r/SuggestALaptop

hi so I'm starting uni in September and looking for laptops on techbazaar, and I basically just have 2 questions, are laptops really going yo be necessary for like first sem, and what laptop would be best for bba under 100k

now I was thinking a thinkpad, specifically lenovo T490 but I'm not too sure, just any guidance would help, thanks

I am a college student majoring in English looking for a laptop to use for school and life in general. I am fine with renewed, refurbished, and used laptops.

Country: United States.

State: California

Budget: $250 USD

Any Screen Size

Weight Limit: Nothing over 4 pounds

Purpose: School and general use

Any Form factor

Intended usage: To do school work while on campus, write essays, watch YouTube videos, and play Roblox.

Desired battery life: 5+ hours

Most to least important: Performance, battery life, weight, screen size, form factor.

I have been looking at:

Lenovo 20L ThinkPad T480

Acer Chromebook 315

Asus Chromebook Cx15

Other needs/Requirements:

- HAS NO AI BUILT INTO IT IN ANY SHAPE OR FORM WHATSOEVER

- Won't lag with multiple tabs open

- Fans aren't super noisy when using

- Will allow me to use Linux as my operating system

If anyone has any other suggestions for laptops, please give those as well. Thank you :)

Total Budget: $600 ish

Used/refurbished: preferably not

How important is weight and thinness to you? not super important.

Do you have a preferred screen size? bigger is better.

Are you doing any CAD/video editing/photo editing/gaming? List which programs/games you desire to run:

-basic office programs like Google docs/word, quick books etc

Brands: not a Mac, person at all but open to any other brand.

Anything else?: just need something basic for my mom, nothing too fancy and not a touch screen if at all possible.

My college professors told us to code in linux. Not in windows, not in MacOS, but linux. (God knows for whatever reason)

Everybody is confused as to what to do.

I was planning to buy MacBook Air M5 but some of the seniors said linux won't run properly in it, and it's not so good for coding.

So shd I go for macbook air m5 or some other windows laptop? Please suggest😭

Please help me decide between these 2 laptops (unless you can recommend others):

IdeaPad: $1499 (no tax)
Intel Core Ultra 9 285H
RTX 5050 (8Gb GDDR7)
32Gb ram 8400
1TB
16” 2.8k OLED 500 nits

Legion 5: $1999 (plus tax)
Ryzen AI9 465
RTX 5070 (12Gb GDDR7)
32Gb ram 5600
1TB
15.3” OLED

I use it for CAD, small assemblies (Autodesk Inventor)

Thanks!

Hi y"all

I'm considering replacing my 2014 MacBook air. Its still working, mostly fine but im not sure how much longer that will hold true and I know Ramageddon will push up prices... The air has 128GB storage and an i5 processpr with 5GB ram, so most things will be an upgrade!

What i like about the Air is the longevity/build quality, portability, and that it has old USB (for all my peripherals) and an SD card reader for my camera. Ohh and its intel based, so runs linux happily (unlike the new soicone chip macs). I'm willing to pay more to achieve longevity, but open to a wide price range.

LAPTOP QUESTIONNAIRE

Country

UK (don'tmind shipping from overseas).

Budget

£2000 (upper limit. Ideally sub £600)

Are you open to refurbs/used options?

Yes. Indeed i might prefer it.

Screen size

13" (12 or 14 ok but 13 is the sweet spot)

Weight limit

~1KG ideally

Purpose

General purpose

Form factor

Standard/Clamshell

Intended usage

Web browsing (firefox), emails, rss, office applications (libre office), photo management (gimp, darktable, digikam etc), basic audio and video management (ripping, playback, some streaming bust mostly I use my TV for that), lightweight programming amd data analysis (R/RStudio, Python), vintage gaming (platformers, text based - i mostly game on switch)

Desired battery life

4hrs+

Please list, in order of most important to least important, the priority between Size, Weight, Performance, Battery life

Weight, size, battery life, performance (lets be honest, most things will be an improvement)

Info/Requirements

Plays nice with linux (currently mint, but I'll probably try something new). 2+ old style USB ports and at least one USB C (I know I need to move eventually, but currentlyall my peripherals, external drives etc, use the old USB standard). An SD card slot would be brilliant, and ideally an HDMI port (though that could be the firat thing to move to USB C as thats a fairly straightforward cable swap - if i do use USB-C for the monitor, i guess I'd want at least 2 USB-C ports, with one offering charging).

Guys , I want to buy laptop under 60 to 70k , pls suggest me best laptops .

Country
United States

Budget
$1000-1500 USD

Are you open to refurbs/used options?
No

Screen size
13”+ (prefer larger)

Weight limit
Any

Purpose
Graduate school and personal/general purpose. Im working on a masters in information science

Form factor
Standard clamshell - don’t need touch/2in1/tablet/pen

Intended usage
Basic office/school things like browser with 10+ tabs, email, word/excel, pdfs, Calibre (digital library), etc.

Possibly some coding and archive work for classes

Desired battery life
Any - performance/size more important than battery life

Please list, in order of most important to least important, the priority between Size, Weight, Performance, Battery life
Performance, Size, Battery Life, Weight

Info/Requirements
I REALLY want a MacBook Air, but thought there might be something better for the price. I prefer mac over pc but I’m open to whatever is best. I want it to last.

I have a Dell Latitude 3330 13.3 inch screen 8gb ram 256 gb ssd. I find it to be slow and clunky and the screen too small.

I read a ton of reviews on finding a laptop suited for me and many came through this community board. So, thank you all for your comments. I figured I'd give some quick feedback if anyone else is looking for a similar computer.

• This is used for personal use at home. Mostly browsing the web and making spreadsheets. We do code in colab and mess around with different AI platforms. Don't use the PC for gaming.
• Bought 16GB of RAM. Really way more than I needed unless you really are a gamer. I have this connected to 2 other screens. So I had on my 3 screens - the Bears pre-season game on yesterday, running some python script for stock screening and had websites like realtor.com up that that requires a lot of processing b/c of the amount of maps and pictures it loads. All worked smoothly and I didn't hear the fan kick on at all. NO NOISE.
• The one thing I was reading with HP and OmniBooks is it is has hinge problems (funny comment I read was that is what HP stands for...."hinge problems"). But I also read that is not for the X version. On this version, the hinges seem like they are built well. We will find out over time as this is a very big screen.
• I really thought I was going to go for the XPS 14 with similar specs (but obviously smaller screen), but everything kept pointing me to this direction. With exception the XPS certainly looks more elegant.
• Anyway, I started this process and thought for sure a Dell, maybe Acer or Lenova for my PC needs. But after 3 hours of researching it, I changed my opinion and can't believe I bought an HP b/c I never had. I just retired a Surface Pro and I have invested in a few of those in the past. But, I can say this HP is impressive so far. It does list for 1,500...but you can find it for $900 ($600 off) at best buy right now.
• Finally with that price reduction and some other back to school sales, I did take the specs and run though both chatgpt and gemini and both pointed to this one across a multitude of factors. But, for the current price, it really tipped it in HP's value.

So far - a very happy HP client.

New to the laptop world and I have a PC I rarely use and decided a laptop would fit my current circumstances better.

Country
Australia
Budget
$1500-$2500AUD $1000USD-$1700USD
Are you open to refurbs/used options?
No
Screen size
14", 15", 16"
Weight limit
1kg - 2kg
Purpose
Everyday use, studying, video editing
Form factor
Regular Laptop
Intended usage
Davinci resolve for video editing would probably be my highest priority and with gaming just basic indie games like hollow knight since I don’t play games that much.
Desired battery life
8-10
Please list, in order of most important to least important, the priority between Size, Weight, Performance, Battery life
Performance, weight, battery life, size.

**Country**
United States

**Budget**
$750 USD

**Are you open to refurbs/used options?**
Absolutely i am

**Screen size**
14+

**Weight limit**
Any

**Purpose**
Light Gaming (Roblox, Minecraft, Valorant, Fall Guys)

**Form factor**
Standard clamshell

**Intended usage**
Light Gaming, Social Media (Discord/Spotify)

**Desired battery life**
Any - performance/size is more important than battery life

**Please list, in order of most important to least important, the priority between Size, Weight, Performance, Battery life**
Performance, Size, Battery Life, Weight

**Info/Requirements**
I REALLY want a gaming laptop that can fulfill my tasks. I prefer 16GB/512SSD, or atleast the one that can fulfill my tasks.

Right now im using an Xbox series S and a Chromebook Lenovo duet 11 for Minecraft Java so not that good.

Hi everyone, my uncle broke my 2020 MacBook Air.. I’m looking to see if I can get another one. Going to be using this for work & grad school. Healthcare documentation etc

Country: USA

Price: 500-700

Refurb or brand new

Size: 13+ screen size

Weight: Any weight limit

Just want a reliable all rounder where I can do school work and watch shows

Just standard regular laptop
 
Just want to be able to use SPSS, docs, etc. want to be on par as my old laptop!

 Good battery life
 
Performance, battery life, weight

 

Hi, I’m a mechanical engineer in the us and i need a laptop that can last me 4 years at least and my budget is 1700$ and under
Sadly i didn’t find any of the specs i found in my budget even though i don’t mind open boxes or lightly used ones
The specs i want is,
32gb ram (if theres any other student that can confirm 16gb is enough then i don’t mind it)
A dedicated gpu
an amd cpu since they’re more efficient i assume?
And great battery life?
Any screen size if its light
Idk if theres any deals coming soon but sadly i don’t have much time left since i start college at the 25th of this month

And kinda of a weird question why does everyone hate remote accessing to their personal pc or the college computers lab? Because i have a strong gaming pc and been thinking about getting a macbook but i never see anyone mention this

I would appreciate any suggestion i am really lost

Currently using Lenovo yoga 7 with 8gb RAM & 512gb storage, AMD Ryzen 5 (2023)
it is getting very laggy while working and having multiple tabs open, I know I need at least 16gb of RAM. Not sure about processor speed.

LAPTOP QUESTIONNAIRE

• Country

USA

• Budget

Prefer to spend $1200 or less

• Are you open to refurbs/used options?

I'd prefer new

• Screen size

15-16in

• Weight limit

Doesn't matter

• Purpose

Work at home

• Form factor

Normal laptop

• Intended usage

Work

• Desired battery life

4+ hours of battery life

• Please list, in order of most important to least important, the priority between Size, Weight, Performance, Battery life

performance, size, weight, battery life

• Info/Requirements
• Needs to be able to handle multiple excel spreadsheets open, adobe reader, work programs, multiple tabs open on web browser