I need to replace our desktop as Windows 7 is no longer supported and both my wife and I are over it taking up space where it is and not being able to move it around. So I am looking for a laptop but I really know nothing about computers anymore.
My wife would basically use it for internet, running her vinyl cutter, Zoom meetings printing school stuff and doing some other teaching stuff. I'd use it for my budget spreadsheet in Excel, creating DnD campaigns (most using internet and Word Processing), the internet and doing taxes. So basically it would need to have Office and be able to run it reasonably fast. Have a $750 budget. Don't want a Mac or Chromebook (had nothing but terrible experiences with those). I want something very reliable. What should I be looking at?
Lenovo tends to get top marks in reliability. HP and Dell both are hit or miss depending on whether you buy their corporate or personal product lines.
Whatever you look at, get the largest amount of RAM, an SSD hard drive and the newest processor family possible laptops are not easily upgraded (RAM and hard drives generally). With laptops, the larger the screen the better, but there's a trade-off with weight and battery life.
Refurbished Macbooks can and will run Windows quite nicely. You just have to pay for a Win10 license unfortunately. The aluminum body models have pretty great reliability and specs, but to each their own.
That said, you can get a free upgrade to Windows 10 from Microsoft for your existing system as a holdover.
Stefan (Forum Supporter) said:
Lenovo tends to get top marks in reliability. HP and Dell both are hit or miss depending on whether you buy their corporate or personal product lines.
Refurbished Macbooks can and will run Windows quite nicely. You just have to pay for a Win10 license unfortunately. The aluminum body models have pretty great reliability and specs, but to each their own.
That said, you can get a free upgrade to Windows 10 from Microsoft for your existing system as a holdover.
Lenovo was one of the brands I was going to avoid due to the laptop my wife got as a work laptop. It is slowest most crashey POS I have ever seen but it is from a public school so maybe it is just the cheapest thing they could buy?
Macs can run Windows reliably? Is that hard to setup? I am basically useless with going anything remotely IT related. Hate dealing with the things but if it is easy enough to do and reliable I'd consider it.
I just want to get rid of the current system cause it takes up more room then I like and I am tired of cleaning cat hair out of the fan (it sits on the floor in a room where the cat spends a lot of her time).
In reply to 93EXCivic :
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201468
Its supported by Apple via Bootcamp
Often the issues with the system crashing isn't the necessarily hardware, but the configuration of the operating system. Many public schools I know usually have a very little IT staff and mostly they are of the "learned it on Google" variety and just pull things out of the box and toss it out the door after some basic configs. Some even have standardized images, which is good, unless there is a issue in the image that never gets updated or fixed and now its replicated across the board.
Ensuring the software, drivers and BIOS/Firmware is up to date generally goes a long way to helping alleviate those types of issues or at least narrow them down.
Insufficient RAM will cause a large number of problems and that is a main source for money saving.
Every computer will have trouble at some point, just the nature of the beast. Avoiding Windows can help as it has a lot of issues due to its need to be backwards compatible, but if you're not comfortable installing something like Ubuntu or Mint Linux, then you're stuck with Apple and while they are far from perfect, they do control the hardware they run on and therefore they tend to be more reliable than comparable Windows systems.
In reply to Stefan (Forum Supporter) :
I tried to do a Linux install once. It failed and the laptop has sat in the closet for the past 4 years...
I need something that I turn on install a couple programs and never think about again until it is completely out of date because there is nothing a single thing I hate more in the entire world then trying to figure out why a computer isn't working right. Seriously I hate computers. The desktop that friends built for me is probably the nearest thing I have had to that but the limitations of a desktop are a little annoying.
A friend pointed out they offer Office for the MacOS so maybe it would make more sense to not even use Windows?
In reply to 93EXCivic :
They're decent machines, but keep in mind these were at the entry level end of the spectrum. Check if they have the 'butterfly keyboard' - can't remember when the Air got that, but they've got a 'orrible typing feel IMHO and are known to break expensively.
If you want a Mac, I'd check if you can get a 13" 2015 MacBook Pro (year/generation is important here) for the same money. I suspect you will be able to and IMHO those are much better machines.
If you are interested in Dell, Go to the www.delloutlet.com and go to the for work section. 5410 is the latest generation and for that price you can get a good middle of the road configuration (I5, 8Gb, 256GB SSD)
If you want to go that route, Just PM me and I'll shoot you a coupon.
Mike
BoxheadTim (Forum Supporter) said:
In reply to 93EXCivic :
They're decent machines, but keep in mind these were at the entry level end of the spectrum. Check if they have the 'butterfly keyboard' - can't remember when the Air got that, but they've got a 'orrible typing feel IMHO and are known to break expensively.
If you want a Mac, I'd check if you can get a 13" 2015 MacBook Pro (year/generation is important here) for the same money. I suspect you will be able to and IMHO those are much better machines.
Like this? https://www.macofalltrades.com/shop/apple-macbook-pro-13-inch-2-7ghz-core-i5-retina-early-2015-mf840ll-a-4-good-mbp-13-27-e15r-8512-c/
In reply to 93EXCivic :
That's the badger. I've seen them a tad cheaper than that depending on where you get them but that also depends on if you get a warranty with it or not.
BoxheadTim (Forum Supporter) said:
In reply to 93EXCivic :
That's the badger. I've seen them a tad cheaper than that depending on where you get them but that also depends on if you get a warranty with it or not.
I am having trouble convincing myself spending $800 on a five year old laptop is a great idea tbh.
In reply to 93EXCivic :
While there is that, I actually did exactly that and bought a refurb 2015 13" MacBook Pro for my own personal use last year. They are a considerable step up from the MacBook Air, but keep in mind that I'm a software engineer and probably have somewhat different requirements even for a personal laptop.
One reason these hold their value so well is because of the well documented expensive problems the later models had.
All that said, I would only spend the money if you really want an Apple device. There are more cost effective high quality laptops available if you "just" want a laptop. I do think the build quality of the Apple MacBooks of that age is very good and potentially better than the Lenovos I own - the MBP replaced a Lenovo that was playing up while I was away from home. That said, I suspect the Lenovos are also more repairable, although the 2015-and-older MBPs aren't that bad.
John Welsh (Moderate Supporter) said:
Last week's GRM chatter about buying a laptop
Here is a unit very similar to what I recently bought and wrote about in the above link. Refurb Lenovo T460 for $419
John Welsh (Moderate Supporter) said:
John Welsh (Moderate Supporter) said:
Last week's GRM chatter about buying a laptop
Here is a unit very similar to what I recently bought and wrote about in the above link. Refurb Lenovo T460 for $419
Ended up ordering this one after talking to some local friends.
Next question buying Office outright versus doing the whole 365 subscription thing? I really don't want to add another service I am paying for every month but it does have some really nice features.
93EXCivic said:
Next question buying Office outright versus doing the whole 365 subscription thing? I really don't want to add another service I am paying for every month but it does have some really nice features.
For 8 years I have run my simple business needs on clones of MS Office and that meets my simple needs for FREE. Specifically, https://www.libreoffice.org/
What do you do with Office? If you want to interact with people who have Office, get Office. Otherwise you can certainly get away with Libreoffice/Open Office/Google DocSheets/etc.
I find those other softwares provide 75% of Office functionality for 0% of the price.
Google Docs is so much nicer than Word though. Until you are a power user, then just use a TeX software instead.
If you want to do the ram upgrade, it is literally a 10 minute, plug and play job. If your machine is like mine they achieved 8gb with two slots of 4bg. I stole one 8gb slot from my old laptop and installed. This then got me 8gb + 4gb = 12gb.
My refurb machine came with DDR3 version of ram. If you want to buy one 8gb that will run about $30. Or, two 8gb for a total of 16gb will run you about $60. Amazon link. Can probably be found cheaper if willing to go with used (which should be perfectly fine.)
Link to video for replacing ram on T460
^If you are upgrading DDR ram, do so in pairs or else you will not get the double bandwidth effect.
In reply to ProDarwin :
Does this mean that my 4bg + 8gb is not operating as 12gb even though in the Settings -> About is telling me there is 12gb?
ProDarwin said:
What do you do with Office? If you want to interact with people who have Office, get Office. Otherwise you can certainly get away with Libreoffice/Open Office/Google DocSheets/etc.
I find those other softwares provide 75% of Office functionality for 0% of the price.
Google Docs is so much nicer than Word though. Until you are a power user, then just use a TeX software instead.
My wife would be using Office for work stuff since the laptop the school provides is beyond useless.
This old Dell E7270 has been pretty good the past few years. It's docked all of the time so the screen size doesn't matter. Only problem I've had with it was the battery swelled up in it last year that needed replaced.
In reply to John Welsh (Moderate Supporter) :
You are getting the whole 12, it is slower than if you had 2 8 sticks in the computer.
