HS student hunting for laptop for programming/light CAD ($700-800)

[lolpwnd31]

My school hands out crappy $80 chromebooks, and they're starting to get on my nerves. I'm also a member of my school's robotics team (we do FRC) and the laptop we use is a garbo $100 laptop as well (2 gb ram AFAIK). I'm looking for something to replace both, preferably around $700-800.

 

I won't be doing any heavy gaming on this; mostly just programming in Java. I might also do some light CAD work if we need to mill out any parts. I'll also be doing schoolwork (mostly just Google Docs) for around 6-7 hrs a day, so good battery life would be nice.

 

I'm looking at the Acer Swift 3 and the Thinkpad E/T480. My main concern is build quality - I've heard that Acer's laptops are poorly built. I'm used to badly built laptops, but considering how infrequently I use them, I'm not sure how they'd hold up to daily use. Bumping up the E480 to an i7 + rx550 seemed enticing but the thermals drove me away from using a dGPU.

 

Do you have any suggestions? Thank you

[kittygamer2023]

19 minutes ago, lolpwnd31 said:

My school hands out crappy $80 chromebooks, and they're starting to get on my nerves. I'm also a member of my school's robotics team (we do FRC) and the laptop we use is a garbo $100 laptop as well (2 gb ram AFAIK). I'm looking for something to replace both, preferably around $700-800.

 

I won't be doing any heavy gaming on this; mostly just programming in Java. I might also do some light CAD work if we need to mill out any parts. I'll also be doing schoolwork (mostly just Google Docs) for around 6-7 hrs a day, so good battery life would be nice.

 

I'm looking at the Acer Swift 3 and the Thinkpad E/T480. My main concern is build quality - I've heard that Acer's laptops are poorly built. I'm used to badly built laptops, but considering how infrequently I use them, I'm not sure how they'd hold up to daily use. Bumping up the E480 to an i7 + rx550 seemed enticing but the thermals drove me away from using a dGPU.

 

Do you have any suggestions? Thank you

https://www.amazon.com/VivoBook-i7-8550U-GeForce-NanoEdge-Display/dp/B07B7VFTN9/ref=sr_1_3?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1543015619&sr=1-3&refinements=p_n_operating_system_browse-bin%3A17702486011%2Cp_36%3A2421889011%2Cp_n_feature_five_browse-bin%3A7817224011|13580791011|13580790011%2Cp_n_feature_seven_browse-bin%3A3012498011|3012497011 

 

Also it is on sale

[lolpwnd31]

28 minutes ago, kittygamer2023 said:

https://www.amazon.com/VivoBook-i7-8550U-GeForce-NanoEdge-Display/dp/B07B7VFTN9/ref=sr_1_3?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1543015619&sr=1-3&refinements=p_n_operating_system_browse-bin%3A17702486011%2Cp_36%3A2421889011%2Cp_n_feature_five_browse-bin%3A7817224011|13580791011|13580790011%2Cp_n_feature_seven_browse-bin%3A3012498011|3012497011 

 

Also it is on sale

Oh crap that's a really good deal! Thanks for this, will look into it

[genexis_x]

5 hours ago, lolpwnd31 said:

I've heard that Acer's laptops are poorly built

Every brand will have bad models. Swift 3 is a decent budget model

 

E480 isn't any different than a regular consumer laptop. Don't get the RX550 model, throttled heavily, performance only on par with Intel iGPU

 

Any preference on weight and display size?

[lolpwnd31]

2 hours ago, GeneXiS_X said:

Every brand will have bad models. Swift 3 is a decent budget model

 

E480 isn't any different than a regular consumer laptop. Don't get the RX550 model, throttled heavily, performance only on par with Intel iGPU

 

Any preference on weight and display size?

At least <15", preferably 14". Weight doesn't really matter.

 

I'll probably bite the bullet on the Acer Swift 3. Is the screen really as dim as people make it out to be?

[genexis_x]

8 hours ago, lolpwnd31 said:

Is the screen really as dim as people make it out to be?

Fine for indoor use

 

For your budget, Swift 3 is probably the best choice. Ideapad 330s 15 is also decent

[lolpwnd31]

Thanks! That was my only gripe.