Anyone w/experience have a recommendation for a decent Windows laptop for an incoming Engineering student?

[ok_cpu]

I have specs, but would love a shortcut from someone who has already landed on a laptop and had a good experience. Bonus points for as close to $1k as possible...if possible.

[Renew Deal]

1. The Lenovo business lines are generally good

X line, like X1 Carbon. They’re probably over $1000, but it depends on features.

[IbogaProject]

2. Ram is extra important now

Lenovo is good for serviceability. But flagships from HP, Asus, Dell and Acer are all solid, budget models is where this issues really arise.

Many models have fixed Ram lately. The issue you will have to balance for them is power, upgrade-ability, weight and secondary specs like screen size and suitability for secondary uses. Also the choosing between Mac, Linux and Windows. Apple and now the new Arm Windows laptops use a new processor type that has dramatically longer battery life. Many Windows models still have up-gradable storage, whereas you are stuck on Mac.

https://www.reddit.com/r/computers/comments/1czrnjy/arm_based_windows_laptop_as_an_engineering_student/

It will come down to which discipline they are studying and how much power they need in the laptop, they need to get a list of software used in the program and see which way to go from there.

[JT45242]

3. I got one that exceeded specs from microcenter last year for my comp science major

Couple of questions...
1. Will they do any game or video work in college? If so, you will be over $1000 to get a good video card.

2. Extra ram is ready to buy and put in. Just make certain the machine is upgradable

3. You can use 529 plan money for a college computer.

Son got a Lenovo L5 from microcenter with a good video card and then added extra RAM. Was $850 to last December. 16 ram. 500 GB solid state drive. Bought another 16 ram online and is very happy with it in all his classes.

With tax under $1000, but that was pretariff.

Good luck

[ok_cpu]

4. Thank you all for the feedback!

I really appreciate it. I'll probably start Lenovo and work out from there. I've always had Lenovo for work and they are horses.

Plus, the campus tech hub as they should know and sell what's worked for other students. Lots of memory, processing, and graphics power so you all are right that a budget laptop isn't going to work.