Inspired by my continual use of the NHS, the Beener twins are off to university in a couple of weeks, one is doing a child nursing degree, the other to study medicine.

They both need a laptop for their course work. Does anyone have any recommendations for spec and manufacturer? I think they may get a study version of MS word or works, but i am not certain.

We have a house HP i3 that has been a good machine and my OH uses an HP i5 for her artwork.

Im not tied to any brand, but want a decent machine that will last their course.

Can anyone give me any insight or help?

thanks

I’d be inclined to get them Chromebooks, the N22 at £100 a pop would do fine. Light, really portable, splashproof, 12 hours on battery and inexpensive. I’d guess everything they’ll be using them for is online anyway.

Students? Lenovo for build quality, and they look crap so they’re less likely to be mugged for it.

I’d respectfully suggest that a Chromebook is wholly unsuitable for a University student’s needs.

Let them spec it up – my kids know more about computers than me – set a budget and they pay anything over that. I went down the road of buying a laptop for my son – he sent it back as was not what he wanted. I guess he is an adult after all…

Firstly congrats on them getting to Uni and choosing a career such as medicine. We rewarded ours with MacBooks, students get discounts. Even a second hand one will be a “treat” ask them what they want ?

I can’t recommend windows machines.

I’d respectfully suggest that a Chromebook is wholly unsuitable for a University student’s needs

Well I’m not going to deny I’m very swayed by the low price and portability of the things, but what makes them wholly unsuitable? I don’t know how long the courses are but I also reckon 18 year olds getting 3 years daily use out of any laptop they’re lugging about is very optimistic.

They will be able to get student rates for the full Microsoft office suite, or possibly for free https://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msuk/en_GB/pdp/Office-365-University/productID.260260600

A good windows laptop for about £350 – 400.

Don’t waste money on macs unless you are affluent,in which case just by a higher spec windows laptop which will be pointless, all you need is a reasonably well speced machine with ms office for those kinds of courses.

Chrome book will be a pain in the backside, too small, too faffy with compatibility issues.not suitable IMO

I was looking on the PC World website last week for a new laptop for myself, they are doing some cashback/trade-in offers so might be worth a look on there if you have any to trade in.

This one looks good value – i5 processor, 256 SSD, 8GB ram, WIndows 10 all for £479
http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/computing/laptops/laptops/hp-pavilion-15-au078sa-15-6-laptop-gold-10146521-pdt.html

The compatability with everyone else is a major factor. It appears that these courses both rely heavily on old school academic texts ( the first yr reading list is v heavy with expensive weighty tomes). They will have online resources to consult and probably work to type up and submit. Im not sure that it will have to be a machine they take everywhere with them…..

@^ We looked at the HP Pavilion machines.. They are really plasticy and flexible.
The HP Envy we bought from cheap laptops as a box open. It is lots of metal, Mac book Pro copy, and seems much better built. I swapped out HD for SSD immediately – it ended up costing £449 for A10, 12gb, 2gb graphics and 400gb+SSD

Our old Lenovo was really well built.

We also helped eldest oab last year buy a Cube monster machine – i7, 12gb, nVidia 980GTX, 500gb Samsung SSD for£600 odd.

Build quality battery life and portability are the key areas.
We bought the wife a new all singing all dancing toshiba when she started her nursing degree, it last just over a year until it died, she then bought a cheap netbooks which she used for the rest of the course as she could carry it around and the battery life was great, the downside was it was too small.
She’s just about to start a postgrad course and we’re going Mac, the uni should be able to advise to make sure a Mac is compatible with the needs of the course.
Use the student discounts.

I don’t know what people are doing to them if they aren’t lasting 3 years, mines been in daily use since I got it for uni and I’m going into my last year now and it’s still fine. HP Envy something, it was about £500. I’ve only needed Office, the internet and a few basic programming things like MatLab though.

what makes them wholly unsuitable? I don’t know how long the courses are but I also reckon 18 year olds getting 3 years daily use out of any laptop they’re lugging about is very optimistic.

If you need something other than a webapp you’re screwed.

My daily workhorse is 2008 vintage and still going strong eight years later.

Same question for my son, but we’re not sure what it needs to do. I get writing writing stuff, but does that need to be a laptop? He’s going to wait a few weeks to find what he really needs, then tell me so I can buy it!

Firstly work out what it’s for.
Fairly detatched from the Uni world but still every course is different. Can they still use a pen and paper these days 😉
Portability and battery life if it’s for taking notes and using all the time. Power? Considering I was using an 2011 Dell i3 until last year as a proper work horse laptop then you don’t really need that much.

Main thing to make sure is that they know what backups are, that and the difference between that and online storage. Personal preference would be the usual look through the dell outlet for the price/size you want.
Again if it’s also going to be used back at base for a lot of typing/essays etc. and research a screen, keyboard and mouse will make a massive difference to productivity. Even just running side by side pages on a proper screen is much nicer and faster for references.

don’t know what people are doing to them if they aren’t lasting 3 years

You haven’t met a student or child recently, have you? :Lol:

You haven’t met a student or child recently, have you? :Lol:

Or our MD. Wears out his every year.

Don’t go for a chrome book. If they need to run any software for their course it will most likely only run on windows possibly mac which puts the chrome book at a disadvantage.
This leave Windows machines or a Mac, I’ll leave Linux out as you can always install it on your windows laptop.
Mac’s are well built and last, nice to work on, good battery life and you done have to worry about virus and malware as much as windows. The downside is they are expensive even with student discount and are more likely to be stolen.

A windows laptop will be more compatible and generally cheaper. A nice screen can also be a bonus if your working for a long time. I would go for at least an i5 with 8Gb of ram and good battery life. Then its just down to how much you want to pay and checking the reviews.

A windows laptop will be more compatible

This is crucial IMHO.

You can argue the case for Macs, Linux, Chromebooks, iPads, Speak ‘n’ Spells or what have you, but the expectation will be that the students will have access to a Windows PC. If the laptop is just for taking notes then any device will have some form of word processor on it, hell a pen and paper will probably do the job, but any course-specific software requirements and electronic course materials will almost certainly default to Windows.

Like I said at the outset, the best tool for the job is a well-built Windows laptop, and Lenovo are market leaders in build quality. Get one with plenty of RAM and a decent screen, CPU less of an issue unless they’ll be doing some heavy-duty number crunching. Consider an external monitor, keyboard and mouse for homework if budget stretches to it.

one is doing a child nursing degree, the other to study medicine.

I’d wager that no specialist software will need to be installed on their personal machines. They might want to use something like mendeley though, so I’d stick with a Mac or Windows box. If they have iPhones and iPads, I’d stump up the premium and go Mac (refurb or educational store). For windows, go Lenovo – I have an X10 Carbon as my dev machine and it’s a lovely bit of kit. I still prefer macs though given the choice.

I have a Surface Pro and it is bloody brilliant. The fact that it is a full-featured laptop with many of the advantages of a tablet makes it ideal for pretty much everything.

And, at an academic conference in June, I used the notes programme to take hand-written notes for the first time, and it worked!

I don’t know your budget, but if you could stretch to the Surface, I suspect you’d find it an excellent solution.

I’d go for a decent windows machine with a smallish screen (13-14″) and then buy each of them a monitor for their room.

Small machine is less likely to be damaged in transit, easy to handle and fine balanced on knees etc. A smaller low-powered machine will do the job plus should have decent battery life. And 24″ monitors can be had for less than £100.

Also get a decent bag, I’ve an armoured rucksack.

. I would go for at least an i5 with 8Gb of ram and good battery life.

Why? That’d kind of my minimum spec for our 3d simulation tool, aside from when I make a mistake with a for loop it’s never really maxing out. It strolls through 1080 video editing too. If all its getting used for is office and youtube/Netflix then it’s massive overkill. Think about what a tablet can do.

daughter recently graduated (Law). Used a Chromebook in 1st and 2nd yr, bought a MacBook thereafter and found it much better.

For my kids I ended up getting them two laptops – an Alienware for general use and a 10″ Windows tablet with keyboard to use for note-taking in lectures etc.

I lecture geography/earth sciences, but principles are similar – lecture notes etc will all be provided online and in my lectures ~80% of the class come with their laptop to annotate straight onto their notes. Therefore portability and battery life are important, similar when you can’t get a desk with a plug in the library. Dont worry too much about specialist software, any medical specific stuff will be provided on central computers for the students to use. Get a half decent screen and internal speakers and this will be the students main form of entertainment and lets be honest, they generally do more of that than studying. I’d think any half decent PCWorld etc £400-600 PC will be sufficient for their needs. Make sure they are insured as this is the stuff most likely to go missing from rooms etc. If you can afford a Mac, then thats fine and lots of the students have them. In my experience, we do all our teaching on PC’s, so sometimes it is hard to transfer the skills over, but they generally sort themselves out!

You really need to be asking the university course leader what they recommend.

Most medics use Macs if that helps…

Pc world is generally overpriced, you can get the same or better spec laptop fome ebuyer or CCL for a bit less money.

If money’s no issue, by all means buy them a mac, bit realise that you are paying a premium for the pseudo trendy name, personally, if I see someone with an expensive mac book, I just think ‘more money than sense’.

Most medics use Macs if that helps…

Not for any real reason though.

No, but its what they use, so makes file sharing easier etc.

the best tool for the job is a well-built Windows laptop, and Lenovo are market leaders in build quality. Get one with plenty of RAM and a decent screen, CPU less of an issue unless they’ll be doing some heavy-duty number crunching. Consider an external monitor, keyboard and mouse for homework if budget stretches to it.

+ 1000

Also consider adding cheap Android tablet as well, if money goes that far.

MacBook. The soks male offspring got one for uni 5 years ago and uses it for “working from home” duties now. In terms of bangs per buck it’s been a revelation (to me, anyway). His sister, PhD student, is on her third Windows based contraption in three years.

Not for any real reason though.

I’m sure the reasons are real – you just might not agree with them.

Lol

My son is off to Manchester soon and I have bought him an Asus UX305 from John Lewis for £599 which includes a 3 year warranty.

It is a 13.3″ laptop with 3200 x 1800 screen, Intel Core M3, 8GB RAM, 128GB SSD.

The main reason for this were:

Low weight
Good battery life
Good build quality
Lots of ports (3 x USB3.0, SD, HDMI)
Hi res screen

I would have preferred a larger SSD but that was not an option.

He has had it for about a week now and I have been pretty impressed. I also paid £85 for 3 year accidental damage cover (although I think I could have got that via insurance).

I did consider cheaper but the machines all seemed either bulky or lacking in other ways.

I did also toy with the idea of a MacBook but the Pro cost a lot more and is being replaced any day now.

I’d agree with all those on here who suggest getting an additional monitor for use when at at home/halls/digs. That way you can get by with a smaller/lighter laptop so it’s easier to carry around

Although I’d like to recommend a chromebook they are most likely to need to run word and powerpoint and while you can use word online it’s going to be a pain particularly if you want to use a plug in reference manager
Mendeley
Refworks
Are common – check the university websites as they are often free for students.

I personally would not go smaller than a 24″ monitor, something like this one from Iilyama as I like the height adjust.

I’d also consider an external mouse and keyboard if they are doing a lot of typing – this is quite personal though as some people get on well with a laptop keyboard. I found the MK270 a bit too soft for typing

You haven’t mentioned a budget so how about a docking station to leave you mouse, keyboard and monitor plugged into. Just disconnect one USB and you are ready to go. Docks start at about £100. I use a StarTech doc (this one) so I am a bit biased

Just remembered get them a subscriptions to a backup service like Carbonite or similar or using Google Drive for storage rather than putting everything into my documents

Thanks all, we are now looking in earnest after the recommendations