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-   -   The Laptop Thread: Configs, deals & questions (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/gadgets-computers-software/67390-laptop-thread-configs-deals-questions-405.html)

I'm not sure if you want me to answer those questions. My assumption (which could be erroneous) is that when you ask for recommendations, you want the best possible value and not things which are observable and matter to a normal customer. You certainly don't want someone to just confirm your choices.

When you're comparing the Legion and the F15, you're comparing a laptop that's best-in-class to one that's close to the bottom-of-the-barrel for its price-range. The A15, which you also mentioned, is even worse:- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRDUR-rPGsM

Please don't take this the wrong way but when you talk about them in the same breath, it tells me that you know very little about laptops. This is perfectly fine ofcourse, I'm sure there are things I know very little about relative to you and would hope that you'd lend me your knowledge should I need it. Because if I had to research everything and come to my own conclusions, I would never get anything done (which by the way if you were to research these laptops, I'm positive you'd arrive at the same conclusions).

Please don't sell yourself short by saying things like "I'm not an avid gamer". You're buying a gaming laptop (and if you didn't care about gaming, even more reason to go AMD as Ryzen 5 absolutely murders the i5 in productivity). You're keen on keeping the laptop for 5 years if possible, which means you're keen on longevity and the things that affect it. Namely, thermals and performance that keeps the machine relevant until the end of its operating life.

Perhaps its uncalled for me to direct this at you but its because of things like this that manufacturers regularly dump some of their worst products in the Indian market and people still put up with it. They would rather make a sub-optimal purchase on heresay or familiarity even if the better product is available at the same price. The result of this is that the market gets exactly what it deserves. :Frustrati


I don't want to comment too much on the whole CPU thing because it would be beating a dead horse at this point, but even if you decide to go with 10th gen. Intel (virtually the same as 9th gen, which was also a refresh. 11th gen. H-parts are not available yet and would be a worthy alternative as joslicx pointed out), atleast choose between the Lenovo Legion, the HP Omen or the Acer Nitro/Predator options if you're spending more that the stated budget. Chassis and overall build quality matter, they can literally make-or-break an otherwise good product.

You're not a layman, you're on Team-BHP and so there has to be an enthusiast in there somewhere. Regardless of what you end up with, I hope it works out well :)

@Amien ill try responding to your points and putting my point of view across:

1. Absolutely agree with your statement on not wanting someone to just confirm my choice. Honest opinions are always what i look forward to on a forum such as this.

2. I understand the reviewer talks about the inherent design issues which is not processor centric. The part on the intake did cross my mind as well when i first saw it.

3. When faced with a situation where i have no information from my experience to guide me, i rely mostly on suggestions and opinions of others who seem to have a better understanding. In this case, the number of people who have asked me to stick with intel are more and one of them has had a bad experience with longevity of AMD.

4. As a follow-up with the above point as @joslicx mentioned, i did try checking for 11th gen Intel availability but seems ill have to wait for some more time, something that cannot be done given the immediate requirement.

5. When i look at a laptop, the first thing i considered was the processor and the config which would fit in my budget. AMD seemed apt at the time of posting my requirements. Hardly had i evaluated a laptop for its heat management, speaker quality, IPS, etc as i was approaching the subject from a casual usage perspective. These are factors that i started considering with time and also understood the need for having to stretch my budget.

6. As my dad too would be using the laptop and he's a fan of Lenovo from his IBM days, the legion's business like looks appealed to him and that's when am contemplating on stretching 10k more and getting the Legion with 10th gen i5 and1650ti at almost 90k.

And not to forget, your inputs on Asus too has made me sceptical. However, it still is the only entry level gaming laptop that has sweet looks to go with it! Again, to co-relate with the Indian auto industry, features and looks do greatly influence the buyer's choice. If it's VFM, then nothing like it.

You can get this HP Omen 15-15-EN0002AX with the significantly faster 1660Ti GPU for less. The Omen is about as good as the Legion and has a true metal build.

I think your store may be trying to rip you off.

I have not been following this thread in depth, but I think that even within the "big" brands each model differs significantly in reliability. Even enterprise models can be unreliable. I've noticed this with both Lenovo and Dell. My ancient netbook from Samsung is rock solid even today, but I've had problems with their ultrabook (hinge, headphone jack, software updates). Dell ultrabook seems to have so many problems with updates and volume control, but a slightly older Dell Latitude seems fine - even though Amazon dot com reviews were scary! My nephew's Acer is perfectly fine, though I was initially against the brand. My suggestion is that you do your research and buy the best you can without getting too fixated on reviews and branding - hopefully you can sort out your problems within the warranty period.

I would agree with mvadg above.

I have mixed sort of experiences for all the stuff I have owned. My first Dell laptop served me almost 9 years. It was replaced by an HP one that had to be relaced in just 15 months of use as it just died. The hp was replaced by a cheap lenovo that served me well for 7 years. Replaced that with another lenovo and it's running fine for 4 years now (recently updated it to ssd so now don't feel like changing it anytime soon unless it dies on me)

Similarly for appliances our LG washing machine is doing fine for 11 years now but the lg fridge always had issues and had to replace that in just 4 years.

There probably is no way to ensure how your electronic item will turn out to be. If you are lucky it will work fine for years. I have stopped worrying too much about this aspect as luck we cannot control and it definitely is a factor.

Its not brand-specific but model/series/chassis-specific. We had a big discussion about this in a separate thread.

Every brand has its hits-and-misses and while there is no definitive answer to reliability, you can eliminate a lot of variables if you can look at each product on its own merit.

Thank you all for your time and inputs, appreciate the help! I had to stretch my budget to 85k and buy the Lenovo Legion with i5 and 1650ti. The build is satisfactory and audio too isn't bad. Only grouse is it is manufactured in july 2020 which i saw on the box at home. Hope there's nothing fishy! Expecting a call from them to register the product and will get it clarified hopefully.

Make sure that your warranty starts from the date of purchase/registration and not somewhere near the date of manufacturing. Many lenovo laptops once registered show their warranty starting from their date of manufacturing or somewhere during the month of manufacturing.

Happened with me, my laptop started showing warranty from the date of manufacturing upon registration. Called and asked them to change my warranty start date to my delivery date to which they obliged but they updated it to my ordering date.

Hi YD14, Just wanted to know which laptop did you end up buying. Can you share a brief review of it. A friend was in a similar situation and would like to hear a user review.

I went with the last option mentioned in my previous post. The sad news being my sister changed her mind and the new laptop is now hers.

The selection process came down to three Ryzen 4800H laptops:
1. Lenovo legion 5:
Pros-

• Known reliability of Lenovo

• Better cooling solution and performance from Lenovo

Cons-

• Expensive! Costlier by 8k compared to similarly spec-ed laptops

• Some minor issues have appeared in my Lenovo, so wanted to test some other brand.

2. Acer Nitro 5:
Pros-

• Cheapest one of the three and that too by a good margin

Cons-

• Online reviews complained about the laptops build quality

3. Asus TUF A15:
Pros-

• Priced just right; neither too high nor too low to compromise on quality

Cons-

• Online reviews complained about not enough cooling

So, as you can see I went with Asus TUF A15 Ryzen 4800H mostly because of its value for money pricing. Here are some points to summarize the ownership till now.

Likes:

• Build to last. The laptop has a solid feel to it.

• Good keyboard with RGB. The keys feel nice to press and with the Aura app backlight can be adjusted for colour and brightness. But the backlight is not 3 zone RGB though.

• Good performance:).

Dislikes:

• Yes the cooling solution is not the best. When under heavy load for long time the temperatures are a little higher than my Lenovo. Also the fan is on the louder side.

• The screen is thin and though nothing has happened till now (my sister often keeps her books on it after studying), I fear if something really heavy is kept on it for too long it may damage the screen.

• Some software issues have cropped up.

• Screen is difficult to see under sunlight

Issues:

• Camera is being erratic. Sometimes after boot up the windows is unable to detect it. I believe it is driver related.

• Same issue with as above with Bluetooth but uninstalling and reinstalling the driver solved the issue.

I haven't upgraded the RAM yet but intend to do so in the coming months. That's all I have to say about this laptop.

If your friend can afford I suggest him the Legion 5 4800H available at 86k on Lenovo's site, because the Asus does not come without a backpack now which increases the price and also it is not currently available.

Thanks a lot for your genuine user review. Also since you own an Ideapad Gaming 3i, how would you compare its durability , thermals and battery life with your current laptop. I am asking this since one of the cheapest models with Ryzen 4800h is from Ideapad Gaming 3.

Thermals and performance is great. No questions on that. The durability not so.

Once I unintentionally lifted the laptop with only one hand with my thumb pressing against the touchpad and the whole weight was on my four fingers below the laptop. This damaged the touchpad and the left mouse button on the touchpad is not working properly.

The laptop, though tough, feels cheap with its plasticky build and that's one thing that bugs me. The backlight of keyboard is so dim that you can notice it only in dark rooms and that also on its brightest setting. The screen of course is not bright enough and glares, making it impossible to use the laptop outdoors. That is further worsened by the battery which hardly lasts 3 to 3.5 hrs under normal use. I haven't used it for any heavy use without being plugged in.

Minor software or driver issues are there but they are with every laptop in the market except Apple I believe.

Hey all!

I am looking for a budget laptop/desktop for mostly coding and study purpose.

It's very confusing to understand what might be good choice. Gone are the days when processors were easy to identify like P1,P2 and for most of the other requirements more ram meant more performance.

I was thinking of Mi notebook which fits the budget, but doesn't comes with additional RAM slot for any future needs.

How is Mi notebook performance wise? I am not into gaming, so don't need a fancy graphics card or something. All i want to be able to do is to run some heavyweight programming IDE and do some simulations.

Another confusion is between laptop or desktop. I don't mind sacrificing portability if I can get a compact desktop with significant price advantage, which I doubt will be the case.

Hence asking this to experts.

I would go for a Dell Inspiron at a similar price. Dell is reliable with very good customer service. Also you would find it at a much lower price at Reliance Digital rather than online - they throw in some useless freebies also, you can bargain for a discount instead of those freebies.

Desktops will always be cheaper than a laptop & also much more sturdy & long lasting. If you don't need portability & you don't mind the space it occupies, then always go for a desktop. Another thing is power supply. In a city like Bombay, you don't need a UPS for a desktop but in cities with power cuts you may need a UPS also (which is not needed with laptops).