I need help with choosing my laptop. I was doing my research and I can’t decide which to choose. Since I don’t have experience with programing, I am clueless and do not really know what is important to look for as a starting programmer. I am looking for a long term investment. I am in a dilemma whether i should invest into high-cost piece of tech.
My requirements for laptop:
Coding usage
web-browsing
life-long battery
classic style (not 360°, not touch screen)
not mac
Here are my key questions:
Do I really need to look for 8h battery life?
Is 15,6" display needed for programing?.. rather than 14"
In your opinion, is +1000$ worth it in the end of the day (meaning years)?
I am using a Hp laptop with a 15 inch screen. HP LAPTOP UNDER 600
I got good battery life out of it at about 50% more than 4 hours. I did just a few weeks ago upgrade to a SSD drive and the extra power savings added about 15% battery life.
You dont want to code for 8 hours on a 15 inch screen if you can help it. I go about 2 2 hr sessions if I am away from a power source and that still gives me enough juice to watch a movie on break or stream some Netflix.
It is light and that is good. I previously had a Gaming Laptop that had a huge nearly 18 inch screen. Big battery and was just a monster and removed the need for a desktop but it cost 3 times as much and to do coding and research and light entertainment it was overkill and a JOB to carry around.
You can get a great laptop for about 500-600 and for the needs you are listing above. The batteries are cheap enough and light enough if your worried about power just get a second battery for about $25-$35.
Warning, this class of computer seems pretty laggy once you add office and other fav software you have collected over the years. You can turn the 1TB drive into a portable DATA drive and replace it with a 240GB SSD
I dont hord movies etc on my SSD so it has tons of free space and it so fast it feels very much like a 1500+ computer for day to day use.
Hope this helps.
I have Acer Aspire E 15 E5-575G-57D4 which have 12 hours battery life and as I am a programmer and web designer myself, this Lappy works like a charm for me. The best bit is that it’s actually to have a gaming laptop under $500 and half of the budget which you’ve specified. Here is the list of such gaming laptops https://www.reviewsdir.com/best-gaming-laptops-under-500/. I would suggest you go for it.
Personally I like to work with a an external full keyboard with standard layout, a mouse and a big screen (24 inch).
If I would work a lot from the same place (home/office) I would invest in a bigger standalone screen (22"-24") and connect my laptop to it. If you have bigger additional screen, you could get a 14" laptop that should be lighter.
I would check these requirements:
keyboard layout that I like. 15" laptops can have the numpad too. Laptop keyboard have sometimes very strange layouts.
SSD, no HDD. Min 256GB.
at least 8 GB RAM (on some laptops you can extend, on some you don’t, the RAM may be even soldered)
display (reflective or mate?)
battery. Some batteries are soldered so you can’t user replace them. Some have internal and external batteries. Do you want to replace it after a couple of years if it can not hold that long?
do you plan to use the laptop on your lap? I’ve seen a lot of laptops that try to suck in air from below, so if you have it on your lap you would block the air vents and it will overheat easier.
weight
CPU - don’t get the lowest one possible, but don’t invest too much either.
I definitely have to recommend a Thinkpad. They’re so cheap, but they’re TANKS, built to last years, and they’re easy to repair. I just got a refurbished Thinkpad T410 for $130, and I couldn’t be happier.
I also purchased a new laptop recently. I only use it for programming. I wanted the best price for the highest value.
Initially, I wanted to buy IBM but read about tracking device scandal that IBM faced. Instead I purchased Dell because I got it with a discount and extra warranty.
I wanted fast so went for SSD hard drive, i7 processor, 8GB RAM.
I didn’t go for crazy graphic card because I don’t play video games but you should if you are a gamer.
Also, I scandalously erased windows 10 and replaced it with Linux Mint Cinnamon.
Personally I went with Thinkpads and I will never buy another laptop.
1)They are very robust and reliable
2)You can find them very cheap used. That’s because they are used in a corporate environment and they sell them in bulk for a low price.
