What HP or Dell laptop do I buy for Suse 9.3 or Mandriva 2005LE
 

Dear Forum

I am a newbie in a lucky situation: I have decided to buy a new laptop and install Linux on it. I have all my files on an external USB connected 80Gb HDU so no need to back up old stuff. Of course, once installed, I want linux to read from the 80Gb external HDU. I will use Linux for office applications, internet, some photoediting etc. Normal desktop use. I am most keen on installing Mandriva 2005, but also looking at SuSe as these two distros seem to be the easiest for newbies. I will do a dual boot configuration via the installer.

I am looking at two possible new machines but I have read about a few problems about the graphics drivers and the widescreen LCD online. Now I go to all you guys for information on which machine to pick.

They cost about the same, so price is not an issue.

Option 1
Dell Inspiron 6000
Pentium M 730 1.6GHz
15.4" WSXGA+
ATI Radeon X300 64 Mb
100Gb HDU 4200rpm
1Gb RAM 2 Dimms
Intel® PRO 2200 and Dell 350 Bluetooth Internal Wireless Cards
XP home + recov cd

Option 2
HP zv6000
AMD Athlon 64 3200 2 GHz
15.4 WXGA brightview
ATI Radeon 128 xpress 200M w/hypermem
100Gb HDU 4200 rpm
1Gb RAM 2 Dimms
54g(TM) Integ. Broadcom 802.11b/g WLAN & Bluetooth
XP home

So for all of you familiar with either SuSe or Mandriva, which hardward option do you think would give me the easiest installation and everyday use?

The 64 bit one.