Im giving myself a computer for the holidays. What should I keep in mind when making a purchase?

Your question is relatively broad, as the level of your gaming, music, and movie usage isn't defined. Will you simply be watching movies or editing them? When you say games, do you mean online Yahoo! poker or do you want to play The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion on the highest graphic settings? The answers to these questions change my recommendations greatly, but I will give a quick, sweeping overview of components anybody should look for with a PC.

If you are going to buy the PC from a major company such as Dell, Gateway, etc. you will find that they offer different level computers for different levels of needs. As somebody suggested, a desktop will typically give you more performance for the price if you plan on using it at home. But, there is something very nice about being able to e-mail from your couch and surfing the net wireless.

Still, you listed movies as one of your concerns, and this typically calls for a large screen and robust sound system. You can get a large screen for a laptop, but then it ceases to be all that portable and you'd still have to hook it up to stationary speakers or headphones to get any kind of audio enjoyment from your music/media. In this regards, do no skimp on the monitor. Look for an LCD monitor with a high refresh rate (for gaming purposes) and make sure it is big enough for your purposes. 17" is a good starting size, but you'll thank yourself if you go 19" or larger. Widescreen is a luxury you can choose if you wish, but I wouldn't say it's required to any degree.

As for the guts of the computer, you're going to want to look at CPU, memory, graphics card, and hard drive space. There are, of course, other components, but these are your core essentials when judging what type of machine you're looking at.

How much CPU power will be completely dependent upon what types of applications you wish to run. If you see yourself doing movie editing, every ounce of horsepower counts. But if you don't plan on doing editing or extremely high end gaming, basically anything that is a 64 bit processor will suffice. It is important you get the 64 bit processor, as this technology will be taking over soon and you don't want to be lagging too far behind after only a year. There are two major brands of CPU: Intel and AMD. Both are good choices and you will find people that swear by one or the other. I've used both, and can say it's hard to make a bad choice.

Memory (RAM) is simple. The more you have, the better. A year ago I would have said 512mb would get most people by, but that's swiftly changing. I'd recommend at least 1gb of ram. If you plan on doing any sort of 3D gaming, put the most in you can afford. RAM is probably the cheapest and easiest way to notice an improvement in your computers performance.

Graphics cards can get more complicated. I wrote another suggestion on graphics card I will link for you here if you wish to read more:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=As7hH...

If you plan on doing extensive 3D gaming and movie watching, you will want a nice graphics card. Get at least 256mb of memory on it. This would be the minimum now for gaming, so if you can upgrade, do it. However for most people, a graphics card with 256mb is going to do the trick for awhile.

Finally, the hard drive. This is just how much stuff you'll be fitting onto your computer. Again, the more the better. If you're downloading music, games, and movies 100gb (gigabytes) gets small really quick. Look for something with over 150gb, and upgrade as you see fit to your needs.

In short: Get a nice monitor! This is something you'll be looking at for hours, so make it pretty. When getting a CPU, make it a 64 bit processor. The best graphics card you can afford is future proofing you to be able to do games for at least 2 years. The more RAM the better, at least 1 gigabyte (But you probably wouldn't need more than 2gb). And the more hard drive space the better: you want to be able to store all your videos, movies, music, and games.

There are other features to look for, but by follow these basic standards you'll be sure to find a PC to suit your needs and price!

A quick word on Apple computers:

These are a great alternative to the PC, especially now that they come with an intel processor. However, they are going to typically cost more than a PC and not every piece of software/hardware will work for it. Still, they are beautiful machines and if you can afford the price tag I wouldn't think twice about recommending a purchase.

Only for games and fun stuffs?

Umm make sure the PC you're getting have a good video card, 512MB >, Window Vista :)

Needs to be a Desktop. Don't buy a laptop.

Flat Screen Monitor. Buy a game card to enhance it.

Mac's don't get viruses like PC's do. They are just cooler in general. The one I am typing this on is beautiful, and doesn't make a sound.

dont let people talk you into something you dont need

get an alienware