New work laptop recommendations?

lindsay

lindsay

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It goes against the grain for this dyed-in-the-wool fanboi of all things Apple, but for some work I'm doing for a client I need a Win10 laptop. I've tried doing it in a Parallels VM but it's slow even with lots of resources applied to the VM on my 2017 iMac, so I decided to take the hit - at least the VAT comes back and it's against CT. Needless to say the client is not buying one for me.
I want a good chunk of RAM (32Gb preferred), a very good processor(i9/Ryzen sort of thing), max 1Tb disk (not storing a lot, the db's are Azure cloud hosted), preferably 17in screen or as near as I can to that (I'll use an external screen onsite but can't always guarantee one being available).

Any recommendations? I was wondering about refurbished or new gaming laptops as an idea; I liked the Surface Book 3 but it doesn't seem to be up there with the best in reviews I've seen. Looking to buy today for fast delivery, so will keep an eye on this thread this morning and hope for some ideas.
Thanks
 
lindsay56 said:
It goes against the grain for this dyed-in-the-wool fanboi of all things Apple, but for some work I'm doing for a client I need a Win10 laptop. I've tried doing it in a Parallels VM but it's slow even with lots of resources applied to the VM on my 2017 iMac, so I decided to take the hit - at least the VAT comes back and it's against CT. Needless to say the client is not buying one for me.
I want a good chunk of RAM (32Gb preferred), a very good processor(i9/Ryzen sort of thing), max 1Tb disk (not storing a lot, the db's are Azure cloud hosted), preferably 17in screen or as near as I can to that (I'll use an external screen onsite but can't always guarantee one being available).

Any recommendations? I was wondering about refurbished or new gaming laptops as an idea; I liked the Surface Book 3 but it doesn't seem to be up there with the best in reviews I've seen. Looking to buy today for fast delivery, so will keep an eye on this thread this morning and hope for some ideas.
Thanks
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First up; the Surface Book 3 is pretty good; although its possibly not as powerful as you might be looking for; I had the 32GB RAM, i7 model from work for a while and really enjoyed using it though!

Do you need a beefy graphics card?

Decent list of 17” device here: https://www.techradar.com/uk/news/best-17-inch-laptop

Personally I’d be looking at a Dell XPS 17 they get great reviews; pricey though!
 
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I'm expecting to pay upto £2.5k inc vat so will look at Dell recommendations above, thanks. The XPS17 is a bit beyond my budget, looks great but not viable I reckon.
 
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lindsay56 said:
I'm expecting to pay unto £2.5k inc vat so will look at Dell recommendations above, thanks
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That's a huge budget for your spec! Lucky! My first port of call would be the dell outlet for work - you can find some great deals on the precision series. I believe their stock changes daily, so you may not see what you are looking for immediately.

Chris
 
toohuge said:
I would be looking at a dell precision laptop - these will have the lifting power you need. Failing that, HP & Lenovo all make portable workstations that will suit your needs.

The alienware laptops are good, but you'll be paying for specs that are optimized for gaming
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This, using a refurbished one now it is far better than any other I had.
 
Thanks @toohuge I've ordered the refurbished one on the outlet, it does indeed exceed my requirements and I'm not precious that it is "refurbished" rather than new. Thanks v much for the tip.
 
A little late to the party - I think this should be a good choice. Bought my XPS 15 from the outlet in 2014 and it came as new, but with a clean install of Windows only (no bloatware). Hopefully your experience will be as good.
 
A bit late, since you've already ordered, but make sure it uses an SSD (preferably an M2 PCIe NVMe type) and not a traditional SATA Hard drive.
 
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