Recommendations for laptop for competitive programming

[HARRIBO]

I am looking to buy a laptop for competitive programming. So things such as online judge problems and contest such as CCC. I want to bring this laptop to class and back, and maybe in the future do some machine learning projects. The two laptops I am considering are...

https://www.bestbuy.ca/en-ca/product/hp-15-6-gaming-laptop-black-amd-ryzen-5-3550h-256gb-ssd-8gb-ram-nvidia-geforce-gtx-1050-win-10/13893448

Or

https://www.bestbuy.ca/en-ca/product/acer-14-laptop-intel-core-i5-8265u-512gb-ssd-8gb-ram-windows-10/13642532

What would you recommend?

Thank you

[kelvinhall05]

Gaming laptop for programming...hah

 

 

Get a Thinkpad. If you want something thin and light X1, X1 Carbon, or X1 Extreme (from cheapest to most expensive). If you want something with lots of IO, get an X-series, and if you want something with lots of IO but bigger, get a T-series. If you want an X1 but with slightly more IO, get a T(s)-series.

[HARRIBO]

Thank you for the response, but out of those two laptops, which would you recommend. I kind of need it asap lol. Thank you. 

[TallTechGuyTTG]

Got to be honest... I have always hated HP computers.... but out of the two laptops get the HP, it's got a higher clock speed and actually has a graphics card in it. Where as the Intel clock speed is way lower in terms of digits and it's running off of the CPU's integrated graphics. 

 

[HARRIBO]

@TallTechGuyTTG thank you for the response. Which laptop would you say has the better cpu, since I heard programming is mainly off of cpu strength. Thank you

[TallTechGuyTTG]

100% the HP laptop. I just benchmarked them against each other - why it took so long to reply... effectively they are very very similar and while the image does show the overclocking speed as higher on the acer or the intel CPU... the fact that the AMD processor in the HP laptop is much newer, and it has far better graphics capability and is like 50 dollars cheaper than the acer is more than enough reason to get the HP. And it has a bigger screen than the Acer laptop. The Acer/Intel is on the left, and the AMD/HP is on the right. 

[TallTechGuyTTG]

What you want to see on the image is the workstation as far as your usage will go... that extra 6% on the right with the AMD/HP laptop is what you are going to want when programming. 

[HARRIBO]

@TallTechGuyTTG ah I see, thank you so very much. I'm gonna pick it up at best buy now while the black Friday deals are still on. Thank you

[TallTechGuyTTG]

HEY BEST BUY DOES PRICE MATCHES AND I JUST CHECKED ON AMAZON... THE SAME PC IS 600 ON AMAZON! See if they will do a price match for you at best buy... you can save a bit more money! They are really particular about that kind of stuff but it's worth a shot. There are several on Amazon... if you can show that it can be shipped and sold from amazon they will drop the price to match it on Amazon. 

[HARRIBO]

@TallTechGuyTTG just picked up the laptop and is working like a charm, thanks man.