Engineers and their laptops

Posted on by adityajayaprasad

As a college student,I have various needs.Not everyone of them are necessary but some are.

Laptops are one of the most essential daily needs of any college students but also the most exploited need. A college student requires a decent laptop but not a high end gaming one.I am a Mechanical Engineer and  i have used processor and graphic intensive CAD applications.For a budget oriented student an i5 processor and a AMD graphic card would be sufficient.Below that would be a struggle at least in Mechanical Engineering.An ideal configuration would include a i5 processor and a NVIDIA graphic card.I have a Lenovo y510p and it is overkill for engineering requirements.I find it a really good buy although i had to change the motherboard .I felt the bulid quality of Lenovo has declined over the years and the customer care is horrible.I bought this laptop for two reasons

  • The value for money.
  • The ability to add a second graphic card(SLI)when its a requirement.

The Laptop has served me very well.Its a bit on the heavier side though and carrying it around is not the most comfortable thing.

I paid $1200 the whole package which included the following specification:

  1. Full HD display (1980 x 1080)
  2. A intel core i7 4800MQ processor
  3. 8GB of RAM
  4. Nvidea GT 755M (with ultrabay for SLI)
  5. A beautiful red backlit keyboard which is a delight to type on.I consider this as one of the most comfortable keyboards that i have ever used.Seriously!!
  6. JBL Speakers which are front facing and a downward facing woofer.
  7. 25 GB SSD in which most of the drivers and boot files are located

This would not be the most affordable laptop but its worth every penny that i paid for it.Other than the horrific experience that i had with lenovo service center,I only have positives to speak about this machine.The Lenovo service center did not know how to put my laptop back together.I could a whole blog about the horrible service.They changed my motherboard after 3 weeks,randomly threw my laptop together and gave it to me.The display is beautiful and a joy to watch movies and read notes from.  It has never let me down.The brushed aluminium finish on the top is a finger print magnet though.

I do not recommend to buy  this laptop as of now.For the same amount of money you could get a MSI GP 70 Leopard Pro which is a 17.3 inch multimedia and gaming monster with a GTX 950M.

A more budget oriented option would be the Lenovo Z510.My friend owns one and is a good daily all round machine.HP offers some very good machines.Click here for more details of that.Lenovo g580 could also be a good bet but remember to always extend your warranty.I learnt it the hard way.I paid $250 for that.

At the end of the day it depends on what are you planning to do with your laptop.I would recommend you to invest some time into researching about what your needs are.I would also recommend you to buy a laptop that could be used for 4-5 years.Always keep that buffer.Remember technology is advancing fast and you don’t want to be that guy who spent everything on yesterdays technology.Be smart and always buy the best.

 

 

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