Purchasing a Laptop: Questions to Consider
When looking into purchasing a laptop, there are so many factors to consider that it can be overwhelming. The best method that I've personally found for breaking it down is to start with the most generic questions and then slowly get more specific to narrow it down. Here are some generic questions to start with:
This is important to know before starting the process as purchasing a laptop is all about trading off one thing for another. You want to determine the top two or three priorities you have for the laptop, get the best in those that you can, and adjust the rest of the specifications to meet your needs/wants while still falling within your allotted budget.
The applications often determine how important processing power is, versus video rendering capabilities, versus lightweight portability.
- Video Encoding or Topographical Mapping – Processing power, memory, and Video Card
- Large Data Sets – Processing power and memory
- Lots of small applications at the same time - memory
- Email and Web Browsing – performance factors become less of a priority, allowing you to focus on features you want in the laptop.
Laptops, by their very nature, are trading off performance for portability. You will not get a new laptop that is as powerful as a corresponding new desktop. Since you are already making that trade off, you need to take a look at how much weight you are comfortable carrying around - not just the weight of the laptop, but the weight of the power adapter and any other accessories you want/need to bring with you.
Once you have a good grasp on the questions above, it’s time to start looking at some specifics. To a certain extent, these questions act as a decision tree – answering some limit the options you have available in other questions. Because of this, I’ve tried listing the questions in the most common order that they are answered.
To a certain extent, all components in a laptop will affect performance, but the key components for performance are the Processor, Memory, Hard Drive, and Video Controller.
Laptops are typically grouped into screen size categories – 10”, 12”, 13”, 14”, 15”, 17”. 14” tends to be the standard that allows for almost all of the available options. 10” & 12” are usually considered Netbooks and you have to drop to an ultra-low voltage processor that significantly reduces computing power. 13” is usually considered “lightweight” laptops, but you sacrifice some features and available options. Going bigger only gets you minor additional features, but it increases the screen size and weight.
Weight is directly correlated to screen size, but there are other factors that affect this – optical drive, size of battery, construction of model, etc. In general, for the laptop itself, 14” laptops range from 4 lb - 6 lbs, 13” are 3 lbs - 5 lbs, and 15” laptops range from 5 lbs - 7lbs.
A docking station is mainly for convenience. It allows you to bring your laptop in, set it down in the dock, and immediately be connected to your monitor, mouse, keyboard, network connection, power, and any peripherals. You could still connect these manually every time you come in and it would work fine, but it can get tedious. Also, if you want two external displays on your laptop, then it would require a docking station. USB docking stations are not very good due to limitations on the bandwidth, so you would need to go with a “Business Class” laptop that supports a docking station.
This primarily affects two considerations – warranty and performance components.
- Warranty – I would strongly encourage getting at least a three year warranty. Beyond that, it depends on how long you plan on keeping the system. As a general rule of thumb, I recommend getting a warranty for one year less than you plan on keeping the system unless it is very inexpensive to add that extra year.
- Performance Components – This is where you get out your crystal ball and look into the future. You not only want to get a decent enough system that it will be running well right now, but also so that it will be running well three years from now as software packages increase in system requirements. This depends entirely on what you will be using on the system, but the more you increase the performance components, the longer the usable life of your system will be, barring hardware failure after the warranty expires.
- Processor – This determines how “fast” your computer is. We currently recommend that you get an iSeries Intel processor – either an i5 or an i7 (i3 only if performance isn’t important and you want a long battery life).
- Memory – This determines how much you can have open at a time. Either the number of applications simultaneously running or the size of a document within one application. Please be aware that you want at least 2 GB just for the operating system, not accounting for any applications you are running. If you exceed the amount of memory, the system will still work, but it significantly slows it down as it has to cache things that are running to the hard drive – which is much slower than memory.
- Hard Drive – This is where you store files, so the larger it is, the more you can store. It is STRONGLY recommended that you keep another backup of any files you don’t want to use in a secondary location off of the computer. Also, you need to decide between a 5400 RPM hard drive, a 7200 RPM hard drive, and a solid state drive. 5400 RPM is slower performance than the 7200 RPM drive, but takes less power so it extends battery life. Typically, we recommend a solid state drive increases performance and lengthens battery life even over the 5400 RPM drive. If price or large data sets stored locally on the drive is important than the other options may be preferable.
- Video Card – With the trend towards more graphical operating systems and applications, we recommend getting a discrete video card with its own memory, rather than an onboard video card with shared memory. If you are doing mapping or much video work, a discrete graphics card is a must.
This can cover a range of things and is definitely a good idea if you can afford it. Some examples of things that it would cover are - accidentally dropping the laptop, closing the laptop with a pen resting on the keyboard, accidentally spilling a drink on the laptop, leaving the laptop on the roof of your car and driving over it, etc.
This has a couple of different ramifications. Most laptops offer a 6-cell and 9-cell option. The length of the battery life goes up in direct proportion to the number of cells, but it also increases the weight of the system significantly. Take the number quoted by the manufacturer with a grain of salt as they tend to be under ideal circumstances – screen dimmed, wireless off, no optical drive running, minimal processor use, etc. If battery life is an important factor, look at third party reviews of the specific models you are looking at.
This not only includes things you might want to purchase at the same time as the system (like a carrying case, wireless mouse, and dock), but also things you may already have that you want to use with the system. Do you have a printer, scanner, external hard drive, or other device that you want to use with the system? Make sure that the laptop model you are looking at has the appropriate connection port and drivers for the operating system that you are getting on the system.
This would be things like – built-in webcam, backlit keyboard, Blu-Ray player, multimedia card reader, firewire port, Bluetooth, glossy or matte display, etc.
If you have any further questions regarding tablets, netbooks, laptops, or computers, you’re welcome to stop by the Forestry Computing Helpdesk and we’re happy to discuss it further with you.