How to Buy Best Laptop for College – Students Guide

Irrespective of a person’s age, profession, and gender, laptops have emerged to be one of the most vital and necessary technical companions for the mankind. This also applies to students irrespective of what their education course or major is. Thanks to the growing electronic learning systems in the schools and colleges. Every student now needs an electronic assistance such as a laptop or a tablet whatsoever to keep up with the education.

Although most of us agree on the aforementioned fact that a laptop has now emerged to be a necessity, very few among us spend some minutes in researching about the laptop before buying it. If all the laptops available in the market can be used for all purposes, why would there be a broad categorization in the making of laptops? Isn’t it?

Buying a proper laptop, which suits your requirement is equally important as the purchase of a laptop itself. However, most of the students don’t actually end up picking a perfect match for them. If you’re a student and about to get a new laptop for yourself, we advise you to dig down to the bottom of our article, to get all the information required to buy a laptop.

Before buying a laptop, don’t just look for deals and offers. Instead, get a clear picture of what will be your primary requirement from the laptop. If you’re a school going student without a specific major, then buying a laptop with the latest set of specifications will be a wise move. That said, this way you will not only end up buying a powerful laptop. You are also guaranteed to have a future-proof laptop.

Irrespective of whether they are going to a school or a college, everyone needs a laptop in their respective study cycles. Now, buying a laptop from the crowded market is no less than a Herculean task. Especially for students, getting yourself a perfect match when it comes to the purchase of a laptop can be very tough as it largely depends on their respective education major. For instance, a student pursuing a degree in engineering or architecture needs a laptop with powerful processing and efficiency. Whereas, students related to any graphics development such as a game development or animation will need a laptop with powerful graphics.

Below are the primary aspects which you should watch out for and consider before buying a laptop.

Price:

This is undoubtedly a vital aspect before you buy a laptop. Choosing a right laptop is always bound to a specific budget, which varies from person to person. You can get a laptop for as low as $100, and they can go up to $1000 and above. So before starting to drill down on what to be brought, it is advisable first to get your budget fixed and search for the laptops in that price range. Ideally, we advise you to spend a decent amount of buying a laptop without compromising on the specifications as we don’t often buy a laptop. That said, it is a long-term investment which we put on a laptop.

Size and design:

Size and form-factor are another important aspects to be considered before buying a laptop. If your primary reason for the purchase of a laptop is gaming or any other graphics related applications, a laptop with a large screen such as a 17-incher should satisfy your requirements. On the other hand, if you need a compact machine which will be very easy to use and carry around, then a 13-inch laptop should be just fine. On a conclusive note, laptop size ranges from 11-inch to a 17-inches, and all these various sizes are meant to satisfy various users. Ideally, a laptop with a screen size of 13-15 inches should fit fine for most of the students, considering the fact that they might need to carry it daily to their schools or colleges.

Pick the right platform:

This seemingly negligible aspect can prove out quite vital once you end up buying a laptop. Although the operating system on a laptop can be changed, it is always advisable to buy the right one beforehand. Currently, the market is filled with various operating systems for the laptops among which Windows, Mac OS, and Linux occupy the major portion.

If you have a long list of applications which need to be installed on your new laptop, then a Windows machine can be quite advantages than that of others. Thanks to its extensive app support, customization, and ease of handling, Windows is currently the leading and most used OS across the globe. Moreover, almost all the application out in the market have a Windows variant, gaining the upper hand to all Windows users.

On the contrary, MacOS is the most refined computer OS available in the market. That said, the resource utilization on Mac OS is way better than that of any Windows or Linux based operating systems. However, Mac OS has its own disadvantages. Not all the applications in the market have a Mac supported versions. Moreover, Mac doesn’t allow the level of customization that Windows allows.

A Linux-based operating system is the most secure OS. It allows its users to lock the user’s data up to the file level. Most of the other OS doesn’t allow it by default. Linux based operating systems are very stable and are very less vulnerable to computer malware. Most importantly, a Linux OS provides an entirely open platform and users can integrate various applications on the system. The major drawback is that it will not have a great user experience as that of a Windows or Mac.

Configuration:

Although, it is not mandatory that a laptop stuffed with powerful innards will always provide good and stable performance. However, a robust set of configuration will always have the upper hand over others. Here is the set of few vital aspects to look out for.

Processor-Sixth generation Intel Core processors are the latest in the market and can provide stable performance. Now choosing between i3, i5 or i7 can rest with the user. AMD is also a powerful processor maker, especially for graphic related aspects such as gaming.

RAM:

Unless you are buying a laptop for your school going kids, a 4GB of RAM is barely sufficient these days. Ideally, an 8GB of RAM will be able to run almost everything you throw at it without a noticeable lag.

Storage: Now storage is a common aspect to look out for, and evidently more the storage, better is the laptop. But, most of the laptops these days are packing an SSD hard drive. Although SSD will have the lesser amount of storage, will have faster memory access.

Battery Life:

Finally, a decent battery life is always an added advantage. Although all of the laptop makers touts to provide an impeccable battery life, most of them do not stand up to their statements. So for all the students reading this article, don’t just rely on the company’s statements regarding the battery life. Go through their real-time performance reviews and decide before you buy.

Final Thoughts:

Apart from all the specifications mentioned above, there are several other aspects to consider before the purchasing of a laptop. Such as a number of ports, connectivity options, touchpad, and keyboard, brand, etc.

So it’s definitely not an easy task. You have to check a lot of things before you make the purchase of a laptop for school or college. If you don’t want to waste time in finding and shortlisting best laptop for you then you can check out Laptop Mag’s top picks of laptops for college. They have picked best laptop for each of the college majors in the US. Well, if you are finding the laptop within your pre-fixed budget then you can check out Laptop Under Budget’s top picks of college laptops. They have picked best laptops for college students for every budget so that guide will help you in finding the best laptop for college within your budget.

To wrap up things, you cannot get everything at your budget. You ultimately have to trade off with some of the specifications, and the art of buying a laptop relies on this trade-off you do. As mentioned earlier, each and every course have its own requirements for the students and their work machines aka laptops. Therefore, it’s up to the person to make a wise choice in choosing the right laptop suiting their course structure.

This article is written by Mike Johnson. He is a senior editor at Laptop Under Budget. He along with his team of laptop experts, helps people in buying best laptop within their budget. Follow him: Facebook | Twitter | Google+.