Laptop advice please

[S600BSB]

I am going to be retiring soon and want to buy a laptop for normal home duties (no gaming). Have used Lenovo ThinkPads for longer than I care to remember for work, so one option would be to just buy similar - they have always seemed pretty reliable. However, thought it worth looking around at other manufacturers. Looking to spend up to £750. Any advice gratefully received.

[Tycho]

Any preference on OS? I know it is a cliche but if you upped the budget slightly then the MacBook Air M1 is brilliant, I bought one last year after being a Windows person for the whole if my life and I love it. You'll get great performance and software support and I haven't missed my old Windows machines at all. I bought a 2nd hand Dell Thunderbolt dock and hooked it up to a big monitor, keyboard and mouse to go with it.

[S600BSB]

Thanks. I have always used Windows, but just been reading about the Mac - the reviews are certainly astonishingly good. Will take a look at one!

[RizzoTheRat]

Check any software you want to use is available on Mac's though. If you're an iPhone or iPad user then it makes a lot of sense as they do integrate well. Generally more expensive than a windows laptop but will probably last longer.

If you stick with Windows take a look at the Dell outlet store. My wife and I both have Inspiron 2-in-1's from there and they're decent machines at a nice discount from the standard retail price. I wouldn't bother with a 2-in-1 fold back screen again though as I don't actually use that feature very often, but I wouldn't go back to non-touchscreen on a laptop.

[eeLee]

While there are some reliability issues with some MacBooks, my wife has a running MBP from 2013 that just keeps going (she did get a 2020 model because....)

Having said that, the reliability of ThinkPads is brilliant, I just sold an X61 for spares or repair that ran for 13 years. It has a fan failure, I would repair it but I don't want to buy a new fan. It would take 20 minutes to do the repair, they are easily serviced.

[Captain_Morgan]

I’d say it would depend on what you value in laptop and what kind of use it will get.

As you are heading into retirement will portability for increased travel become a greater benefit over say screen size?

If portability and battery life is a want then I’d agree the mb air is hard to look past if you have no incompatible sw issues, I’d even go so far as saying if you have a mix of home use and travel I’d consider upping the budget again to cover a monitor for home use.

If windows is a must for sw needs then dell and Lenovo both do 13-14” ultra portables but I’m not sure if they’ll fall into budget for the commercial grade products unless you went refurbished

The consumer grade offerings tend to be less robustly built an issue if traveling but perhaps not if it’s strictly for home use and would open up the option of 15-17” screens

[campionissimo]

I'd really recommend the Lenovo Ideapad Flex5, I bought 2 of them for the teenagers while they were studying from home, they've been really great. Internet stuff, watching movies (you can flip the screen over and stand it up), ms office work etc. Excellent battery life, super quick start up (in windows 10s mode, and windows 11), very lightweight and portable. Touchscreen too, which is great for some programs/websites. All in all, great little machine. Think I paid £400 for one, £450 for the other. AMD Ryzen3 chip.

[sgrimshaw]

Friend recently got this Samsung Galaxy Book:

https://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/samsung-galaxy-boo...

It's a lovely piece of kit

[anonymous-user]

Definitely look at how long the laptop is updated for. Makes a huge difference to its longevity, if it can be easily and reliably upgraded to a newer OS.

Macs are very good in this regard, as are business laptops.

My Mrs’ HP Envy and my old Sony Viao were supported for 3 years. My Dell Inspiron from 2018 isn’t getting support for Windows 11, so I won’t be upgrading it. It is still getting patched and updated for Windows 10 however.

[Tycho]

sgrimshaw said:

Friend recently got this Samsung Galaxy Book:

https://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/samsung-galaxy-boo...

It's a lovely piece of kit

Like really nice but I’d try and get a windows laptop with 16gb these days. My work laptop only has 8gb and it does slow down when a few things are open.

[AJB88]

S600BSB said:

I am going to be retiring soon and want to buy a laptop for normal home duties (no gaming). Have used Lenovo ThinkPads for longer than I care to remember for work, so one option would be to just buy similar - they have always seemed pretty reliable. However, thought it worth looking around at other manufacturers. Looking to spend up to £750. Any advice gratefully received.

Whats the usage? any reason for laptop over desktop?

[sgrimshaw]

Tycho said:

sgrimshaw said:

Friend recently got this Samsung Galaxy Book:

https://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/samsung-galaxy-boo...

It's a lovely piece of kit

Like really nice but I’d try and get a windows laptop with 16gb these days. My work laptop only has 8gb and it does slow down when a few things are open.

Don't disagree, but for £750 there's not much out there with 16gb RAM on board, especially if you want to stick with Intel CPU. In fact laptopsdirect, only have one ...

https://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/asus-k513ea-core-i...

[rustyuk]

You won't get a new Mac for £750, I paid nearly 1k for a 2013 Model. After being a massive Windows fan for years I can't see me buying another Windows laptop again.

Work have just sent me a brand new ThinkPad E15 i7 - it's ok I guess. Still rubbish compared to my 2013 Mac

[S600BSB]

Thanks for the advice. Got to use a MacBook Air M1 over the weekend and was very impressed. Think I am going to take the plunge.

[CorradoTDI]

S600BSB said:

Thanks for the advice. Got to use a MacBook Air M1 over the weekend and was very impressed. Think I am going to take the plunge.

Apple event tomorrow at 6PM so worth waiting for that!