FUTURE TRENDS
Like any other computer, future laptops will have faster microprocessors with more memory. The storage devices may change from removable disks (floppy, Zip, CD, DVD) to solid state memory, which could make them even lighter and thinner. While some models of laptops already have the ability to send and receive data using infrared and wireless Internet technologies, this feature may become more common. In the future, laptops may eventually be replaced by wearable computers.

WHAT THEY CAN DO
A laptop is a full-blown, genuine computer that can do anything a desktop computer can do. For example, you can do programming, word processing, spreadsheets, databases, accounting and multimedia presentations. In fact, many people in the How Stuff Works office use laptops as their only computer. The portability of laptops allows you to do many things that you cannot do with a desktop. For example, you can write your sales proposal, article or business presentation while travelling on a plane, or commuting on the bus or train or subway. We will discuss some examples of laptop uses in the following fields:

• education
• entertainment
• law enforcement
• amateur astronomy
• navigation
• business

Education
Students and educators have found that laptops answer a lot of their needs. In fact, some colleges and universities that require incoming freshmen to have computers recommend laptops. Teachers have found a variety of uses for laptops, too. Lecture

Presentations
In college, where lectures to large classes are commonplace, many professors can use their laptops, along with other audiovisual equipment, to project slides or lecture notes. And as technology creeps further into public elementary, middle and high schools, there is a growing trend toward teachers using laptops in the classroom for lectures.

Notetaking
Students can use laptop computers to take notes during lectures; this is more common in college than in lower schools. However, many special education students do use laptops for notetaking, or to run specialized software, such as hearing interpreters. As another example, if a student is injured and cannot use his/her writing arm, the school system may issue a laptop for notetaking or for downloading notes supplied by the teacher.

Laboratories
In both colleges and lower schools, science students can use laptops for gathering data from laboratory experiments. Laptops can also be taken into the field to gather data. For example, laptops can be hooked up to probes, such as pH electrodes or temperature probes, and taken to a salt marsh, stream or lake. Students can then measure pH and temperature and use the data to study the environment. In addition to laptops, scientific calculators and PDAs can also be equipped for taking these types of measurements.

OTHER USES
Laptops are becoming quite commonly used for business and for pleasure.

Entertainment
Because most laptops either have standard or optional internal CD-ROM or DVD drives, you can play music CDs or movie DVDs on your laptop. Imagine sitting on a long flight or train commute during which you can type your presentation for work, and listen to your own music CD. Or perhaps you're on a plane and you don't like the in-flight movie; if your laptop has a DVD drive, you can just pop in your own movie and enjoy!

Law Enforcement
Many police cars are now equipped with laptop computers. Police officers can use laptops to type incident reports immediately at the scene, rather than take notes and type the reports later. This time saving feature allows them more time to patrol. Furthermore, police can also use laptops with wireless connections to central police headquarters to check such things as criminal records, vehicle registrations and outstanding warrants, which saves time and can assist in making arrests.

Amateur Astronomy
Because laptop computers are so portable, amateur astronomers can take them easily to observing sites. Computers can be used to drive telescopes to various celestial objects. Furthermore, if the telescope is equipped with a CCD camera, the laptop computer can be used to acquire, process and display the image from the CCD.

Navigation
When sailing and boating, it is essential to know precisely where you are on the water. On small boats, space is a premium; they cannot have chartrooms or large chart tables. So, you can use a laptop computer, equipped with appropriate software and a global positioning system (GPS) device, for precise navigation.

Business
Some may say that the business field has benefited the most from the laptop computer. Salespeople can use the laptop to make presentations to customers, access company data over the Internet and process orders while on the road. At trade shows and conventions, it is easy to setup a laptop for a multimedia presentation of your company's products and services. These are just a few examples of how you can use laptop computers; there are many more. See the Links section for links on some of the subjects we've talked about.