I’d look for previous threads, but products change with time.
My present 17" machine is an HP ENVY dv7, which gave me good service right up until it didn’t. I bought it at COSTCO for a good price, and it got decent reviews. But I fear that things may be starting to fail. There are still 537GB left of 671GB, as I have not loaded this up with a lot of heavy hitter software, but there are glitches starting to show up.
Anyway, I’d be happy with a 15.6" screen (but not a 13"), really need to have a DVD player, and really, really don’t care about having touch-screen. In fact, I prefer not to have it, as I’m a mouse guy. I hate touchpads, but they seem to be ubiquitous; most laptops will allow you to disable them. I don’t do gaming or anything else graphics-intensive. I don’t need to tote it anywhere, and really don’t even need the battery, as I leave it plugged in all the time.
I don’t want to spend the money for an Apple, so don’t bother suggesting them.
So the issue boils down to reliability, which is where the search becomes complicated. Most laptops get a hefty percentage of one-star reviews, and the products seem to have gotten flimsier over time.
If you have purchased a laptop in the past year and think it’s the bomb, please let me know.
I bought a refurb Dell Latitude with Win-7, two years ago, for $135, and have absolutely nothing to complain about. Older machines have some obvious shortcomings, like mine has only two USB ports and the mouse uses one of them, but basically, my simple demands have not yet been stymied.
I mentioned what I don’t use it for, but it was sort of buried in the paragraphs. Online browsing, some photo storage, no gaming, nothing graphics-intensive. I’m really a low-impact user nowadays. The most heavy-duty data program I use is a genealogy program, but even that doesn’t take up all that much space.
I had a Lenovo (IBM) years ago that held up pretty well, but the reviews are really no better than any other brand at this point.
I’m really leery of Dell products after bad experiences in the past. It appears that they have improved somewhat.
If you don’t want to spend Apple money, you have to give up a little on review-enthusiasm and customer service expectations. In return, you pay a fraction of the price - then it’s just a matter of getting the best bang for your buck while avoiding any duds.
Figure out which Lenovo IdeaPad has the features/price you want. Then come back and tell us and we’ll see if somebody can find something better.
I’m pretty happy with LeNovo. One problem is that, like you, I dislike touchpads. But my computer does not allow disabling the touchpad and I keep touching it accidentally. From the Dope, I got the idea of using a program called Touchpad blocker, which mostly works (except when it doesn’t). Trouble is there is no way of finding that level of detail.
It’s not the Dells are so bad, but calling their service line is impossible and even when you get through the people don’t know anything at all. And don’t have access to the machine you have just bought.
I just folded a piece of paper double, a little larger than the touchpad, and taped it down with scotch tape. Rubbing over it has no effect. I can even write notes on it, and replace it when it gets full of scribbling. I was glad I hadn’t disabled it, when my mouse crashed and I had to use it in an emergency. Some laptops have an F-key that can toggle the touchpad on and off, but mine doesn’t. One of those good ideas that was “improved” into oblivion.
The problem I’m seeing with Lenovo is that they only offer an external DVD. I use my laptop literally in my lap in my living room, so an external drive doesn’t work for me.
Places like Sam’s Club and Costco are good places to look - they tend to have “last year’s model” but loaded with RAM and other formerly extra-cost options, at very good prices.
That’s where I bought my present laptop. I’ve read warnings on this board that they tend to carry bottom shelf models, but don’t know if that’s really true.
True for TVs and such - I’ve written at length about the variations in what are presented as “the same model number.”
But their computer offerings tend to be perfectly good models that are a half-step behind current builds, packed wit’ vitamins and sold at a good price. Nothing else the makers can do with a warehouse of slightly outdated builds.
Perhaps I’ll give that a shot. This laptop worked fine until the whole Win 8.1 fiasco, and it still does what I want it to do, but I suspect that the hard drive may be laboring and perhaps that the radio is also having a problem. Hopefully, Costco has a model with an SSD hard drive.
We got hundreds of them at work. There’s a reason most states have a contract with Dell. Used them at work for 20 years. They are tough and reliable computers.
I left my desktop on all the time. I never thought I’d be happy with a laptop, but when it crashed, I grabbed a temporary laptop because I could get a cheap refurb quickly. That was two yeas ago, and I fully bonded with my laptop, and now I’d never bother with a desktop again, and no longer own one. I leave my laptop on all the time, it’s run perfectly and does everything I want it to. It’s never been lifted off my workstation since I plugged it in.
Whether I need a laptop or might like a desktop better doesn’t seem germane to whether I leave it plugged in all the time.
As far as durability goes, the big names (Dell, HP, Lenovo) have consumer grade and business grade lines. The consumer lines tend to be made down to a price, as you’ve seen in the reviews. The business lines are usually built to take a bit of punishment as aceplace57 probably can attest. Let’s compare. Here are what appear to be the least expensive HP consumer and business laptops with internal optical drives and 15.6" screens (the screens and video cards appear to be the same):
HP Pavillion 15z, starts at $340, with an AMD Dual-Core A9 APU, 8 GB RAM and 1 TB HDD.
The Pavillion looks like a better deal with twice the RAM and twice the drive space at half the cost. Who wouldn’t go for that? I’ll bet it won’t last nearly as long as the ProBook; part of the extra cost goes for quality. Then again, you could buy the cheaper laptop, replace it once, and still be less than the price of the more durable one.
One other thing to consider: if you plan on traveling outside the country for an extended time, the warranty may not be very helpful. Many companies will make you go back to/send the laptop back to the country it was purchased in for warranty repairs. I know Dell and HP do that with their consumer lines. I don’t know about Lenovo. Apple doesn’t care. Bring it in to the nearest Apple Store or authorized dealer. I know Apple’s not on your list but I wanted to complete the list.
