New Laptops for College

Kokoleka

Hi, we're looking for some laptops for college use, and need to know what kind of specs to look for in a well-rounded computer(we don't need anything special).
We did find one that we liked, maybe we could use it as a "base" to start from, spec-wise, and y'all could tell us what you think about it(pros, cons, and such).

You can find it here(hope this link works):
<a>http://www.dell.com/us/p/inspiron-15r-5537/pd?oc=fncwu178h&model_id=inspiron-15r-5537#overrides=fncwu178h:</a>

So, what do you think? Is this a good choice? If not, what(if anything) should we be looking for?
Thanks for your help in advance!

Edit: Looks like the link didn't work. Could anyone instruct us how to make a link? That would be super. Thanks!

shwaip

what's your major?

what do you want to do with the pc?

do you have a desktop?

Kokoleka

The computers are for me and my brother; he has not decided on a major yet. I have a small interest in computer sciences, but may switch (if I do get into that, however, I would like a good entry-level computer).

Aside from school, I would like use it for gaming (like WoW, LotRO; Diablo, nothing extremely taxing). Aside from that, just using Word doc., and playing music is about it.

We do have a desktop, but it is quite old (but still works good though). It has CD/DVD drives ; if you need to know anything else about it, let us know :)

Thanks for your help!

Tushon

for the link, it has to do with the new "user" ranking system that doesn't let people below a certain rank post links to combat spammers. This affects stuff like auto-linking youtube videos. New plug-in that Lincoln wrote and is working on. I've been out of the laptop game for a while, so other people will probably have better advice. Your GPU is going to be the biggest performance factor in games, and I, personally, will not go back to using computers without an SSD.

midga

I recommend looking at a ThinkPad for longevity and functionality.

Straight_Man

You will need to be careful what GPU you get in your ThinkPad, though. I have a great for everything EXCEPT gaming W520. the graphics a game would use are the built-on-CPU graphics unless you use an external monitor, and then mine offers a Nvidia Quadro GPU. the Quadros were NOT made for gaming and are NOT intended for gaming. They are GREAT for photo editing and general NON-gaming use.

drasnor

The current-gen ThinkPad T-series has optional consumer-grade discrete graphics. Any Ultrabook (Intel classification) with discrete graphics is going to be alright. If the display is suitably low-res, the integrated graphics in 4th gen Intel chips is not bad.

Kokoleka

Hello all! Been reading all of your replies, and researching some more, and got it narrowed down a bit (all your posts are very much appreciated also!).

I had heard about SSDs and heard that they were VERY good; if it is possible, we will try to look into them. Our current budget is probably 1k or less, so we'll have to see what we can swing. If we do go with one though, what would you recommend as the minimum storage size? For an HDD we've decided no less than at least 500GB, but we probably don't need more than 1TB.

We looked into ThinkPads, and they don't quite seem like what we are looking for. They look like great laptops, but seems like they could be a bit more than what we need. Are they more for business? We are planning on getting a Dell, unless something better is suggested or comes up.

For the CPU, we had a few questions. When considering 3rd and 4th gen., which would be better for a computer that you want to last longest? Is 4th gen. that much better than 3rd? We also wondered if that was the case between i5 and i7. We know we at least want an i5, but we're not sure if we should just go ahead and get an i7, or if it was really that much better. If the way I explained that is confusing, please let me know; I'm still trying to learn what all of this means and how to word it (but I am learning!).

Now, I know this is a very opinionated subject, but we just aren't sure which one to invest in (and you guys' opinions would help a lot). Between Windows 7 and 8, which would you say would work best for this? We have been using XP ever since it came out, and I am REALLY not excited about changing; I am hearing 8 is even more different than 7 (which I have tried and am learning to use). Is this something we could pick purely based on preference, or does one of them actually work better? We were considering touch-screens, but that isn't something I'm really attached to.

Concerning RAM, we think we shouldn't go under 6GB. Is this a good number to start with, or should we look at getting at least 8GB? Thanks! :)

Tushon

Addressing in sections:

You can get a lot of the benefits of SSD and the storage size of a normal drive with something similar to the Seagate Momentus XT which @primesuspect reviewed somewhere in the past. That's a 500GB with a SSD cache onboard and there are other sizes available.

Thinkpads are generally aimed at business users, and are "generally" more reliable because of it. Dell is fine for most people.

3rd or 4th is probably negligible for your purposes. i5 vs i7 is 2 physical cores with hyperthreading, making it appear and perform as a 4-core processor vs 4 physical cores with HT, making it appear at 8 cores. For your stated purposes, the price tag that comes with the i7 is probably not worth it. I guess from a longevity perspective, getting the latest gen might be best, so a 4th gen i5 is my recommendation. Lower power consumption = nice plus for laptops

Windows 8 is kinda like Windows Vista. Some people hate it, other people love. It's microsoft trying to force people to get used to touch based screens, but it's for laptops ... which, for the most part, do not get touchscreens. Several people here have used it and have no problem with it, others hated it and stuck with Windows 7. There are some other nominal differences, but you can basically think of the touch screen being the key difference.

6GB+ of RAM is a good thing for longevity. It's almost always less expensive to upgrade RAM/HDD separately, but then you have deal with a different warranty, etc. That's a decision you'll have to make, but I personally went for 8GB and was very happy for a while. 16 now, but I frequently have multiple clients for very memory intensive game open, plus a million Chrome tabs and Steam, etc.


EDIT:

That particular laptop that you linked will have a hard time playing games on any decent resolution. You'll need to select one with something other than just Intel HD 4000 graphics. This one, for example, comes with a GT 630M (about normal for the "step up" and a 500GB/32GB SSD combo, 8GB of RAM, etc

Straight_Man

I would, myself, specify a couple desktops for your price range. Most laptops do not take more than one HD unless you sacrifice a DVD drive. So, an SSD would need to be 500 GB ideally in a laptop, and though that would WORK in most laptops, it would be $400.00 or more depending on brand for a 400-500 GB SSD. The ThinkPad has a removable DVD, but the adapter they sell for a HD is shoddy in design. Also, Thinkpads with dual HD or mSSD and HD are about $1,500 or more dollars. BUT, you can get 3-4 Year extended warranties for them directly from Lenovo for about $300.00 extra.

Depends on how long you want a laptop to last. I would say 800-1000 EACH is likely for a laptop durable enough for college use and to last all through college of 4 years. If you are going to go to community college and plan to work and save money for a better laptop in say 2 years, I would say what Tushon suggested instead overall (I prefer Windows 7 to learning Windows 8 but I am old-fashioned enough to think that Windows 7 as of right now supports more software than does Windows 8-- the laptop Tushon linked to is a Windows 8 laptop and for tech reasons I would NOT try even to put Windows 7 from anyone but Dell on it). College kids who use laptops to the full tend to be rough on them. So an extended warranty from Dell or Lenovo would be useful-- preferably an on-site service warranty.

drasnor

Get Windows 7 if you intend to use it for anything other than web browsing. Windows 8 is total garbage for productivity. The Metro UI doesn't let you have two applications open in the same view which is a critical failure for most work scenarios. you have to switch to desktop view for this functionality and it's a crippled version of what's in Windows 7. Honestly though, if your computer science college is anything like the one where I went to school it is only a matter of time before you'll be using Linux.

Tushon

(I basically agree with that assessment of Windows 7 ... I have a copy of 8 for knowledge purposes)

ardichoke

Also, ditto on the Linux note. Honestly, I'd be pretty wary of any university whose Computer Science program revolved around Windows. If you're going for CS, you might just want to skip Windows entirely and just get a Linux laptop from https://www.system76.com/ (or maybe http://zareason.com/).

Then build a cheap desktop for your gaming needs if you feel so compelled. That's more or less what I ended up doing the last couple years in college (Linux on my laptop for work, Windows on my desktop for play). The good news is, Steam is running well on Linux these days and the Steam Linux game catalog is expanding rapidly.

Kokoleka

Thanks so much for all the wisdom!

With all your help we put together a configuration and went to the dell site to find it. Did not find it pre-built, went to chat with them and found that we didn't have options to change the configuration. The agent kept trying to steer us to Alienware; guess that's the only kind they sell that have options. I'm afraid that will put us way out of our budget and would be overkill.

Here's the configuration we decided on:
4th generation i5 processor
8gb of RAM
hdd 500gb 7200rpm
Windows 7
discrete GPU
15" screen (this isn't a have-to, but it would be nice).

We found a couple of laptops that were GREAT, except for the fact there was either an Integrated GPU or it had Windows 8. We were also disappointed to find out that 4th gen. processors are not compatible with Windows 7; is this true? We were also told they cannot add another GPU except on their Alienware systems (I don't remember it being this way a while back...but I could be wrong...).

This might be a bit of a stupid question, but can you add RAM or another GPU to a laptop? I seem to remember someone telling me you either cannot add anything to a laptop, or it is very hard...

This was one we found that is close, but is lacking 4th gen. and 8GB of RAM. Are we going in the right direction?
http://www.dell.com/us/p/xps-15-l521x/pd?oc=dncwx15bw7&model_id=xps-15-l521x

Thanks for bearing with us on this!

Also, the Linux idea is really great, but I am not *positive* about my major yet. I have had NO classes on computers whatsoever, but it sounds like a field I might like. If that does turn out to be my major, I will switch later :)

Tushon

Yeah, the one you linked should be good. They are not correct about 4th gen compatibility, but perhaps in their environment, they choose not to offer 4th-gen i# with Windows 7 on the same machine. Likewise, they may choose not to offer video card choices on different machines where they could previously (probably a cost-cutting measure ... less customization = lower cost). What you linked should be good.

Keep in mind that the performance/$ is vastly better on desktops and you could think about putting one together in the future .We'll be here

Straight_Man

The only bone I will pick about the one you linked is this:

It comes with Win 8 and no touch screen. Windows 8 was made for touchscreens.

Tushon

Straight_Man said:

The only bone I will pick about the one you linked is this:

It comes with Win 8 and no touch screen. Windows 8 was made for touchscreens.

The one that @Kokoleka linked in the most recent post comes with Windows 7 and can optionally be changed to Windows 8

Straight_Man

Um, when I went there, it said windows 8, my mistake perhaps, but.....

EDIT: It says Windows 8 at top left of page, but in details list it says with Windows 7 home premium 64bit. The XPS series can take more RAM (memory) easily after the fact, also (that subseries has had RAM available from Crucial for about 5-7 years). I would get 2 year enhanced support with it also.

HD is good, the mSATA is high speed buffer used for reading and possibly writing. It is a mini-SSD equivalent.

RAM from Crucial is here:

http://www.crucial.com/store/listparts.aspx?model=XPS 15 (L521X)&amp;Cat=RAM

They guarantee compatibility (I used the RAM configurator to get this page listing) with a refund if it does not work.

Tushon

@kokoleka, do keep in mind the reviews though. Dell has had some longer term issues with some of their recent hardware regarding wireless connectivity.

Kokoleka

Hi all!

So, we found another laptop which looks close to what we need. What do you guys think?:

http://www.dell.com/us/p/inspiron-15r-se-7520/pd?oc=dncwm12s7&model_id=inspiron-15r-se-7520#overrides=dncwm12s7:

How does this compare to the XPS? We also looked up the connectivity issues, and they are still having them (it sounds like they tried to fix it, but it didn't work).

Tushon

Pretty solid choice, as far as I can tell. The graphics card for that one is also better than the GT 630M according to a couple random google sites.

Straight_Man

Looks like the best, except for a slow HD (typical cost controlling short cut speed, 5400 RPM instead of 7200). Later, you should be able to get the laptop an SSD though.

Kokoleka

We are most likely going to get the Inspiron and change out the HD later if we need to as suggested above. As luck would have it, Dell is out of stock right now (and since it was Windows 7, we aren't sure if it is coming back or not) but we did find the exact same thing on ebay.

It has a warranty, and is refurbished, but is much cheaper than from Dell (it also comes with 1 year of support from Dell). That being said, we have bought things off of ebay before and know you have to be careful with what you get, but we have no experience buying electronics off of there.

What do you guys think? Is it a good idea?

drasnor

No. Laptop scams are the oldest scams on eBay.

Kokoleka

Any way to tell if an auction is legitimate or not? I can link it here if it's worth looking further into; the problem is that I don't think Dell will be re-stocking this computer anymore, so Ebay or Amazon are two other places we thought to look. Are there enough legitimate sellers to risk buying?

drasnor

I can't answer that for you. Personally, I tend to be risk averse with expensive purchases and the buying goods that might or might not be legit, might or might not show up, and certainly will be provided without guarantee or warranty is unappealing. The tremendous hassle of resolving that situation heavily weights toward buying from an established vendor with a good resellerratings profile. You might hit up a local computer secondhand store in your area as an alternative.

Kokoleka

Hello all!
Thanks again for the feedback; my parents talked about it, and went ahead and bought them. They have been using Ebay for years, and it is possible to find legitimate deals (or at least with what we've bought, prior) as long as you make sure of your sources. If it does turn sour (here's to hoping it won't, lol) Ebay has a Buyer Protection Plan in place, so we aren't stuck. My Mom checked into many other places that sold these laptops, and none of them carry Windows 7 anymore, which was pretty much a deal-breaker. Dell will not give us a straight answer on if they are even planning to carry them anymore.

Thanks for all of your help in choosing these computers also; we have certainly learned a lot, and the time you give to help people like us is very much appreciated! When we start building a desktop (which should be much more flexible and interesting) we will certainly come back to you guys for advice :)

Straight_Man

Welcome, good luck with the Ebay deal. I tend to also buy not from Ebay, but to each their own.