I've got two "primary" computers and one significantly older one.
I'm trying to understand what my best courses of action are for updating and upgrading the computers.
No computer games on any of them.
My primary computer is a 1-year old HP Pavilion dv9700 laptop which I use for school. Common programs are AutoCAD, Photoshop, Sketchup, & illustrator (plus Word & Firefox & etc). I don't have graphic card info to hand right now; it would be whatever was installed at the factory. It works well but occasionally chokes on large files in Illustrator & sketchup.
Intel Core 2Duo CPU T5750 @2.00 GHz
4 GB RAM
64 Bit
Windows Vista
300 GB hard drive (mostly full; need to transfer stuff out)
Adding a second hard drive should be not too difficult. If most of the space on your drive is used for data storage, you can transfer most of that to the other drive. If it's applications, make sure you install them on the new drive. For security reasons though it would be better to ensure they still land in the
Program Files folder. If you want to upgrade to Windows 7 anyway, you could simply install it on the new drive instead of the old one.
I wouldn't ugprade much on your computer. More RAM is not necessary. I suspect a new graphics card might be one of your best options, I hope I am under no illusion when I think that graphics-intensive programs like AutoCad know how to use the graphics card.
I would recommend Windows 7, definitely.
Oh, and I am blind. Considering that it's a notebook, a better graphics card and a second hard drive might be hard or impossible.
The desktop is a Black Friday special from 2 (?) years ago.
Compaq Presario.
AMD Athlon 64 processor
3700+
1.79 Ghz
960 MB RAM
WinXP + updates.
hard drive around 250 GB
That could use more work, focusing on RAM (2 GB should be enough unless you want games and 3D modelling maybe) and a second hard disk.
Of course, consider whether you really need a second desktop if your wife prefers doing bills and facebook on the notebook anyway, and if a new notebook wouldn't be better.
If I could read...
Er. Okay, 4 GB, Windows 7, and a second hard drive with the notes I made regarding the notebook might be a good choice. Check the Graphics Card, too.
I personally never manage to keep up-to-date on the details of Graphics Cards (or processors), so I can't recommend anything specific in that area.
There's also a 6-year old Toshiba laptop that needs to be reformatted, but otherwise has run flawlessly for 6 years. Wondering if it can be made into a netbook or something at some point. Runs Win XP with updates.
Well, what do you mean by "made into a netbook"? A netbook is basically a lightweight (literally and figuratively) notebook with a small display and typically with cheap components, but with networking (Wireless LAN specifically). All this ensures it is small, can be easily transported is and cheap. It won't allow you to do fancy stuff, but it gets you online.
In a way, your notebook is already a netbook.

(Except it might be too big?)
Upgrading notebooks is not always easy, since they are built really tight. Younger notebooks allow easy access to hard drive and RAM, making it possible to upgrade those parts easily. More RAM and a bigger hard drive won't hurt. I am not sure upgrading to Windows 7 will do much. I haven't checked the benchmarks if it can outdo Windows XP in regards to energy efficiency, though it might. The
Aspire 1420P I got on the
PDC seems to run pretty well and long.
If your laptop does not have a dual core processor, I would seriously consider just getting a new one. It doesn't have to be a high end machine, it doesn't need to be a netbook either.