I have an eight-year-old laptop that needs replacing and I’m paralyzed. What are the most reliable ones now? Do I need a desktop for CAD? Pros and cons of operating systems (and where do I find them?) Browsers ditto? Where do I find answers that aren’t just product marketing?
A number of posts have mentioned brands, but it’s very important to consider the line within the brand. Consumer-oriented lines from HP (Pavilion, Essential), Dell (Inspiron, Vostro), and Lenovo (Idea pad, Legion) are absolutely terrible. Plastic everything, difficult/impossible repairs, no upgrades, etc. Every corner that can be cut, has.
Instead, look to the enterprise lines. Lenovo Thinkpad (my preference)/Think centre, Dell Latitude/Precision, HP Elitebook. I usually find the older ones (3-5 years old) that are off-least after enterprises are done with them, do a minor upgrade, and I’m good to go for a long time. Obviously that will depend on your needs, skill set, and desires.
HP is terrible at every level. Dell and Lenovo enterprise machines are fine
Even Lenovo dropped the ball on their latest Thinkpads. Terrible thermal design, they messed up their BIOS (long boot times, Lenovo support just told my colleague to roll back to an older version, lol. Then the next support call they wouldn’t give support because he wasn’t on the newest version). Overall total bullshit for fully decked out $3000 machines.
Personally I’d never buy a laptop if I can avoid it, desktop parts are just so much better and cost less.