Laptop for College (Software Develepment) Questions

[Joey__]

Should I go hexa/octo core or is quad enough?
Should I settle for 1080p display?
Would 8GB RAM enough or should I go for 16? (or is ram speed more important)

Any recommendations?
 

[_Omega_]

3 minutes ago, Joey__ said:

Should I go hexa/octo core or is quad enough?
Should I settle for 1080p display?
Would 8GB RAM enough or should I go for 16? (or is ram speed more important)

Any recommendations?
 

I am still using my surface pro 4 for my master class in uni and it works fine for me even with 4 gigs of ram and a dual core with ht... but i still think a quad core and 8 gigs of ram should be the minimum. A hexacore and 16 gigs of ram would be good to be a bit more future proof...

[Tom_nerd]

13 minutes ago, Joey__ said:

Would 8GB RAM enough or should I go for 16? (or is ram speed more important)

If you want to "future proof" it, I'd go for 16. As chrome 'll snap that up fast.

[Tom_nerd]

14 minutes ago, Joey__ said:

Should I settle for 1080p display?

On a laptop, people can rarely see more than 1440P. So save the money and go for a good looking 1080P screen.

[Tom_nerd]

15 minutes ago, Joey__ said:

Any recommendations

What's your budget?

[DANK_AS_gay]

1 minute ago, Tom_nerd said:

As chrome 'll snap that up fast.

"How to use a for loop"

*ANGRY WINDOWS ERROR NOISE*

[Joey__]

1 minute ago, Tom_nerd said:

What's your budget?

anywhere from €500 to €1000 ,https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B09N7HLKKY/ref=crt_ewc_img_srh_1?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=A8KICS1PHF7ZO this one seems very nice but german keyboard, might have to accept my german fate and go with it anyway lmao

[Tom_nerd]

1 minute ago, Joey__ said:

,https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B09N7HLKKY/ref=crt_ewc_img_srh_1?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=A8KICS1PHF7ZO

seems like a great option. Although a buddy of mine who had that said that clicking on the trackpad felt "unnatural" due to the bump, although he got used to it.

[_Omega_]

Just now, Joey__ said:

anywhere from €500 to €1000 ,https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B09N7HLKKY/ref=crt_ewc_img_srh_1?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=A8KICS1PHF7ZO this one seems very nice but german keyboard, might have to accept my german fate and go with it anyway lmao

looks good for the price... but if you dont want a german keyboard you have a problem

 

[RONOTHAN##]

The one I've been using for my Comp Sci degree is a Thinkpad L13 Gen 2 with an i5 1135G7 and 8GB of RAM. For 98% of what I do, it's more than enough. It is my preferred machine for working on projects because I prefer typing on a chicklet style keyboard and changing scenery is always a plus. That said, there have been a couple projects I've done where I have maxed out my RAM usage, and times where I have had to go over to my desktop (5900X) in order to get stuff to work (damn you Java). 

 

I doubt you'll need more than 4 cores for most things you'll do in there (most stuff is very single threaded), but 8GB of RAM is really tight. The only reason I was fine with getting it is because I got the laptop for $300 used, if I were to spend any more than that, I would be running 16GB at the minimum, probably wanting to step up to 32GB. 1080P display is fine, I don't personally see much reason to go above that unless you're doing heavy content creation.

[Joey__]

2 minutes ago, _Omega_ said:

looks good for the price... but if you dont want a german keyboard you have a problem

 

couldn't I just switch the laptop language and switch the keycaps?

[_Omega_]

Just now, Joey__ said:

couldn't I just switch the laptop language and switch the keycaps?

not too easy to do it on a laptop and for example the US keyboard is a different layout A

[JogerJ]

If you need US keyboard you could try and get laptops that ship out of netherlands. They mostly ship with ANSI keyboards.

 

Otherwise you can at least get student discounts on retailers like Dell or Apple.

Edited May 9, 2022 by JogerJ

[rikitikitavi]

You will spend most of your time reading/typing, so to be honest you can go as low as an ancient linux potato. However, there will be courses that require specialized software... you'll have to consult your advisors/professors and get a suggestion. Usually you'll have access to lab computers in such instances.

 

Rule of thumb: go for the best keyboard, display and battery you can get.

Minimum RAM is 16GB for Windows, 8GB for macOS w/ M1. Otherwise performance doesn't matter as much unless you are buying an old/cheap potato or planning to game and/or use it for something else.

 

External KB is a an option - you can have a small ergonomic kb that will beat any built-in.

Display ppi matters. Resolution is relative to the overall size, so 1080p small looks better than 1080p big screen.

Tiny laptop at school, big monitor at home.

 

A great overall laptop: MacBook Air M1. You might be able to find a good price with Apple educational pricing. One downside: there will probably be a course with some obscure software that you won't be able to run on it even through virtualization.

 

8 hours ago, _Omega_ said:

not too easy to do it on a laptop and for example the US keyboard is a different layout A

8 hours ago, Joey__ said:

couldn't I just switch the laptop language and switch the keycaps?

ANSI - NA layout, horizontal Enter/Return

ISO - European layout, vertical Enter/Return, extra button next to left Shift.

 

You can switch/change software layout/mapping of the keys, either with the OS's built-in selection of layouts, or with a 3rd party software like karabiner-Elements (macOS). Moreover, with such software you can do things like put arrows on the home row, create macros, layers, etc.

 

As for the keycaps - you should learn touch typing and not care about it.