I need something light weight for travel with good battery life.
It should be able to play basic games, nothing fancy.
I live on a PC, so this will be my second computer, not prime.
I figure:
1 TB SSD storage
At least 16GB memory, but not sure if I need to worry about the type of memory
Would like at least one HDMI port and more than 2 USB.
AMD or Intel? How much does it matter?
14" is a good size.
I’m assuming there will be options under $900.
I currently have a 2014 Laptop that was great in its day, but 11 years old and heavy is time to go. I also have a little crappy piece of junk that struggles to run anything, but hey it was only $99 3 or 4 years ago.
Please don’t suggest Mac or Linux, seriously, just Windows 11.
I bought this for my folks who had a Win10 machine, it’s not perfect and probably heavier than you like.
I snagged it on a pre-return to school sale for $480, showing as around $670 now. The battery life is okay, not great, and it’s light to me compared to my dedicated video card equipped 17" gaming laptop, but I don’t think I’d put it in the lightweight category. I prefer AMD (and their dedicated graphics, see more in a moment) to Intel after the customer service failures in acknowledging and dealing with their last Chip failure, but it’s not a strong preference all else being equal.
It has the “Radeon Graphics” which may or may NOT be enough for basic games, but that depends on the definitions of basic.
Figure this works as a “compromise” offering, where it’ll probably work, but not thrill you, and hopefully another poster can identify something more perfect soon.
Fully a PC, fully portable, very light, long battery life, etc. I’ve owned several Surface pros for the last ~10 years. I would never buy a conventional laptop again; these are that much handier.
It might not be a perfect fit for all your use cases, but it might be. Worth a look IMO.
I think the Surface is a great option, but I skipped it because it’s low number of ports (2 USB-C), no HDMI, 512G storage, and cost, with the bigger 13" display being $1200.
But I fully grant, for a machine to run Windows it’s super portable, and has a very long battery life. It does run Snapdragon processor vs. an Intel/AMD one, and tends to be more efficient as a result.
Once again, it’s getting everything in What_Exit’s list feels like it’s going to be trouble.
A possibility though (again, did this for my folk’s new laptop) is to buy a nice portable hub (powered or not) with the HDMI and additional ports as an easy swap in when you need them, and using the defaults for your out-and-about use.
I have a “docking station” that has all sorts of ports, has an HDMI connection to a second monitor on a tilt swivel arm and all the rest. The “docking” process consists of setting the surface & keyboard on the desk in front of the other monitor and plugging the power cord hanging off the docking box into the power input of the Surface.
This is mine but there are many variants:
Yeah, they’re a bit more expensive than a cheap laptop. But the portability gain is insane.
Oh, no disagreement, if weight and battery life are a priority, I’d get the hub and eat the additional price, shop for a savings, or consider a quality reconditioned last-year model.
All the ports needed (though just barely), fast charging battery if not huge, configurable with a 1 TB drive, and just about $960 - cheaper though for on-sale options if you pick a more common configuration (normally the half terabyte but otherwise hitting the specs) for a few hundred less. And default weight is only a hair over 3lb.
I bought a replacement Windows 11 HP Envy a few months ago. 17.3" touchscreen, 2T drive. They come in a variety of price ranges on Amazon. Couldn’t say what the battery life is, though, as I don’t rely on it.
I’d also put in a vote for the Thinkpads, Dell Latitudes, or Dell XPS systems. The Surface laptops are nice premium devices too if you don’t mind paying more for a smaller size. They have really nice screens. You can get nicer screens on Thinkpads and Latitudes too but they’re typically an optional upgrade.
Couple quick notes:
Not sure what you mean by “basic” gaming (things like solitaire?), but if you ever want to play modern high-graphics games, you’d probably need a discrete GPU — which is at odds with everything else you want, especially portability, battery life, and price. Instead, I’d recommend excluding that from the criteria altogether and opting for GeForce Now if you ever want to play a demanding game. If that’s not even a major point, then just ignore gaming altogether in your search. It’ll make your search a lot easier. Any recent laptop can play your basic 2D games already, and maybe also older 3D titles.
The ports are going to be harder and harder to find, especially full-size USB-A and HDMI. If you can live with a USB-C dock thingy like LSLGuy mentioned, that will make it easier.
The Snapdragon CPUs (which are neither Intel nor AMD; it’s an experimental move off of x86 architecture altogether) is Microsoft’s answer to the newer Macbooks. The switch to ARM processors should give you much battery life and heat, at the expense of compatibility. Those systems don’t run the regular Windows but a lookalike called Windows for Arm. Some apps will be native to that system and run great (especially first-party Microsoft apps), while others might be emulated, and some might not run at all (especially some games and low-level system utilities). If you’re mostly using the browser and office apps, you should be fine. But it is a risk you should be aware of. It’s no longer backward compatible the way most Intel and AMD CPUs have been for a long time. And unlike Apple, Microsoft doesn’t have the same level of vertical integration and ecosystem control… many third-party apps will stay x86-only for a long time, meaning they’ll either run slower on Snapdragon computers or (rarely) not run at all, unless Microsoft is willing to force everyone to move over the way Apple did. (Unlikely, IMO).
Dell just rebranded everything, Latitudes are no more. The professional line is now Pro Essential/Pro/Pro Premium/Pro Max. I’m just waiting for my Dell rep to send me some review units.
No worries, that was me talking in my [Psst, check it out] voice, not the lickspittle smarmy teacher’s pet [You’re in troooouuuuble] voice or scary mod voice.
Just figure What_Exit’s worn out enough right now, so I want to keep it to what he asked.
Fwiw, i bought an HDMI to usb-C cable, and I’m very happy to not have to fuss with docks. My external monitor has two cables hanging off it, and i just plug in the one that matches the laptop I’m using. (I had four recently, my MacBook pro, a gaming PC, my travel PC, and a work laptop.)
Also, for travel, i like the laptops that can flip into a “tent” formation, for reading stuff on them on an airplane. (Like the Lenovo yoga or the hp Spectre, although those may be pricey for your needs.) Although, now that Netflix won’t let you download movies onto a Windows laptop, maybe it’s less useful. But i used to use that all the time when i flew
WE are you a Costco member? I got my mom an HP laptop there earlier this year and the prices can’t be beat. You might even consider spending $65 on a membership just to get the discount.
Just be sure to carefully compare the specs 1:1 with other places you’d shop. I am pretty sure Costco gets slightly different builds.
I can’t recommend Mom’s laptop, as we specifically went for a 17” screen so I’m sure it’s heavier than you want.
I finally got my first AMD processor this year after 20+ years of building Intel-centric computers. For a desktop, not a laptop. I don’t think it really matters much anymore. Not when you’re upgrading from a $99 POS. Also don’t worry about RAM type.
Discreet GPU would counter what I’m looking for. That raises cost and energy consumption and I’m talking older games, not modern Steam games.
The docks defeat a lot of the portability and convenience, this will not be my primary computer, but my literal lap top and travel computer.
Additional benchmark, everything I do runs very well on a AMD Ryzen 5 4600G with Radeon Graphics, 3700 Mhz, 6 Core(s), 12 Logical Processor(s) and only 12GB of Ram & a NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 SUPER
Following this thread, as of right now, I have the Dell 14 Plus as my current baseline. I can probably get a discount through my wife work on this. Maybe.
What are people thoughts on Dell “Renewed” laptops? (Refreshed or Refurb laptops)
I found a Dell 3lb Win 11 Pro with lots of ports, even a network jack.
32GB DDR4 3200Mhz SDRAM, 1T SSD,
Bluetooth, USB, Wi-Fi Drawback? Only an i5 4 core ?
