You can buy a laptop that dosen't have the best hardware for cheap, and throw Mandrake (I still don't call it Mandriva) Linux on it. Mandriva is pretty user friendly, and will run better on not so good hardware. If you have to use windows, then go with Windows 2000. As far as I know 95% of programs that run in XP run in 2000, and I personally perfer it over XP.
__________________
|