Need advice on buying a laptop.

I'm a university student and my 7 year old Lenovo laptop is barely holding to life. So i was looking for a laptop with a sensible price i can play beam in. My max budget is 500$ and looking to buy a brand new one by amazon.
Any advice would be appreciated

 

Really? Nobody else?

 

Right now it's a little over budget, but I've seen this at $500 before.
https://www.amazon.com/ASUS-FX505DD-Gaming-Laptop-GeForce/dp/B07V336VJJ
It has a GTX 1050 in it, and a AMD Ryzen 5 3550H processor. (4 cores, Base clock 2.1GHz, Boosts up to 3.7)

I know you want a laptop, but its easier to find better performance in a desktop at the same price.

 

I shall remind you that i need something portable for univetsity tasks and such so i just wanted something little stronger for playing beam.

 

Right? I know your situation, I'm in school myself. I have a cheaper laptop that is only for school work, and a desktop for games.
A GTX 1050 will get you far in games, it might be worth the extra ~70 dollars.

 

Thank you very much!

 

Need to get a laptop or either a pc windows/ no Mac u can find a nice windows laptop u can use on the go and a gpu laptop is with at least 5.5 gb to get the game running smooth if u want laptop over 5.5 gb and a/or or 8 gb but that might be hard to find one. Good luck on trying to find one

 

I used the Dell inspiron 2n1's for school for a couple of years. Had two of them. Absolutely hated them, worst built quality on any computer I've ever had.

Currently have an high end HP envy. I love it, I really miss the 2n1 feature though, that's really useful for presenting and reading and such. Very light and awesome build quality, though I paid a lot since I got it before Ryzen came out with their newer stuff that brought prices down. Handles Matlab and Solidworks well, not sure what programs you need for school.

Of course mine was way out of your budget, but my whole family has had good experiences with HP's stuff in any price range. I'd recommend looking into what they have within your budget. You probably want to look into an external GPU rather than a laptop with a dedicated GPU as well. Easier to upgrade, less worries about cooling, etc...

 

Oh hp envy? That's so cool! Isn't that called "monoblock"? My father also has one in his workplace. It's 27 inch version. Thanks for the advice, will look for them.

 

HP envy 13' laptop. Cheapest I'm seeing them from a 5 sec google search is around $570 before tax, so you might be able to find one in budget.

Mine is a 13' touch screen. i7 8550U @ 1.8/2ghz, 8gb ram. It gets the job done for school; I'm sure they've come down in price for these specs since Ryzen's been releasing some nice affordable stuff since I got mine. Paid an arm and a leg for this one sadly, but my stupid Dell Inspiron broke on the first day of CAD class so I didn't have a choice.

 

I've usually had a pretty good experience with HP desktops. They're pretty solid machines, and my parents have had both a Pavillion P600 and an Envy Phoenix. The Pavillion started having CPU fan issues after about 5 1/2 years (Fan would randomly go into full blast and then go back to normal), and a simple replacement fan fixed it. The machine was getting old tho, so they got an Envy Phoenix for its audio/storage/graphics capabilities and the fact it had an SSD. That was in 2016, so it's been four years- the only problem they've had since then is that sometimes the machine just... won't turn on. I'll open it up, clean it out, re-adjust everything, etc- and it still won't work. The next morning it'll work fine. HP- Solid machines, a bit of a mixed bag in terms of thermals if you've got a ton of dust in the room and you load it up with tons of documents and audio files like my parents
Side note, my uncle had some HP all in one (23-f260xt, I believe) and it was super slow and hella loud after, like, three years- which is most likely down to the fact that it was like $250. The pattern continues- somewhat?

 

Does the laptop neccessarily need to be new? If you were to buy a used one, you could get a better bang for your buck. If that would be the case, you could go for something like a Dell or HP laptop, which then could serve you well for the next few years

 

^This
I would definitely look at your local listings on craigslist, gumtree, or whatever is near you. A quick look on craigslist and I found multiple laptops with 7th or 8th gen quad cores and GTX 1050's for under $500

 

Old laptops are gross in my experience. In the words of the great LGR-
“See, these speakers can get pretty gross. There’s always,like, macaroni and cheese and poop smeared inside ‘em.”

 

Thing is, i am not in Usa ( Azerbaijan to be correct) and importing a second hand laptop is too risky for me. Also, laptops are very expensive because of high electronic taxes
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That would have been the best option if i lived in America, but i don't.

 

Keep in mind that laptops due to the cramped nature of their hardware tend to run hotter than a comparable desktop. While nowadays CPU and GPU in general should be assumend to be safe from damaging overheat, such throttling means that you cannot use the rated performance for any significant period of time.

 

Buying a second hand laptop for important use might not a good idea, unless you're buying it from a good well known company that sells second hand and/or refurbished products. Maybe a good second hand seller as well, but you should look carefully.

I bought a second hand Lenovo Y50-70 for 400$ almost 2 years ago and it has had issues ever since I got it.
(i7-4710HQ, GTX 860 4GB, 12 GB DDR3 (upgraded to 16) and a dying 1 TB SSHD...yes, SSHD. Replaced it with a 1 TB SSD. Also only has ONE SATA controller which is shit)

I bought it with visual damage and has gotten more damaged during ownership. (I must admit, I'm not completely careful with this laptop, mainly because its...annoying me.)
The backside/underside has some missing plastic pieces and more things have broken off. The screen hinge is visible and wobbly and I can easily rip off the bezel since there's a dent.

Since a few weeks I've been noticing that its getting less and less fps in ANY game. (it actually got more fps in Beam, thats probably just the new update..) It often has hiccups and generally feels slower.
Could also just be Windows 10 though... but then again;

I have a feeling it seems like my laptop is slowly but surely coming to it's end. I somewhat regret this purchase. Don't be like me and buy somewhat blindly.
----
If you do want to buy second hand, do a lot of research, browsing and see if theres common issues on the laptop. Also seek for advice with experts.
Don't get an Apple product either.

 

Sorry for the bump, but I want to say that I hope finding a laptop goes well for you Addicti0nToB00st, By the way, I noticed you saying that you need a laptop for college. Are you doing some kind of business/tech/computer thing in college?

 

Sorry for the late reply,yes i am.
Update: I got a 2nd hand laptop!
It's Lenovo T540p with intel i7-4700mq cpu and nvidia geforce 730m for gpu for 428$

 

That's a FakePad.... Still quite good, though.