10 things to consider when buying a new laptop.
When people ask us which laptop is best for their needs, the first thing we tell them is that there is no clear answer. There are too many different types of laptops, and different price categories to suit them. However, we do give people a checklist that they should consider before splurging on a new device.
Size: If portability is your main concern, then you need to consider a notebook that has a small-ish screen and a light weight. Any laptop marketed as an Ultrabook should fit your bill here, as they are designed to be slim and light. More to the point, though, look for a laptop with a screen that’s 12.5-13.3 inches in size, and a weight that is from 1-1.5kg.
Screen quality: You’ll be staring at your laptop for many hours every day, so you want to make sure you get a screen that is comfortable to look at. Many laptops these days also have touchscreens, which means they are glossy. Glossy screens lead to reflections, so consider a laptop that doesn’t have a touchscreen.
Next, look at the resolution. A 1920×1080-pixel resolution (aka Full HD) should be considered if you want plenty of space to line up windows and keep things in view. Finally, the viewing angles are extremely important. A laptop screen that touts IPS (in-plane switching) technology offers the widest viewing angles and the best user comfort.
Try not to buy blind. If possible, go into a store and see the screen for yourself. Otherwise, rely on multiple reviews to get a good overview of the product.
You want a keyboard that has a comfortable layout with full-sized keys and some space around the arrow keys. The keys should have adequate travel on the downstroke and snappy responsiveness when you let them go. Make sure the keyboard is also backlit, so that you can type with an easier view on the keys in dimly lit environments.
As with the screen, it helps to try before you buy, especially if your main task will be typing.
Core i7-based systems are for those of you who want the best performance from your laptop. However, note that with a Core i7-based system, heat coming through the base of the laptop can be cause for concern, especially if you plan to actually use the laptop on your lap a lot of the time.
RAM: You need 4GB of RAM or more to get the best out of your system. More RAM allows for more applications to be run at the same time, and for more data to be quickly accessible by the system at any one time, which comes in handy for tasks such as editing photos.
Storage: Hard drives used to be all the rage, but these days they are mostly out of favour, especially for thin and light laptops. This is because they can be slow, somewhat bulky, and produce noticeable heat and noise. A solid state drive (SSD), on the other hand, offers a lot more speed than a hard drive, runs silently, and can be installed in a form factor that doesn’t add too much to the weight and bulk of a laptop.
The only problem is that SSDs don’t offer as much capacity. You’ll be stuck with a drive that’s either 128GB or 256GB in size, and even then, laptops with 256GB SSDs are pretty expensive. Stick to a 128GB SSD for your new laptop, though, and you’ll love the speed with which it can load programs, access your data, and also how quickly it can boot up your system.
The newest, fastest laptops also have NVMe solid-state drives which are much faster than traditional SSDs but also more expensive.
Look at the rating of the battery in Watt-hours (Wh) or milliamp-hours (mAh). The larger these figures are, the longer the battery can last. For a 13.3in Ultrabook, for example, a battery with a rating from 44Wh to 50Wh will give you the best results.
USB 3.0: You shouldn’t get a laptop without a USB 3.0 port, and you should look for a laptop that has at least a couple of these ports. This is for obvious reasons such as plugging in an external hard drive to back up your laptop’s data, or for when you want to plug in a conventional mouse or a fancy keyboard.
Fingerprint reader and TPM: Fingerprint readers are great for logging into mobile devices and the latest Windows 10 Operating System makes further use of them with its Windows Hello system. Ultimately, people can guess your password, but few can fake a fingerprint.
Build quality: No matter how careful we are, laptops can get bashed and dropped. Some are ruggedised to withstand rain and dust and some are built especially for the brutal educational environments – some even come with military-grade protection. Others can weather liquid spills and can be rinsed clean. Either way, it’s worth checking out how much testing a laptop has undergone (the manufacturer usually crows about it) or whether there’s any certification.
DoubleAnetwork
