[Kestrel5915]

Originally Posted by sgiitk

As for Lenovo Thinkpads, both I am our son had HDD failures about the 2-3 year mark. One may be just a chance, but two - something seriously wrong. I got the HD uninstalled, since I was in a hurry and my friendly dealer just gave the unit to me with the disk there. So I was able to do a 'clean' install with none of the Lenovo junk.

Which series Thinkpads were those?
I'm looking to buy one, most likely P or W series.

[Aroy]

In my opinion only T and X series of Thinkpads are worth buying. The other series have better option from Dell and HP.

[sgiitk]

My Thinkpad battery has packed up. Now I will have to get a new machine. Since my usage is limited to Tally and occasional work where a Win system is required, I am now looking at i5, 4GB, 500GB, Win10 systems. Preferably 14" or 15". Any suggestions?

[latentpotential]

Originally Posted by sgiitk

My Thinkpad battery has packed up. Now I will have to get a new machine. Since my usage is limited to Tally and occasional work where a Win system is required, I am now looking at i5, 4GB, 500GB, Win10 systems. Preferably 14" or 15". Any suggestions?

1. Replacement battery on ebay?
2. The new inspiron models from Dell, they are 2 in 1 with foldable touchscreens. Have two of these now, in 13 and 11 inch sizes. You can extend warranty to 5 years.

[landcruiser123]

Originally Posted by sgiitk

My Thinkpad battery has packed up. Now I will have to get a new machine. Since my usage is limited to Tally and occasional work where a Win system is required, I am now looking at i5, 4GB, 500GB, Win10 systems. Preferably 14" or 15". Any suggestions?

If you're interested, buy the new generation Dell Inspiron 15 5000 series.
This model isn't available on most e-retailers and your choices are Dell's website or their exclusive store.

Note that this model has the DDR4 RAM and is powered by the 7th gen processor.

[sgiitk]

Originally Posted by latentpotential

1. Replacement battery on ebay?

I have had enough problems with my ThinkPad. The touch screen went Kaput at about the same time as Win10 upgrade. HDD failed (both mine & my son's). There is a time when on does not throw good money after bad.

[r_devakumar]

Originally Posted by kkkkkaran

HP 15-ay516TX 15.6-inch Laptop (6th Gen Core i5-6200U/4GB/1TB/FreeDOS 2.0/2GB Graphics), Turbo Silver https://www.amazon.in/dp/B06Y64D31X/..._NhTrzbYG21QBQ

This is on sale on Amazon for another 22 hours. Pick this up, along with the required RAM upgrade and SSD. All of it should fit well under 50k INR.

For SSD: Kingston UV400 or Samsung 850 Evo depending on your budget.
The internal HDD that you remove can be used as an extern al disk by purchasing an external casing for it.

Adding the RAM and SSD should be a simple 10 minute DIY.

I am still researching and will take another week or two before buying. Came across the below:

1. Lenova 80SV001SIH (Intel Core i5-7200U/8GB/1TB/Windows 10/nVidia 4GB) - 56K

2. Dell Inspiron 5559 Core i7 6th gen, 8 gb ram, 1 tb hdd, 15.6" screen, 2 gb amd graphics - 62K

Dell is with i7 & 2GB graphics and Lenova is with i5 & 4GB graphichs. With SSD upgrade, I am thinking Lenova would be a better option with 4GB graphics and also close to my budget (60K). Apart from studies, the laptop will be used for occasional gaming also.

[sgiitk]

@landcruiser123; Right now things are in a cold storage due to impending GST. In fact my vendor is unable to get pricing for most brands.

[aditya.bhardwaj]

Need some help guys ! I am an architect and interior designer by profession and i want to purchase a laptop. I already have a workstation at home for all the heavy softwares like Autocad, Sketchup. It is basically a very good rendering machine.

Now i used to use an HP laptop earlier which died on me two years back. I plan to get a mac book air which is costing around 60k as my requirements are good battery backup and mostly i will be running Autocad 2D and microsoft office. No heavy softwares would be used on this.

PS: I have never used a mac before and have been using a windows laptop since the start.

Is this a good decision to move on to a different OS and will this sustain for the next 3 to 4 years. I do keep all my gadgets very securely.

[Aroy]

Originally Posted by aditya.bhardwaj

Need some help guys ! I am an architect and interior designer by profession and i want to purchase a laptop. I already have a workstation at home for all the heavy softwares like Autocad, Sketchup. It is basically a very good rendering machine.

Now i used to use an HP laptop earlier which died on me two years back. I plan to get a mac book air which is costing around 60k as my requirements are good battery backup and mostly i will be running Autocad 2D and microsoft office. No heavy softwares would be used on this.

PS: I have never used a mac before and have been using a windows laptop since the start.

Is this a good decision to move on to a different OS and will this sustain for the next 3 to 4 years. I do keep all my gadgets very securely.

Even for Autocad 2D the CPU and RAM requirements are pretty steep. So I would suggest that you do some research on the type of computer (CPU, RAM etc) recommended for Autocad.
https://knowledge.autodesk.com/suppo...-Mac-2017.html
We have two Apple Macs Laptops, one dual XEON Desktop and two PC laptops in our family. For trouble free idiot proof operations Apple is excellent. But that comes at a steep price.

Unless you are running free version of older software on your HP laptop, you will need a separate license for running Autocad on Apple.

I suggest that you stick to Windows based Laptops, as the price range is enormous and support in Delhi quite good.

[sgiitk]

Originally Posted by aditya.bhardwaj

Need some help guys ! I am an architect and interior designer by profession and i want to purchase a laptop. I already have a workstation at home for all the heavy softwares like Autocad, Sketchup. It is basically a very good rendering machine.

Now i used to use an HP laptop earlier which died on me two years back. I plan to get a mac book air which is costing around 60k as my requirements are good battery backup and mostly i will be running Autocad 2D and microsoft office. No heavy softwares would be used on this.

PS: I have never used a mac before and have been using a windows laptop since the start.

Exactly mu situation from a year ago. I recommend a Mac. Initially it is a pain to us used to Windoze, but the build quality and stability does you a lot of good. We also have a thread on the Mac which helps a lot in case of queries. Make sure that Autocad 2D works on the Mac.

[Fillmore]

Originally Posted by aditya.bhardwaj

Need some help guys ! I am an architect and interior designer by profession and i want to purchase a laptop. I already have a workstation at home for all the heavy softwares like Autocad, Sketchup. It is basically a very good rendering machine.

Now i used to use an HP laptop earlier which died on me two years back. I plan to get a mac book air which is costing around 60k as my requirements are good battery backup and mostly i will be running Autocad 2D and microsoft office. No heavy softwares would be used on this.

PS: I have never used a mac before and have been using a windows laptop since the start.

Is this a good decision to move on to a different OS and will this sustain for the next 3 to 4 years. I do keep all my gadgets very securely.

If you have never used a Mac and would like to try one out , its a good idea to go for a Mac. It is cool and worth the experience.

However don't expect to be blown away. These quotes you hear like "Once on a Mac never on Windows..." etc no longer hold water in my opinion, because things are different today. When on equal or better hardware i.e. 8+gb ram and an SSD, Windows 10 is as efficient and has its benefits when compared to a Mac.

These following are purely my personal opinions so most likely they would be many who may agree/disagree.
My experiences are based on the following
- My work laptop is Windows 7 - non SSD
- Have a Windows 10 personal Laptop SSD
- Have a Mac on McOS Sierra personal Laptop SSD

Where I find the Mac is better
- Video editing, Image editing, Music mixing etc.. (mac has better tools and utilities)
- If you don't use a mouse the touchpad is superior and has more functionality
- Software Install / Uninstall steps are simpler
- Reduced viruses / malware compared to Windows
- Unix flavor inbuilt if you are a scripting guy

Where I prefer Windows 10
- It is easier and cheaper to upgrade your hardware (Ram/SSD) on Win vs getting ripped off on a Mac, where you are locked down on selecting an insanely expensive laptop if you want better specs.
- Multitasking / ease of navigation between apps find Win10 better
- Windows snapping / resizing multiple windows is better on Windows
- Availability of software again Windows 10 has more options
- Microsoft Office : The Windows ver is superior to the Mac ver. It has many more widgets and controls that are missing on the Mac ver.
- Copying into external drives etc. NTFS is more widely used than Mac FS (both cannot write to each others filesystems , except if you use FAT )

[landcruiser123]

Hello Laptop Gurus,
I'm looking to buy a laptop for grad school in the US. I'm thinking of buying it now and shipping it to a close friend and collecting it later when I reach the US.

Budget: $800-1000 (Lesser the better, I'm planning to buy a 21" monitor too)
Requirements:
1. SSD (advised by a lot of seniors)- 256/512 GB, 512 preferable
2. Good to Great Battery Life
3. 14" preferable, 15.6" or 13.3" also okay
4. Full HD screen (Minimum)
5. External graphics is welcome, but integrated graphics will suffice for my tasks
6. ASAP- As Small As Possible

I saw these two deals:
https://www.amazon.com/Lenovo-Flex-T...n%3A9521908011

https://www.amazon.com/Acer-Aspire-C...C4HHXPM1Q9203R

Which is better and what are the differences?

Also, are ThinkPads worth the extra $100 I will spend on them?

Also, any pointers to look out for better deals? (I have a .edu mail ID)

TIA

[sgiitk]

I have bought another Lenovo. Yoga 710 80V40095IH. HP had jacked up their specs and prices. Lenovo were following suit. Mine is i5, 4GB, no separate graphics, and 256GB SSD. It has a 14" display. The next one is coming at 8GB+512GB and 13.3". My dealer convinced me that he will provide the support.

[dark.knight]

Originally Posted by landcruiser123

Also, are ThinkPads worth the extra $100 I will spend on them?

I don't know about the specs or the other details like pricing, value etc but I will answer this one question of yours. I've been using a ThinkPad from my student days as well, my very first laptop was an IBM ThinkPad.

Ever since whenever the need to buy a new laptop arose (which was only 2 more times), the thinking was - "which ThinkPad?", that's about it. Lenovo were contract manufacturers of IBM's laptops for 2 decades, they bought the rights for the ThinkPad and ever since they diversified into making normal Chinese spec laptops called Lenovo. The difference here, even if both the laptops come from the same factory is about as much as a Geely (Chinese car brand) and a Rolls-Royce, yes, TP is that good. Why?

- Magnesium Alloy frame and roll-cage protection for HDD
- Water drain holes in keyboard to prevent HDD/screen damage
- Carbon fiber composite plastic lid behind the monitor
- Rubber dampened, long travel-keyboard.. best on earth
- Best in class warranty
- Best in class reliability (the first IBM TP lasted 6 years and was exchanged only because I wanted a faster processor, it was operationally perfect)

TP is popular in US, apart from MacBook and Alien. I highly recommend only Thinkpads, no Dell, Lenovo, Asus or Mac can compete by a mile.