Need Help Choosing A Laptop

[DeadlyPilot]

So someone is asking for my help to pick out a laptop. I've never bought a laptop before but I know a bit about building gaming PC's. This person won't be gaming but they said they will want to use it mainly for school, photo editing, and maybe a little bit of video editing (though mostly photo editing). All of which I know nothing about so I'm really lost on what kind of specs I should be looking at. Would an i7-5500u show any improvement over a good i5? Would 8gb of RAM be enough? Do they need a GPU?

[Mira Yurizaki]

9 minutes ago, DeadlyPilot said:

Would an i7-5500u show any improvement over a good i5? Would 8gb of RAM be enough? Do they need a GPU?

If you want performance on the processor part, avoid anything with a U at the end. They are all dual core processors. An i7 is not always a quad core in mobile land, neither is an i5.

 

8GB would be okay, but 16GB may be better, depending on how big the files are.

 

A discrete GPU may or may not help depending on the software being used.

 

Also what's the budget?

[Gung Pow Chicken]

If you aren't doing any Multi-Thread work then an i5 would work just fine along with 8gb of ram. Just to be a little future proof you could go with 16gb. I'm still using a Thinkpad x230 as my main laptop and it's got a 3rd gen i5 with 16gb and 2 500gb ssd's. Still a beast. 

[DeadlyPilot]

21 minutes ago, M.Yurizaki said:

If you want performance on the processor part, avoid anything with a U at the end. They are all dual core processors. An i7 is not always a quad core in mobile land, neither is an i5.

 

8GB would be okay, but 16GB may be better, depending on how big the files are.

 

A discrete GPU may or may not help depending on the software being used.

 

Also what's the budget?

She never gave a specific budget but she is willing to spend as much as 1k

[Gung Pow Chicken]

4 minutes ago, DeadlyPilot said:

She never gave a specific budget but she is willing to spend as much as 1k

Here are a few good choices

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Lenovo-Thinkpad-X240-Premium-IPS-i7-4600U-256GB-SSD-8GB-RAM-Windows-7-Pro-/112015323309?hash=item1a14a230ad:g:BhoAAOSwR5dXRx7J

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-Lenovo-Thinkpad-T540p-i5-4300M-16GB-MEM-128GB-SSD-FHD-15-6in-1920x1080-/191888072998?hash=item2cad6ba126:m:mAt1N5keQ1b_OyGqerXAXZA

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Lenovo-Thinkpad-T450s-14-FHD-1080P-IPS-i7-5600U-8GB-256GB-SSD-Ultrabook-Laptop-/152096395520?hash=item2369a6d100:g:8p0AAOSw~OdVVLG0

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Lenovo-ThinkPad-W541-15-6-1920x1080-i7-4910MQ-8GB-2-x-500GB-K1100M-Workstation-/162092156529?hash=item25bd720671:g:F0UAAOSwXSJXO3wV

 

^^^^ I have a W541 with 32gb and 2 850'ss and it runs all of my test VM's, definitely as good as my desktop. Minus GPU is a little weak

 

Lenovo has great support and any of the T/X/W series laptops are amazing.

[GoodBytes]

47 minutes ago, DeadlyPilot said:

So someone is asking for my help to pick out a laptop. I've never bought a laptop before but I know a bit about building gaming PC's. This person won't be gaming but they said they will want to use it mainly for school, photo editing, and maybe a little bit of video editing (though mostly photo editing). All of which I know nothing about so I'm really lost on what kind of specs I should be looking at. Would an i7-5500u show any improvement over a good i5? Would 8gb of RAM be enough? Do they need a GPU?

Here are the general tips.

• As mentioned by M.Yurizaki, CPUs in mobile space is mostly dual cores. Larger, thinker machines usually carry quad core CPUs. They are exceptions, of course, hence why I said usually. Avoid Y series CPUs as those are super weak in performance, and so is the M series. Great for mobility and long battery life though, but not performance. Something you will quickly see, is that in the laptop world, you are balancing performance and battery life.
   
• Specs isn't everything. A problem that mobile system have, is cooling. What is the point of all these fancy hardware, if you have crappy cooling engineering, making your system loud without doing anything (some will kick-in the fan just for being plugged in.. that bad), and it throttles like no tomorrow... So you have to check reviews. Usually larger laptops have larger heatsinks and fans solving this, but you loose on portability, and the system is bigger.
   
• Virtually all laptops throttles when pushed. Laptops aren't desktop. Gaming laptops are so big and large to try and avoid throttling. But the way laptop are generally designed, is that you have the have the CPU base clock, the turbo clock (max frequency of the CPU when under load), is designed to kick-in in small bursts, not pushed continuously.
   
• Battery life. Battery life mentioned in specs, are usually under decent setup configuration for high-end laptop (Using Office, or web surfing with Firefox or IE (not Chrome, consumes too much power), 50% brightness, good wireless signal, etc...), and at ultimate best for low-end systems (Screen at minimum brightness, using Ethernet, WiFi off, Bluetooth off, idle on the desktop, no background programs, nothing open... might as well the computer be sleeping). There is no line to be drawn, even the 2 groups I just did, you can blast me with exceptions. Basically what I am trying to say, is don't really believe them, look at reviews, and what people are getting.
   
• They are many Lithium-ion/poly batteries. Some sucks, some are good. No details are ever really released. Some are resistant to heat, other not at all. Meaning with the device running warm/hot, the battery oxides itself faster, wearing out the battery. Normally, premium laptops, have good batteries. And you < $400 laptop, definitively not, and then you have the in between. You also have duration. For example, some premium mobile systems have a battery that are rated to keep 80% of its max capacity after 3-4 years, the cheap laptop will probably last you 1-2 years, before it cant' hold up a nice charge. Again, not much detail from the manufactures, you need to ask, and see what they say for a specific laptop model.
   
• Battery life degrade over time. The max battery life of the system degrades over time. Some faster than other, again, manufacture don't really say. So it is best to overshoot the battery life you need, so that in the long run, your laptop is still useful for you. Of course, longer battery life, means lower performance of the system, as while better battery exists, and are implemented in more expensive laptops that offers you lower specs for your money (ie: the money goes in build quality, battery, after sale service, warranty service, cooling engineering, etc...), it can only do so much. You won't have a GeForce GTX 980M with a Quad Core i7 CPU in a 12inch form factor, that is light as a tablet, and give you 9h of battery life, is what I am saying. Basically, we return to the point of balance.
   
• Build quality. This is a major thing. Cheap build quality means that if you carry your laptop around a lot, the plastic might crack, things can break, and so on. Problems, problems and more problems, usually after the warranty.
   
• Personal advice: If you plan to get a laptop for school, where you'll carry everyday, might get bump, or hit as you drop your bag on the floor.. beside the fact of suggesting something with long battery life, as you won't have always access to power outlets, and be thin and light as you'll carry it everyday, all the time, get an extended warranty. GET IT WITH THE MANUFACTURE! Don't take it with a big box store. With the manufacture you know that your system will be repaired properly, with genuine parts, and pretty much all of them offers accidental damage protection. And many times it is cheaper than the big box stores. In laptop, many things can go wrong when used heavily like for school, so it is worth the small extra, in my book. Some companies like Dell, offers even: Next business day on site service. That means that a certified trained Dell technician comes at your place, at the time you want, to fix your laptop in front of you. So, no need to ship anything, you always have it, you can make sure that the work is done properly, and that the fix actually fixed the problem. And NO, it doesn't cost an arm and leg.. it is around the same price as the big store extended warranties, so how crazy is that!
   
• You get what you paid for. This is the general rule for anything in the tech world. Don't see for the lowest price.
   
• Check reviews, check reviews, check more reviews. There is NO perfect laptop. I'll say it again, there is no perfect laptop, they all have downsides. You need to analyses the downsides, and make sure they don't affect you.
   
• If you see glossy anything, beside the screen, avoid at all cost. Glossy plastic will look bad in 1 month from when you have your system, and look like 10 years old, after 1 year, especially if you take it with you everyday. You can use the softest cloth in the world.. it will get scratch just by the air pushing the dust. Also, laptops with it, you can be sure that they are shitty quality and will break. It is an easy detector of such laptop. As for the screen, it is all based on taste. Usually Business class system (which you can order, you don't don't need to a business to order from. No company will say no to money :). Also,  many manufacture offers free shipping BOTH directions, so if you don't like it, you can return it. Just call and ask to be sure, as this depends on region).

 

And I think that is pretty much it. In conclusion:

• You get what you paid for.
• Get more battery life than what you need, as over time it will degrade.
• It is all a balance between: performance, quality, cooling/quietness, weight/size and battery life.
• Check reviews, even on suggested systems. I might have a system that I strongly suggest, and like very much, but you might hate it deeply, because the downsides affects you, and not me. There is no perfect system. If a review site says that it is perfect or close to with silly down sides as "expensive", and not actual downsides, than look somewhere else for other reviews. In depth reviews is what you want.

 

Oh forgot something, depending on the manufacture you plan to get your system from, and region, you can negotiate the price with the manufacture over the phone or chat system, if you order directly from them. You can be sure already, out of the gate, that you can get the as rebate the retail store profit of the system, just by asking for a price. Also, sometimes, you get free upgrades, like more RAM, or better display or larger drive, better wireless card model, just because the manufacture has too many parts it wants to get rid off, so you can win more (although, now that more and more laptops have things soldered in, this is less common).