Mostly I edit on laptops, which is something I can do on a small and modest screen. But currently I'm engaged on a project -- which should be public soon -- that means some hefty writing and rejigging while on the move.

Little laptops don't cut it for that. You don't get enough stuff on the screen. And here's the rub. A lot of big laptops don't cut it either. 'Stuff on screen' depends upon resolution, how many dots there go to make up what you see .

Consider this: my lovely little Packard Bell Butterfly Touch portable has an 11.6 inch screen with a resolution of 1366 by 768 dots. What do you get if you go out and buy one of those big 15.6 or even 16 inch laptops? A much bigger screen. Usually with a resolution of 1366 by 768 dots. In other words they look the same, only bigger.

<!--more-->Yes, you can fiddle around in Word by making the text smaller to fit more in. But the space available for everything else remains the same, and frankly I hate it. If that's all there is I'd rather take along the Butterfly Touch.

The answer lies in finding a laptop with a higher resolution screen. My old MacBook Pro had a screen that was 1440 by 900, which fits in a bit more but not much. If you shell out megabucks you can get a MB Pro with a higher resolution screen of 1680 by 1050. But my Apple days are past.

How easy is it to find a Windows laptop with higher resolution? Not at all. I couldn't find one in any local computer store, and most models sold simply seem to stick with that standard resolution. Finally I latched onto a Dell Studio XPS 16, bought through Dell's outlet store via eBay. Not cheap at £899, but a sight cheaper than it would have been bought direct from Dell, and perhaps half the price of an Apple equivalent if there were one.

It's a sixteen inch screen, which makes for a big laptop. But it's got a beautiful keyboard and the screen on this one is an expansive 1920 by 1080. Exactly the same resolution as my 24-inch desktop monitor as it happens. So what works there, works here.

At six pounds plus in weight I won't lug it everywhere. But for heavy writing and editing it seems pretty perfect. I'll be lugging it to Venice later this week to find out. Here is the beast below...

I've found out one thing already though. BBC iPlayer on it is pretty amazing. So I'll certainly be taking along some telly too.

[caption id="attachment_5853" align="alignnone" width="490" caption="Dell Studio XPS 16"]<a href="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/rimg0077.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-5853" title="Dell Studio XPS 16" src="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/rimg0077.jpg" alt="Dell Studio XPS 16" width="490" height="367" /></a>[/caption]