Is a 8GB Surface Laptop 3 good enough for Informatics ed?

[NeuraCode]

Hi,

 

So I'm doing computer science / informatics and I really like the Surface Laptop 3. But unfortunately, the 16GB start way above my budget. I can afford the 8GB Model. So my question is if I can get through college with only 8GB of RAM

 

If you happen to have other recommendations: I am from the Netherlands and my budget is €1200. I'm willing to go slightly up if I really like it. 

 

What I'll be using

• Typically 4-8 Chrome tabs
• Visual studio / Visual Studio Code
• Android Studio
• Atom (light front-end dev) 
• PhpMyAdmin for light database structures 
• Spotify always runs on the background

Thank you for helping out 

[aaradorn]

Is there a specific reason you are focussing on surface 3 laptops? I mean, they look good but are pretty overpriced.

[samcool55]

I wouldn't risk it.

I started college with an 8GB laptop and it worked fine, for 1 year.

Second year, had to get a different laptop because mine couldn't be upgraded to 16GB and 8GB was just not enough anymore. It solved a lot of problems for me and never had issues for the rest of my education. (well, i did, but those were my fault, not the laptop)

 

Both were second hand btw. don't know if that matters?

[NeuraCode]

2 minutes ago, aaradorn said:

Is there a specific reason you are focussing on surface 3 laptops? I mean, they look good but are pretty overpriced.

I like the display, comfort, looks etc. I don't care too much about performance because I won't use most of the high spec benefits. So I rather have an aesthetically pleasing one. 

[Aniallation]

I agree with Surface laptops not being particularly the best you can get for the price, especially since the whole form factor schtick of Surface is gone in the laptop. 

 

I have an Acer Swift 3 and it has been by far the best overall laptop I've owned especially after considering the value. They're releasing a new one soon with Ryzen 4000 series chip - I'd definitely check it out.

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

8 minutes ago, NeuraCode said:

Hi,

 

So I'm doing computer science / informatics and I really like the Surface Laptop 3. But unfortunately, the 16GB start way above my budget. I can afford the 8GB Model. So my question is if I can get through college with only 8GB of RAM

 

What I'll be using

• Typically 4-8 Chrome tabs
• Visual studio / Visual Studio Code
• Android Studio
• Atom (light front-end dev) 
• PhpMyAdmin for light database structures 
• Spotify always runs on the background

Thank you for helping out 

For regular computing science, 8GB would be okay. And I mean... just okay. You might run into limitations here and there but a good CS department in my opinion should have a remote server you can use for running very demanding test scripts, etc. I'm in my 5th year and I'm still using a laptop with 8GB of RAM. That being said, because you're doing informatics, I would air on the side of caution and get something that you can add more memory to down the road. 

[NeuraCode]

2 minutes ago, samcool55 said:

I wouldn't risk it.

I started college with an 8GB laptop and it worked fine, for 1 year.

Second year, had to get a different laptop because mine couldn't be upgraded to 16GB and 8GB was just not enough anymore. It solved a lot of problems for me and never had issues for the rest of my education. (well, i did, but those were my fault, not the laptop)

 

Both were second hand btw. don't know if that matters?

What do you use to get well over 8GB?

[NeuraCode]

1 minute ago, Aniallation said:

I agree with Surface laptops not being particularly the best you can get for the price, especially since the whole form factor schtick of Surface is gone in the laptop. 

 

I have an Acer Swift 3 and it has been by far the best overall laptop I've owned especially after considering the value. They're releasing a new one soon with Ryzen 4000 series chip - I'd definitely check it out.

I have had my eyes on the 8 core Swift 3 initially but the screen has terrible color accuracy and the nits level is really low. I'm looking for a high res gloss display with at least 400 nits. I really won't use the benefits that high core count will give me so I rather spend my money on aesthetics and portability. 

[aaradorn]

Take a look at this laptop. I think it looks pretty nice

 

Asus TUF Gaming A15 FX506II-AL059T

 

It's cheaper and probably a lot faster as well.

[NeuraCode]

Just now, aaradorn said:

Take a look at this laptop. I think it looks pretty nice

 

Asus TUF Gaming A15 FX506II-AL059T

 

It's cheaper and probably a lot faster as well.

Thanks for the recommendation I don't care about gaming though. I'm only interested in slim ultrabooks 

[Aniallation]

40 minutes ago, aaradorn said:

Take a look at this laptop. I think it looks pretty nice

 

Asus TUF Gaming A15 FX506II-AL059T

 

It's cheaper and probably a lot faster as well.

Actually just got one the other week for the miss to do her photo and video editing on. It's a great laptop for if you need the power and is light for a gaming laptop, but if you don't, it's pretty hefty to lug around all that extra weight you won't take advantage of. The charging brick is impressively small though.

[samcool55]

1 hour ago, NeuraCode said:

What do you use to get well over 8GB?

Virtualization, running my own phpmyadmin and apache, stuff like that.

[xc3ll]

Hi,

 

8GB should be sufficient for the tasks you mentioned.

 

I've recently bought a Surface Laptop 3. I wanted to get the new XPS 13, after my surface pro 3 died, but then I've found a deal on the base Surface Laptop 3 for 700 Eur. Even though I'm not particularly happy with the mediocre hardware/software-integration on microsoft devices (they all have random issues, which never get patched), it was a compelling value. Especially since you can upgrade the SSD yourself without leaving any marks (warranty!).

 

I was concerned about the 8 GB of RAM as well, especially for development, but it has not been an issue for me so far. You cannot really host any VMs, but then again, the new intel chips might be fast, but they also reach their thermal limit pretty quickly on such thin devices.

 

Value-wise I would strongly recomment the base model with an DIY SSD-Upgrade, if you are ok with the alcantra finish (which is actually kind of nice to rest your hands on).

[NeuraCode]

On 5/30/2020 at 9:37 PM, xc3ll said:

Hi,

 

8GB should be sufficient for the tasks you mentioned.

 

I've recently bought a Surface Laptop 3. I wanted to get the new XPS 13, after my surface pro 3 died, but then I've found a deal on the base Surface Laptop 3 for 700 Eur. Even though I'm not particularly happy with the mediocre hardware/software-integration on microsoft devices (they all have random issues, which never get patched), it was a compelling value. Especially since you can upgrade the SSD yourself without leaving any marks (warranty!).

 

I was concerned about the 8 GB of RAM as well, especially for development, but it has not been an issue for me so far. You cannot really host any VMs, but then again, the new intel chips might be fast, but they also reach their thermal limit pretty quickly on such thin devices.

 

Value-wise I would strongly recomment the base model with an DIY SSD-Upgrade, if you are ok with the alcantra finish (which is actually kind of nice to rest your hands on).

What issues are you facing? I need to do my exams on those machines so if it's going to hinder my exams I can't buy it