Want to Buy a New Laptop? It’s Easy If You Do It Smart
What do you need to keep in mind when you want to buy a new laptop?
Some people may look for the consumer reports best laptops or laptops for college students’ consumer reports depending on their needs.
But here, we will give you some other things to consider.
After reading our post, you can become an “expert” in choosing a laptop or giving shopping advice to your friends. Let’s get started right now.
How to buy a new laptop
Your Demand
Laptops are becoming an indispensable item for many people, from students to employees. However, you need to determine your demands like studying, working, playing games, enjoying entertainment or surfing the web before bringing them home.
Based on actual needs, we can divide as follows:
- Laptops for basic purposes: If your demand is not high, the low-profile laptops will satisfy you and save money.
- Laptop for gaming: In case you use your computer to play high graphic games such as PUBG, Fifa Online 3, League of Legends, laptops with high configuration, for example, core i5 or more upper will be suitable. As such, your computer can run smoother, less hanging or shaking during playing.
- Laptop for graphic design or programming: With specific graphic design or programming tasks, you need a powerful configuration laptop with high capacity graphics card, CPU, and RAM. The reason is that the application or the software tools for design and programming are quite heavy, requiring advanced processing programs.
Your budget
You should set a budget before you buy anything, especially a quite expensive product like a laptop.
With basic needs, you can spend less money to own a laptop to surf the web and use office applications like Word, Excel. Laptops with higher prices are ideal for those who need high-configuration for gaming, graphic design, or programming.
You know what? Old computers can still work well, but the new software may not be compatible with it. So you should replace the new laptop to keep up with technology changes.
Operating System
On the market, there are many operating systems, but the standard operating systems on laptops are Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux. Based on your work as well as operating system features, you can find the proper one that best suits you.
- The most popular one is Windows, with the ability to adjust quickly, connect with compatible peripherals and good security, and support for many applications.
- In contrast, Mac OS offers high stability, great security, but products running this operating system are quite expensive, such as Macbook.
- Finally, Linux is an open-source operating system with many different versions like Ubuntu or Fedora.
This type of operating system is entirely free but difficult to use. Additionally, the number of applications that support this operating system is still limited.
Hardware
To judge whether a computer is strong or weak, the hardware is the decisive factor for performance. Check them out carefully before paying anything.
Screen Size
The screen is an essential factor to pay attention to when buying a new laptop. The big difference between Full HD quality and a regular screen is easily noticeable. Currently, two screen sizes that are used by many customers are 14″ and 15.6″.
The big screen can satisfy your entertainment needs and support your work better. However, if you usually bring your laptop to work or school, look for the small screen from 10.1″ to 13.3″.
Central Processing Unit
The central processing unit (CPU) is the main factor that determines the speed of the laptop. Following your needs, you will choose the right processor. You should buy a CPU of Intel or AMD because these are two famous brands and trusted by users for many years.
Generally, the chip names like Core i3, Core i5, or Core i7 are popular. Core i3 is simple enough to use for everyday work. If you use the laptop for graphic design, programming, and gaming, the Core i5 and Core i7 are great choices.
RAM
RAM is a vital component of the laptop. It acts as a cache to create space when you run the applications. One tip for you is to buy a laptop with 4GB RAM or more. When you are doing graphics or playing games, you should choose 8GB RAM.
VGA
VGA (Video Graphics Adaptor) is also essential for those who play games or make graphics. There are two leading manufacturers for the graphics card, Nvidia and AMD. You should buy discrete VGA from Nvidia for gaming and AMD for graphics. These options will help you get more compatibility.
Hard Drive
Many people only care about hard drive capacity but forget about the type of hard drive, although that is much more important. Hard drive affects the speed of copying data and booting.
If some parts of the computer are damaged, you can repair them. However, when a hard drive has a problem, the data is difficult to retrieve.
There are two main types of hard drives. They are HDD (Hard Disk Drive) and SSD (Solid State Drive).
SSD speeds up applications, read, write, and transfer data many times faster than HDD, and it also has a more extended life expectancy. With many advantages, the price of SSD is higher, so you should consider when choosing between these two types.
Some Other Factors
In addition to choosing carefully the hardware configuration such as RAM, CPU, and hard drive, do not ignore some small details but also bring many utilities. Here they are:
Keyboard
The keyboard has a good bounce will help your data entry becomes easier and smoother. Besides, buying a laptop with a keyboard light will be very useful for you to use in places with lowlights.
Connectivity
Not all the ports you need are on your laptop, so trouble can occur when you can’t find some ports to use. Therefore, you check your current work connected to which port, then find the most necessary ones.
Warranty Policy
Before buying any kind of products, you should find out the policy, the time, and the quality of the warranty. This information is essential because the electronic components are often broken.
Even famous brands also cannot wholly guarantee, and the repairing cost is not cheap at all. Be aware of this, guys!
