Laptop for college student

camarlins

Distinguished
Jan 31, 2012
2
0
18,510
1. What is your budget?
500-800$ can stretch to 900 but ugh.

2. What is the size of the notebook that you are considering?
nothing specific, to be carried to class, so maybe smaller the better

3. What screen resolution do you want?
n/a

4. Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop?
this is just for school projects, to be used away from my desktop at campus mostly.

5. How much battery life do you need?
the more the better

6. Do you want to play games with your laptop? If so then please list the games that you want to with the settings that you want for these games. (Low,Medium or High)?
games would be a plus, this is primarily for school (computer science programming), only game types would be like League of Legends (Medium is fine).

7. What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo/Video editing, Etc.)
This is for my Computer Science classes. So this will be working with compilers, databases, etc...

8. How much storage (Hard Drive capacity) do you need?
n/a, prefer SSD if in price range.

9. If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post their links.
This is where it hurts (will explain at the end), Best Buy/Tiger Direct.

10. How long do you want to keep your laptop?
2+ years

11. What kind of Optical drive do you need? DVD ROM/Writer,Bluray ROM/Writer,Etc ?
n/a

12. Please tell us about the brands that you prefer to buy from them and the brands that you don't like and explain the reasons.
open to all brands

13. What country do you live in?
US

14. Please tell us any additional information if needed

Ok, heres the story. Ive always built my desktop computers, never owned a laptop. Professors this semester require laptop in class ASAP (started class Monday). So I went after class to Tiger Direct and bought this laptop...http://

I always consulted TH for parts for my desktops, no idea why I didn't look up advice on here before going to the store. What I found at the store at TigerDirect was this laptop. I wanted something with at least i5 processor for my programs. This had almost everything I was looking for in my price range (i5, 8 gigs ram, gpu is a +). I understand HP is like sacrilegious around here.

The scores aren't bad on Windows Experience Index from what Ive seen compared to similar priced products.
Processor 7.2
Memory 7.2
Graphics 6.7
Gaming Graphics 6.7
Primary Hard Disk 5.9

Did I make a mistake not going Asus or Lenovo? The guy tried to upsell me on getting a Microsoft Surface 3 but I didn't bite. I read some reviews and saw the specs and just went with the HP. I basically can get by 1 more class (Wednesday), but need it Friday for sure. Any info on whether I should return and change products or stick this out would be much appreciated.

My zipcode is 33165 in case you want to see if products are available in my area. Thanks again.


 

camarlins

Distinguished
Jan 31, 2012
2
0
18,510
Im thinking of just adding a ssd and sticking with it...Samsung 840 250gb
That would put me at total cost of $784 So the final product is i5 4th gen, 8gb ram, AMD Radeon HD 8750M Graphics, and a 250gb SSD. Its still not a brand Im in love with, but the specs seem decent for the price.
 

iron8orn

Estimable
May 31, 2014
51
0
4,610
Not a bad deal.. def not really gaming level graphics but some less intensive games will do fine. the GCN architecture should give you at least some advantage in your programming over the Nvidia kepler in its class.
Either can be good just really comes down to what you wanna spend, ya know.
You could build a pc a lot more worthy for what your doing for 800.
A lot of good people here to help you along the way if it would be possible in your situation. Think about it :)