Recommendations for a new lap top

[Roman Moroni]

I am totally clueless when it comes to all things IT, so I need some guidance from you chaps.

My current laptop is coming to the end of it's useful life, so lately I've been considering buying a new one. By a massive coincidence, as a thank you to their staff, work has given us a £250 gift voucher which can be spent in a number of places including Currys/PC World; I'm happy to match the amount for the right machine. I've looked at their website to find they have got around 150 in the right price bracket but I really don't know whats good, bad or somwhere it between. https://www.currys.co.uk/computing/laptops/laptops... Hence the post.

My needs are very simple. 98% of my use is looking at the internet, occasionally needed for letters etc and Word based documents from work. Both Mrs & Miss Moroni use tablets but I prefer a laptop. I assume a £500 budget is sufficent but I'm happy to be guided.

Your sage like help will be gratefully received.

[Martzip]

For what you need it for, you can't really go wrong even with a low end laptop.(I'm no computer expert here, just going off of my own experience) I pretty much play in the same area as far as my computer needs and typically go as cheap as possible - never had any issues. I would recommend maybe getting slightly more than 4GB of RAM as that can impact how many things you can have going at once and how quickly/easily you can switch between them, but even that's not a big issue. The one thing I'd look for in your case is a computer that comes with a free year of Microsoft Office so you have all the work apps you'll need and not have to pay for a subscription, at least not initially.

[Captain_Morgan]

At this price point if be looking for the newest processor, at least 8GB of ram & the largest ssd plus a known good make.

I wouldn’t worry about a office subscription as you can use office online foc if you company doesn’t have a Microsoft home use agreement & if you want local sw both open office & libra office are freeware & ms office compatible.

Of those laptops at curry’s I’d probably go with either of these depending on outright speed or battery life being the main criterion

https://www.currys.co.uk/products/lenovo-ideapad-3...

https://www.currys.co.uk/products/hp-15seq2510sa-1...

[.:ian:.]

Definitely get 8gb ram, minimum.
Have a look at dell outlet, basically new, same warranty, maybe a generic box.
https://m.dell.com/h5/m/uk/InventorySearch?brandId...

[grumbledoak]

Even with your low requirements,
. 4GB RAM is not enough to browse the web now! Get 8GB min.
. I would also spec an i5/Ryzen 5 or better,
. get a 512GB SSD if you can for a bit more longevity

then sort by price!

Based on that, and as above. the LENOVO IdeaPad or the HP Pavilions would work
. https://www.currys.co.uk/products/lenovo-ideapad-3...
. https://www.currys.co.uk/products/hp-pavilion-14ec...

this one breaks your budget but gets you the 512GB "disk"
. https://www.currys.co.uk/products/hp-pavilion-15eh...


If your voucher is more flexible you could also try the Dell Outlet, or Lenovo, or HP
. https://www.dell.com/en-uk/dfh/shop/dell-refurbish...
. https://www.lenovo.com/us/outletus/en/
. https://www.hp.com/gb-en/shop/offer.aspx?p=c-hp-ou...

[Alex Z]

Whatever they have with a Core i5 processor, 8gb RAM, full HD screen and a 256gb SSD will be fine.

You could get an ex-corporate Dell with the same spec for quite a bit less though.

[paulrockliffe]

Alex Z said:

Whatever they have with a Core i5 processor, 8gb RAM, full HD screen and a 256gb SSD will be fine.

You could get an ex-corporate Dell with the same spec for quite a bit less though.

Agree with this, with it being a laptop you should aim for the minimumish spec and then prioritise the form factor, screen size and build quality rather than paying for performance you don't need. How light do you want it, how big a screen do you need, do you want it to hinge over so it tents when you don't need the keyboard?

I presume they're all touch-screen these days, but if not, make sure you get a touchscreen. I would also want the option to add a second 8gb RAM board if possible as it gives you the option to do more demanding stuff down the line if your requirements change, but I wouldn't make that a deal-breaker.

It's probably also time well spent working out whether you need a Windows machine as you're spending about 10% of your budget on a Windows License and your description didn't list anything that you can't do on a Chromebook. Will you get faster performance and a thinner lighter machine for the same money if you go for Chrome OS instead of Windows?

[camel_landy]

Alex Z said:

You could get an ex-corporate Dell with the same spec for quite a bit less though.

FWIW - I usually get mine from ITZoo...

M

[DE1975]

At this point in time, it's probably worth holding out a few weeks Black Friday, as Currys usually have some decent reductions on laptops in their Black Friday sale.

[tangerine_sedge]

At this point, in true PH fashion, I'll chip in with something that 100% doesn't meet your criteria.

I always recommend Apple Macbooks for people who aren't particularly IT literate. ~£900 will get you a bottom spec Macbook, but it'll last for years and won't need very much maintenance at all. Case in point, My daughter and wife both have 4+ year old Macbooks which work as well as the day they were bought, and more importantly, I've never had to 'look at', 'patch', 'fix', tinker with, or swear at either of them. They just get on and do it themselves...

[RizzoTheRat]

Captain_Morgan said:

I wouldn’t worry about a office subscription as you can use office online foc if you company doesn’t have a Microsoft home use agreement & if you want local sw both open office & libra office are freeware & ms office compatible.

Re office, if you use 365 at work you may well find it's registered to you and you can use it on multiple machines, if not check if your work are on the Microsoft Home User Programme which will get you a discount on a MS subscription if you want it.

[camel_landy]

tangerine_sedge said:

At this point, in true PH fashion, I'll chip in with something that 100% doesn't meet your criteria.

I always recommend Apple Macbooks for people who aren't particularly IT literate. ~£900 will get you a bottom spec Macbook, but it'll last for years and won't need very much maintenance at all. Case in point, My daughter and wife both have 4+ year old Macbooks which work as well as the day they were bought, and more importantly, I've never had to 'look at', 'patch', 'fix', tinker with, or swear at either of them. They just get on and do it themselves...

+1...

M

[paulrockliffe]

The discount on HUP isn't what it was though unfortunately, it used to be a one-off fee for Office 20xx of about £20 and you could pay for things like Visio for £10 a pop. Now it's £5 a month, which is a huge increase in price if you only want to use the Desktop apps as your £20 would last you somewhere between 2 and 20 years.

But, it is still incredibly cheap for what it is and Office 365 is really very good if you use it, especially the Family version which is 6 Microsoft accounts and installs on several machines per license and 1Tb of storage per user. If you pay for storage at all, chances are O365 is a better bet. Mobile apps etc are very good these days too.

Get a family setup using To Do, Outlook and One Drive to organise everything, manage the household, do homework etc and it's a bargain. I mean with kids it's worth the £5 a month just so they know what's what when they end up in a job using Excel all day.

[the_stoat]

For your usage try a Chromebook. They are brilliant devices, especially the instant on when you open the lid and the no messing about setup.

[eeLee]

The M365 HUP is cheaper than the "list" price of M365 but we pay pretty much 50% of what MS will charge per year for Family. That's 1Tb OneDrive each and lots of software. Between SWMBO and me, we run across Windows, Mac, iPadOS, iOS and Android and have all of the files we need and software to do stuff with it for that low price.

FWIW, I have an ex-corporate ThinkPad X1 Carbon that flies still, has 8Gm RAM, runs Win11 and has the quickest SSD known to man. If you go new, I second the recent gen CPU and good RAM. Do not at this time in human civilisation get something that does not run from SSD.

[Magnum 475]

camel_landy said:

tangerine_sedge said:

At this point, in true PH fashion, I'll chip in with something that 100% doesn't meet your criteria.

I always recommend Apple Macbooks for people who aren't particularly IT literate. ~£900 will get you a bottom spec Macbook, but it'll last for years and won't need very much maintenance at all. Case in point, My daughter and wife both have 4+ year old Macbooks which work as well as the day they were bought, and more importantly, I've never had to 'look at', 'patch', 'fix', tinker with, or swear at either of them. They just get on and do it themselves...

+1...

M

And if you buy it from the Apple Certified Refurbished store, you'll get at least a 10% reduction from list price. I get most of my stuff that way, although it does mean you have to wait until the spec that you want is available.

[Turtle Shed]

Chromebook and £270 change. Since the day I bought my cheap and cheerful Acer I have been kicking myself for not buying one sooner.

Light as a feather, battery lasts all day, does everything I could ever want in a laptop.

[paulrockliffe]

Another thought; you could try installing Chrome OS Flex on your laptop, it's an easy way to check whether you can work with a Chromebook, but it might also breath enough new life into your machine that you can spend your windfall on something else?

I've installed it's predecessor from before Google bought it on some pretty ropey old crap and it's pretty amazing the difference it made. My only reservation is that laptops progress in size, weight, battery performance, so for a primary device you're probably better with new hardware too, but for what it does it's great.

[Vasco]

Personally, I'd always avoid Currys.

[grumbledoak]

OP, you will want to consider how frequently and how much compatibility you need with "Word based documents from work" before buying a Chromebook.