to go academics route or industrial, and where does your potential advisor chiefly send his/her students?
2. I would suggest that you scope out local support in your lab. If you advisor is more established (tenured and older than 50), are there knowledgeable post-docs, and do they seem willing to teach the grad students. How many post-docs are there?
3. Does your potential advisor wear a suit to work, or does he wear slacks and a button-down? The suits don't go into the lab, the button-downs do.
4. Is the lab clean / organized?
5. Is your potential advisor tenured? If not, how close? Will your Ph.D. potentially be interrupted by denial of tenure?
6. How well-funded is your potential advisor, and who funds?
7. How important is location to you, and do you like Boston? pssst...You should. Great music scene.
I can think of more if you need them. These are my quickies.
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You don't love me, you just love my piggy style
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