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Desktop, laptop, or both? How to determine the right configuration—and the right products—for your business
By Reed Richardson
For most small businesses, purchasing new computer equipment is no small matter; it’s a major capital expenditure that can significantly impact a company’s long-term chance for success. Consequently, many small business owners often adopt a “wait ‘til next year” approach, putting off the purchase of new computers until it’s absolutely necessary, like after a hard-drive crashes or their old computers achieve dinosaur status.
“But budget alone shouldn’t drive the decision” on buying a computer, advises Charles Davies, a technology expert for the Visa Small Business website. “A wise, far-sighted purchase at the outset can save money in the long run.” In fact, many experts agree that a strictly balance sheet-focused strategy often fails to account for the hidden costs that arise from clinging to obsolete computers or an antiquated network—things like declining productivity, low employee morale, and unhappy customers.
How do I know if I need new computers?
Leland Means, senior manager for Dell Computer’s Home and Small Business division says that there are three telltale signs that your small business may be due for a computer upgrade. “The first is the age of your computers,” Means says. “If they’re over three years old, we advise our customers to replace them because typically they’re going to start having so much downtime for maintenance issues that neither your employees or your IT staff will be as productive.” Other clues that your computer is ripe for retirement include continually waiting for web pages to load or having to shut down one program before opening another.
The age of a computer is also related to the second criterion Means recommends considering: the security of your current system. “Even with security downloads and updated patches, old computer systems are never going to be as robust as new systems,” Means notes. This means that a small business’s fouryear- old PC is more vulnerable to hackers and viruses, putting your invaluable customer and financial data at greater risk.
The last of these telling symptoms involves a lack of compatibility. This can often occur in offices that practice the “cascade upgrade,” in which only the boss or top manager gets a new computer and everyone else gets their supervisor’s hand-me-down computer. “If you have several different brands of computers that stretch across several years of production, your IT staff may be overwhelmed trying to keep all of them working together,” Means says. To keep your IT staff or, as is the case with many small businesses, the owner, more focused on preventing security breaches than reacting to them, he suggests buying several computers of the same brand at one time. “This standardization improves compatibility and makes everyone more productive.”
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OK, I need new computers, now what?
The biggest mistake many small business owners make is rushing out to buy a computer without asking themselves what they really want it to do, not just now, but two to three years down the road. To prevent spending thousands of dollars on something that doesn’t fit your business, it’s important to get educated and consider as many options as you can. Perhaps the biggest mystery confronting small business owners when they have finally decided to begin the search for a computer involves the long-standing question: Desktop or laptop? This is a question that, as technology rapidly progresses, becomes increasingly difficult to answer. To help cut through the clutter, be sure to consider the following:
Portability
The ability to carry along your computer, which for many small companies represents their entire office, is the primary benefit of a laptop, or notebook, computer. Even if you travel only occasionally, the prospect of taking this valuable tool with you rather than having to leave behind a bulky, desktop computer (and its precious information) is often well worth almost any price differential. However, when trying to determine a notebook’s true mobility and ease of use, examine more than just its size and weight. Also look at oftignored, but just-as-important features such as battery life, wireless connectivity, and the bulkiness of the power pack.
This portability can be a critical factor if your work requires you to adapt to constantly changing circumstances and can sometimes be the difference between making and missing a sale. Walking into a potential client’s office and smoothly making a full-color presentation on your laptop—something that no PDA or Blackberry can match—still carries with it a certain cachet, one that speaks of solidity and established success.
If you work out of a small, home office, a notebook might still be appropriate, despite the fact that you may never take it on a business trip with you. Its smaller size, for example, can free up valuable desk space and make organizing easier. Likewise, its ability to be quickly closed and discreetly stowed away can aid in preserving a healthy work-life separation, especially if you’re working and living out of the same space.
Capability
The old conventional wisdom that you must choose between processing speed or portability when considering a computer purchase is no longer applicable, says PC World columnist Michael Lasky. “Though notebook PCs tend to be a tad more expensive than desktop systems, today they can be just as powerful,” he notes. In another nod toward the convergence of capabilities between the two, Lasky observes, “many [desktop] models are compact enough to occupy only a modest amount of space on your desk.”
Indeed, many notebook computers now come equipped with all the same drives, graphics and video cards, and peripheral ports as those offered on desktop models. Of course, desktops typically offer a half-dozen or more USB ports and their chassis often come ready to accept additional hard drives and memory caches that you can install yourself, which further extend the computer’s effective lifespan.
Notebooks, on the other hand, cannot provide the same level of upgradability due to their obvious space constraints, though most major computer companies offer some kind of upgrade program. In these programs, technicians will replace the hard drive, memory card, or other aspects of your current notebook at a much lower price than you would pay for a new machine. The only drawback is that you may have to give up your computer for anywhere from one to two weeks for the changeover. One other important thing to remember when buying a notebook computer is that you can’t upgrade to a larger screen, so it’s important to be very comfortable with the screen size at the time you purchase it.
Durability
Notebooks, by their very nature, traditionally have been the more fragile sibling to the desktop’s robust tower. This despite the fact that notebooks are exposed to far more dings and drops. Fortunately, many computer manufacturers have increasingly caught on, turning out more and more rugged notebooks, some with impactresistant metal or hard plastic bodies as well as waterproof keyboards.
This last point is an important one, as water or soda spilled over a desktop keyboard is but a minor inconvenience, while the same mishap on a notebook often turns into a catastrophe that requires replacing it entirely. Similarly, any other major repairs on a notebook computer can necessitate long stretches without it. And notebook replacement parts are typically more expensive and less available than desktop parts.
When considering the expected lifespan of a computer, it should also be noted that desktop computers rarely suffer from being lost or stolen—one of the constant bugbears of laptops. To address this ongoing problem, many computer companies now offer a service such as Dell’s CompuTrace, that acts as a kind of Lo-Jack for computers, significantly reducing computer turnover due to theft or forgetfulness.
Ergonomics
Perhaps one of the greatest hidden costs to using a notebook computer involves the physical toll on its user. Walk through any airport and you will see dozens of people awkwardly hunched over, their wrists painfully arched upwards, all examples of bad computer posture. Maintaining these positions for hours on end, day after day, can quickly lead to physiological ailments like eyestrain, sore necks and backs, and repetitive stress injuries in your hands and arms.
To avoid this, most computer experts recommend that, if you do use a laptop when you travel, you avoid using your notebook’s built-in keyboard and mousepad for long periods of time. Instead, bring along a more ergonomic keyboard and external mouse (preferably, both wireless) for use in your hotel as well as when you return to the office.
Taking all these criteria into consideration, many small business owners may still feel unsure as to which type of computer, desktop or laptop, suits them best. If it remains too difficult to make a clear choice, it might be wise to do what many small business owners end up doing—buy one of each.
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