Hunt for a new laptop

Little Less Conversation

I'm on the hunt for a new laptop. But don't know where to start.

Thought maybe a small mini laptop would be cool and easy to carry around but I have the tablet when I'm on the move. So guess that's not all that important.

Looking online, it seems like they are doing away with CD/DVD drives? Not that I use the drive much anyway but I do get the odd cd and dvd and do want to copy them. So having a CD/DVD drive is important. Unless they do external drives now and you plug it in through the usb port. I can live with that as well.

Next issue is space. I need space so something with loads of space.

jhud

You can get usb dvd drives easy for around 30euro or maybe less. In relation to laptop please let us know your budget and what the main use its for so someone can recommend one that meets your needs.

Little Less Conversation

jhud wrote: »

You can get usb dvd drives easy for around 30euro or maybe less. In relation to laptop please let us know your budget and what the main use its for so someone can recommend one that meets your needs.

Mostly used for gaming and college work. Would 500 be a realistic budget for something good?

mrcheez

Acer Swift 3 is one I use, and one my bro bought recently. Solid and performant while very portable. Buy ext drives for more storage/CD functionality.

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Bit of a search and I don't think I can get everything I want in one device. So guess I'll stick to buying a laptop. Afterall, I do have the tablet for portability. So a good laptop for around 500. Any recommendations?

Skerries

Little Less Conversation wrote: »

Mostly used for gaming and college work. Would 500 be a realistic budget for something good?

to get a small laptop that has discrete graphics you would need to double your budget
for your budget you should concentrate on the best CPU and ram with storage combo

https://pricespy.ie/computers-accessories/computers/laptops--c353?sort=price&filterId=s322293404&offset=144

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Skerries wrote: »

to get a small laptop that has discrete graphics you would need to double your budget
for your budget you should concentrate on the best CPU and ram with storage combo

https://pricespy.ie/computers-accessories/computers/laptops--c353?sort=price&filterId=s322293404&offset=144

I may get a normal laptop instead of a smaller one. I might as well because I have the tablet for taking about with me.

Now I don't know what I'm looking for.

mrcheez

List out the sort of games / applications you want to use, and it'll give an indication of the power you require.

Do you have a screen size you need, or will you use an external monitor?

Is €500 the absolute max you can stretch to? Might be hard to get a well-powered laptop playing modern games for that price. Depends on the game.

Minecraft will be ok for example

this one

has a strong cpu (4-core i5)
good amount of ram (8gb)
is fairly light (1.6kg)
has a good quality full hd screen - 14 inch size which is a good balance of screen size and portability
fast ssd hard drive (256gb)

https://www.currys.ie/ieen/computing/laptops/laptops/hp-pavilion-14-ce0501sa-14-intel-core-i5-laptop-256-gb-ssd-silver-10184651-pdt.html

it's 599 but well worth the 100 extra for what you get.

it's the best deal from a price/performance ratio around at the moment.

you can get a dvd/cd drive/burner for cheap on ebay
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/External-USB-2-0-DVD-RW-CD-RW-DVD-Drive-Rewriter-Burner-writer-for-Laptop-PC-MAC/282741475764?epid=4026081909&hash=item41d4b489b4:rk:4:pf:0

if you want to run games you will pay more and sacrifice portability as it's bigger and heavier like this for 650 sterling

https://www.saveonlaptops.co.uk/30023991-Medion-Erazer-P6689-Gaming-Laptop_2277804.html

uk site, delivers to Ireland. long established.

Ivefoundgod

I've got a gaming laptop, Dell Inspiron 15 7000 Gaming its a great machine but honestly if I could go back in time i'd have spent the money on a desktop. I do most of my gaming on an external monitor and when i play on the laptop itself the heat and noise make it a fairly poor experience and one I try to avoid. Its also far too big and heavy to carry around so it stays at home generally unless i'm doing something intensive as i've a T440 and a work laptop for day to day use/college work. I think most gaming laptops in the budget range like mine will have similar issues and I would think long and hard before investing 1k or so on one.

I'd have been happier with a semi decent laptop that could run Football Manager and a desktop for proper gaming. Plan on getting an XPS or MBP in the next year or so to replace the T440 and when i do that the gaming laptop will be permanently located beside the monitor.

As the others have said, in that budget your best bet is to get the best specs you can and save up €500-700 and build your own PC.

another option these days is if you get a laptop with a thunderbolt 3 port you have the option to connect an external gpu (egpu) box to the laptop to provide graphics horsepower for games

this is useful mainly where one would need a light laptop for portability but want to also game. or maybe you have a nice ultrabook provided by work, that's another case.

of course laptops with thunderbolt 3 enabled usb c ports aren't on the budget end

also you would want a fairly decent cpu to avoid being cpu-restricted in games even though most of the gruntwork is done on the gpu side

that said the 4-core i5's and i7's of the current mobile u generation are not terrible

also the egpu box start at about 250 euro and then you have to pick up a graphics card. but if you bought a second-hand say nvidia 1060 then it would give you a decent gaming machine.

you lose a bit of performance maybe 10% of the gpu but still good.

probably not an option for the OP here as budget is too low but an interesting one to consider.