First off dont listen to Dingy Acer r shit might as well buy AMD chip set he will be saying next

seriously Buy Dell there cheap and yet get a good spec if she has the money get Intel Centrino chip as gives good battery life and and wireless as for support you must know someone in IT that can help if she has problems

if you have the bosh the dell Latitude D410 r good but about 700 squid

spec wise

intel centrino
20-40gb drive is fine if not playing games
at least 512MB memory (more if she is impatient)

the smaller the laptop generally the more expensive they are