Help me pick a laptop

We have found that we have need for a second laptop in the family.  Mrs. Sonic and I have been generally fine with a new-ish MacBook Pro and iPad and phones, but have some needs now that makes a PC laptop desirable.  

We have a weekly podcast with two other friends (Everyone Racers) and the ancient Mac we had been using for one of us is just too old to keep up with a 4 person Skype video feed, so this would be the primary use.  Secondly, the new tuning system for the race car runs only on windows. Windows machines are typically less expensive than the Apple stuff we are used to.   

What recommendations do you have in the $500-$600 ish range that will work for this fairly limited use?  If it is substantially better to spend a little more, tell me why. 

Thanks!

Get a new Macbook and install Windows in parallel.  Boot into Windows when needed, run Mac the rest of the time.  Done.  Windows runs quite well on Mac hardware (since they tend to pick decent hardware).

That said, look for video requirements, I'd look at the video card included on any laptop you're looking for.  Devices that tend to be geared towards gamers will have better video cards that can handle the video feeds you're trying to do.

Otherwise, go for the most processor speed and the amount of memory you can get with as much battery as possible.  While Memory can often be upgraded later, some models make it harder than others.

I just bought a ~$460 equivalent HP laptop... bottom sayz 'Model 15 da0004nw' ?

it's got a 7th gen i3, an nvidia graphics card, and 4gigs of ram, 1TB HDD, and is running win10 home.

get 8gigs.  I've got firefox with 8 tabs open, and it's using 80% of the memory... and that's after clocking off a bunch of HP bloatware, and futzing with some other processes that suck up memory usage.

it's run LiveForSpeed pretty well, though; plus a bunch of airfoil stuff.  Haven't tried skype/hangouts with it yet.

caveat emptor, ymmv, etc etc

I'd be tempted to get a used laptop in that price range. I like my Dell XPS 15, looks like you might be able to find a used one or a used XPS 13 in that price range on Craigslist if you hunt a bit. (I paid way, way more but that was a while ago.) I always like to go for a higher end processor so the computer is useful for longer. i7 quad core CPU, 16gb memory, SSD drive are your keys. It should then be usable for a number of years to come.

I just bought a Lenovo Ideapad 330. I've been very happy with it so far. 

dculberson said:

I'd be tempted to get a used laptop in that price range. I like my Dell XPS 15, looks like you might be able to find a used one or a used XPS 13 in that price range on Craigslist if you hunt a bit. (I paid way, way more but that was a while ago.) I always like to go for a higher end processor so the computer is useful for longer. i7 quad core CPU, 16gb memory, SSD drive are your keys. It should then be usable for a number of years to come.

This would be a great way to maximize your performance per dollar.

Also, it feels terribly wrong to suggest buying a new Apple laptop, but installing Windows in a VM would work...it would be putting a lot of eggs into one very expensive basket, but it would let one computer do everything (tuning, Skype video chatroom, and whatever Apple software is good for )

GameboyRMH said:

dculberson said:

I'd be tempted to get a used laptop in that price range. I like my Dell XPS 15, looks like you might be able to find a used one or a used XPS 13 in that price range on Craigslist if you hunt a bit. (I paid way, way more but that was a while ago.) I always like to go for a higher end processor so the computer is useful for longer. i7 quad core CPU, 16gb memory, SSD drive are your keys. It should then be usable for a number of years to come.

This would be a great way to maximize your performance per dollar.

Also, it feels terribly wrong to suggest buying a new Apple laptop, but installing Windows in a VM would work...it would be putting a lot of eggs into one very expensive basket, but it would let one computer do everything (tuning, Skype video chatroom, and whatever Apple software is good for )

Prior to buying another Mac laptop, it would be a good idea to confirm that the tuning software is fully functional inside the VM (i.e. make sure it talks to any external hardware in the way that you expect).  Also, how old is the "ancient" Mac, and could it possibly be made to keep up with some upgrades?  Maxing out the installed RAM and swapping out a hard drive for an SSD come to mind.

I would take that $600 to Costco and buy one there.  Good value, and their customer service is excellent.

1988RedT2 said:

I would take that $600 to Costco and buy one there.  Good value, and their customer service is excellent.

At Costco, this one seems particularly interesting (and on sale until Saturday): https://www.costco.com/HP-Pavilion-x360-14%22-Touchscreen-2-in-1-Laptop---Intel-Core-i5---1080p.product.100461407.html

sleepyhead said:

get 8gigs. 

These days, I'd recommend 16GB.

Thanks for the feedback so far!

Some answers to what you asked:   The "ancient" mac is from late 2008, the first of the unibody MacBook Pros.  RAM has already been upgraded, HDD stripped down pretty well, but original.   We can't both use the same machine the way we do the podcast with the mics and whatnot, so we both can't use the Mac we have already.   

That HP at Costco does look like a deal.  Any brands to stick with or brands to avoid?  

In that price range I'd buy some off-lease corporate laptop. My preference is usually Lenovo, but pretty much any of the "good" brands like Lenovo, HP etc do the job.

The main reason is that the $500-600 range is usually compromising on screen and keyboard, plus the corporate models might not be as snazzy, but they're a lot more robust than the consumer stuff. Usually easier to fix, too.

Where does one find off lease laptops reliably? 

Looking around a bit, I found this which seems decent.  Thoughts?

https://www.dellrefurbished.com/laptops/dell-latitude-e6440-195098.html?

Latitude laptops are good. That's a business class laptop and would serve you well for many years. My only hesitation with that laptop is the hard drive. SSD drives are so, so much better and faster it's no joke. You could upgrade it yourself but at a cost of time and money.

Sonic said:

Where does one find off lease laptops reliably? 

Amazon is where my last referb came from. The Lenovo I just bought came from Staples. They were priced competitively and had it in stock. 

Is this one too far outside your price range?

https://www.dellrefurbished.com/laptops/dell-latitude-14-7000-series-e7450-168892?

It's a newer platform, has a lower res screen which might be a downside for you, and has an SSD. It's running Windows 8.1 which is newer but I'd upgrade to 10 if I was you.

Sonic said:

Where does one find off lease laptops reliably? 

I've had good luck finding them on eBay as seller or manufacturer refurbished items. Several other vendors (including Apple) have their own refurb stores, too.

I just purchased a couple of refurb desktop computers from Newegg and was really impressed at how much computer I could buy for the money asked.  Lot of options for a refurb laptop; something like this seems worth considering?

Acer Spin Refurb for $500

dculberson said:

Is this one too far outside your price range?

https://www.dellrefurbished.com/laptops/dell-latitude-14-7000-series-e7450-168892?

It's a newer platform, has a lower res screen which might be a downside for you, and has an SSD. It's running Windows 8.1 which is newer but I'd upgrade to 10 if I was you.

 

I have one of those as my work laptop, except mine has a 1920x1080 screen.  This is a good option (although you really want the higher resolution screen if you can stretch the budget for it).

If it does not have one, and you can add it, you may be surprised at how much of a performance boost putting an SSD in the MAC will get you.

One of the top names right now is Asus.  I just got their top-of-the-line Republic of Gamers laptop which was over $1000 and overkill for you, but good lord is that thing amazing.

Any of the Dell, Lenovo, HP, or other common brand names come with a significant amount of bloatware.  My Asus came with next to none.

8gb minimum, 8th gen intel, and don't skimp on the video card.  Nvidia makes nice cards, but as long as it isn't the cheap base model card you'll be fine with many of the offerings.

If I were buying a $500 laptop right now, this is the one I would get.  It's an open box that was $800 new, right now its $570 open box.  1TB SSD, 8gb, 8th gen intel, 

In reply to Curtis :

While I don't dispute that ASUS makes good laptops, keep in mind that it's usually the consumer laptops from any brand that come pre-loaded with all sorts of junk bloatware. The corporate ones (which several of us suggested above) usually don't, because every manufacturer knows that 99% of companies will wipe the OS anyway and install their corporate OS image.

Yes, the Dell Latitude line does not come with bloatware. It is a business class laptop.

Are you casting just audio or video as well? If you're pushing or plan to push video, Lenovo has some good options with independent GPUs, which I would consider if streaming from a laptop. Personally, my Laptop is ASUS and my streaming desktop is mostly ASUS as well. Yes, they can come with some annoying software (you'll be using Skype, so you won't need to remove it), but they are easy enough to remove.