Laptop Choices - Recording a Secondary Concern

  • Thread starter Thread starter Sky Blue Lou
  • Start date Start date
Sky Blue Lou

Sky Blue Lou

Well-known member
Seems as though the desktop days are waning. I have a decent box still running Win10. It will not handle Win11 so its days are definitely numbered. I don't game and if were to get into it I would have a dedicated box. I have an older recording box that I am going to stick with for now but having Reaper on the laptop for experimenting (maybe with some mobile stuff) is the plan. Looks like the CD/DVD readers are no longer standard - what's up with that? I'm looking for suggestions but figure basic specs should be 16gb+ RAM, 500gb+ drive, 16"+ screen (no touch), Win11Pro, etc... What about connections? There are multiple options amongst the various versions of USB and HDMI and WTF is Thunderbolt? I have a long time dislike for HP products but that may be foolish these days. Same with Dell. I have better feelings about Lenovo, ASUS, Acer and etc but that may also be misplaced.

Budget is $1500 or less. Thoughts/recommends?

Thanx.
 
I have had good luck with Dell in my professional career, and my wife has had several Dell laptops. The laptop I bought for myself in 2022 was about $1500 and is a Dell xps-15 with an I-7 processor, I maxed out the RAM at 32 GB and 1 TB SSD. It currently has Win 10 Pro and I am not planning to upgrade to 11. I have Reaper installed, and Vegas Pro for video editing. It works well and I use it more than my work station for recording because I can easily move it to where I am working or take it with me when traveling.
 
R D Smith said:
I have had good luck with Dell in my professional career, and my wife has had several Dell laptops. The laptop I bought for myself in 2022 was about $1500 and is a Dell xps-15 with an I-7 processor, I maxed out the RAM at 32 GB and 1 TB SSD. It currently has Win 10 Pro and I am not planning to upgrade to 11. I have Reaper installed, and Vegas Pro for video editing. It works well and I use it more than my work station for recording because I can easily move it to where I am working or take it with me when traveling.
Click to expand...
Do you have any concerns going online with it after Win10 support ends?
 
My current laptop is about 6-7 years old and going very strong. I very deliberately placed a custom order for a Lenovo *business class* laptop (not the regular Lenovo consumer grade machine). As I recall - I simply went to the website and chose the options I wanted. Seems like it came in about $12-1300.00.

I've had several Lenovo business class laptops and they've all been very solid.
 
Are business class more robust physically or component-wise? Any other differences?
 
Been running a Surface Pro for the last few years. Had the 6, now on the 9.
I5 16gb, and replaced the 256gb SSD with 1tb.
Super portable and runs very well, BUT... screen is 13", and is touch. That is alright by me as I use the dock for 2 more large screens in my office along with ports.
Also useful as a tablet.
 
Dave Matthews said:
Been running a Surface Pro for the last few years. Had the 6, now on the 9.
I5 16gb, and replaced the 256gb SSD with 1tb.
Super portable and runs very well, BUT... screen is 13", and is touch. That is alright by me as I use the dock for 2 more large screens in my office along with ports.
Also useful as a tablet.
Click to expand...
Yeah thanks but no. I need a physical keyboard and a larger screen. I also don't like touch screen. I get grimy mitts sometimes.
 
Sky Blue Lou said:
Yeah thanks but no. I need a physical keyboard and a larger screen. I also don't like touch screen. I get grimy mitts sometimes.
Click to expand...
Yeah I get it. I do have the Surface keyboard which works well, but this platform is not for everyone, nothing is. :-)
 
Lou, why the down on HP? I have a 15.6" i3 g6 W7 machine that still works very well. Yes, it has had a new screen in it because I damaged it and yes, a new keyboard but then it has had years of hammering!
I also would not worry about the W10 machine going on line, the HP does several times a week and I have no trouble and just run Msoft anti-mal for free and the free MalwareBytes once a month or so. Rarely do any of them find any nasties.

I am typing on a Lenovo T510 W10 and shall not go W11 until I am forced too. If and when I shall be looking at a 17" laptop, refurbed...probably be looking at W12 or 14 by then! Well, NEVER going to be a 13 is there?

Dave.
 
Dave Matthews said:
Yeah I get it. I do have the Surface keyboard which works well, but this platform is not for everyone, nothing is. :-)
Click to expand...
Agreed. I am exploring alternatives for my future. I have 4 computers at my house that get some use. The one I'm working now is the workhorse but needs hardware upgrading for the switch to Win11. Not gonna happen. The others are for other things. This or one will be a backup/server with the workhorse machines in the house networked to it. Whichever one has the most oomph. OS doesn't matter - it won't be on the web. Everything will get backed up there and then backed up to external drives from there. (I have too many files/photos/importan shit to lose a drive now.) So I need a new future-proofed workhorse and if I can take it traveling all the better.
 
ecc83 said:
Lou, why the down on HP? I have a 15.6" i3 g6 W7 machine that still works very well. Yes, it has had a new screen in it because I damaged it and yes, a new keyboard but then it has had years of hammering!
I also would not worry about the W10 machine going on line, the HP does several times a week and I have no trouble and just run Msoft anti-mal for free and the free MalwareBytes once a month or so. Rarely do any of them find any nasties.

I am typing on a Lenovo T510 W10 and shall not go W11 until I am forced too. If and when I shall be looking at a 17" laptop, refurbed...probably be looking at W12 or 14 by then! Well, NEVER going to be a 13 is there?

Dave.
Click to expand...
Is there ever going to be a Win12? I have actually heard it will essentially be 11a. I had a bad experience with some HP products back in the day and I do not like their business model - give away the printers and rape em on the ink cartridges. Yeah it works...

Yeah end of service for Win10 is October 2025 so I am not going to by a brand new 10 box now. The laptop I have for travel at the moment I have stripped and am giving to my mom for typing and printing her recipes, journals and etc... She won't be going on line with it, she has an iPad for that. She wants a physical keyboard and easy printing. (She's 92.)

I am leaning Lenovo.
 
Touch screens are wonderful.
I don't dab on them most of the time, but they're great for scrolling up and down a page like this.
Lenovo laptops are good for touch screens.

Sod Windows for general browsing or editing documents. I use Suse Linux.
Just downloaded Suse Leap 15.6, and discovered the media player now plays MP4 videos. Pleased.
 
Sky Blue Lou said:
Is there ever going to be a Win12? I have actually heard it will essentially be 11a. I had a bad experience with some HP products back in the day and I do not like their business model - give away the printers and rape em on the ink cartridges. Yeah it works...

Yeah end of service for Win10 is October 2025 so I am not going to by a brand new 10 box now. The laptop I have for travel at the moment I have stripped and am giving to my mom for typing and printing her recipes, journals and etc... She won't be going on line with it, she has an iPad for that. She wants a physical keyboard and easy printing. (She's 92.)

I am leaning Lenovo.
Click to expand...
At one time MS said that WIn 10 would be the last "version" of Windows. You see how that worked out. I guess they couldn't obsolete an estimated 13 million PC currently running Win 10 (or lower) without changing the version number. You know that all the PC manufacturers are saying "thank you for the extra sales".

I have been running this Lenovo S340 for quite a few years (10th Gen). It's a laptop, and usually resides on my lap or on the TV tray next to my recliner. It's my browsing computer, but I have Reaper on it so I can piddle with stuff in the family room if I want.

My audio computer is a 4th gen I5 so unless I hack the system, it's staying on 10. 12GB ram. 1TB SSD and 2TB Barracuda drive. It does my audio and video editing just fine. I'm not entirely happy with Win11, so I probably won't upgrade it. (I think their menu system SUCKS the big weenie vs Win10)

My online/email/taxes/banking computer was upgraded to a WIn 11 Lenovo Ideacentre 12th gen I5. I added as second drive, and upped the memory to 24GB from the original 8.

You can buy the updated system for $500 right now at Staples. Lenovo IdeaCentre Tower Desktop Computer, Intel Core i5-14400, 8GB RAM, 512GB SSD, Mouse & Keyboard Included, Windows 11 Home $509.99.

Get 16GB of Crucial DDR5 memory for it for $60 and a 2 TB Barracuda drive for another $60 and you should have more than enough to run Reaper and go online as well. About $630 total and you're good to go for another 8 to 10 years. It even comes with an optical drive, although I grabbed a USB burner for $20 to use with my laptop so I could actually use 2 burners on it.
 
Oh yeah, Around 2006, I bought an HP Plasma TV. It went out within the 1 year warranty. They tried to fix it but couldn't so they sent me a refurbished unit. The issue was it came with a 90 day warranty. I went all the way to the customer service manager and got nothing better than 90 days. I told him "You obviously don't have much faith in your products!!!" I then told the CS manager that after having everything from an HP calculator in college, HP monitors, printers, computer, DVD drives, etc for years that I would NEVER buy another piece of HP gear. (and those were the days when a calculator cost $200+, laser printers were $1000. I've stuck to that since 2006. I've bought at least 6 computers for myself and my daughter in that time. I have Asus, Lenovo, Dell but no HP. I've also recommended to people other computers, specifically avoiding HP stuff.

The funny part is that the refurbished TV ended up lasting 18 years. I just replaced it this spring! If the doofus CS manager had said he would tack the 90 days on at the end of the 2 or 3 months remaining on the original TV, I probably would have sold at least a half dozen systems for them in that time.

Not that they care.....
 
Ha haa. Yeah not an HP fan.
Anyway, I have desktop/towers coming out my ass. 2 here and a spare server at work - all i5 minimum. Plenty robust for what I need and none of them will go online so Win10 will be good. This new laptop will be my magic carpet to the future and until I retire for good will go to work with me as well.
 
I had a HP LaserJet 5L printer, which the paper stood up vertically in a trough.
It would often grab 20 sheets at once, then get stuck.
The only thing HP got right was to integrate a new BubbleJet printhead on every ink cartridge.
 
Thanks for the input guys. I went with the Lenovo Thinkpad e16. Ultra 5 cpu, 32 gig RAM, 512 SSD. Should do what I want. $1100 after coupons and such, free shipping.
 
Sky Blue Lou said:
Do you have any concerns going online with it after Win10 support ends?
Click to expand...
No. I ran Windows 7 Pro on my work station until I got this laptop with 10 and decided it was a good upgrade. I learned during my professional career, to be careful with upgrades, they sometimes have side effects that can take days to resolve. When you work for a big company, the IT department takes care of it if something blows up. Since I was a contractor, I didn't get paid to work on fixing my computer for days, consequentially, I only upgraded when a piece of software required it.

Now, I just run a script blocker, and don't click on pop ups or strange emails I receive.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top