Latest "which laptop" thread. May contain stupid.

[fd3]

So, our laptop is about 10 years old, but clearly was "teh shit" back in it's day.  I have had an 8GB i5 machine suggested to me, but that's same spec as our old machine.  How much faster could having a graphics card and SSD make it?
For all I know (nothing) i5 from 10 years ago could be << than i5 today (less cores or somesuch).

(click to show/hide)

It reckon it is
Processor   Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4300M CPU @ 2.60GHz   2.59 GHz
Installed RAM   8.00 GB (7.69 GB usable)
System type   64-bit operating system, x64-based processor
Pen and touch   Touch support with 2 touch points
But struggles to run any games what is not online, so I reckons it has a block of chees where the graphics card would be

[Bledlow]

Mrs B's old laptop died, & it was a bit inconvenient not having a laptop to borrow, so I bought an ex-corporate lease Dell. Quite a lot faster processor than yours, but still an i5 - just a newer one.

It was slow on startup, but the computer seemed well-made (better than Mrs B's old Lenovo was) & in good condition & I thought it worth replacing the spinning HDD with an SSD (the HDD could be a backup disc), so did so. I bought a basic Kioxia SATA SSD of about the same capacity as the HDD, marketed for just this purpose, upgrading old PCs. Cloned the HDD to it (using a cheap caddy to hold the SSD), then swapped them round.

As expected (I've done this before with an old desktop) there was a massive improvement in startup speed, & a lesser improvement (depending on what was being done) improvement in speed elsewhere. Neither I nor Mrs B uses it for gaming, though.

[barakta]

The Intel chips seem to have generations. You can look them up on wikipedia and search CPUs on benchmark sites like https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_list.php to get a sense of how much faster.

It's also likely the RAM and other parts of the motherboard will be running faster too in 10 yrs.

[perpetual dan]

A 10 year old i5 will be less fancy than a modern one. Which is relevant if you’re waiting for the computer to compute.

More likely, for the average user, is that feels slow when booting and saving / loading files. The SSD will help a lot there.

It might also be worth looking at how full your memory is getting. Putting bits of the 8GB on and off disc, to make space, will make a computer feel slow. Eg editing photos, large graphics heavy presentations. The SSD will help again, but if that’s the case I’d be looking for more memory as well.

[fd3]

So, arguably I could tray and swap out the HDD for an SSD and see what happens, realistically it should be as fast as a modern i5 w/. 8GB RAM (?).

googles

Most confusing, there are modern (2019) i5s rated at quad core 1.6GHz and 6MB Cache vs my current i5 which is 2.6 GHz and 3MB Cache.  Listed online as 2/4 Cores vs the modern 4( - not sure whether that is two different measuring types and a modern i5 would have 2x the cores or whether it depends on the model and I may or may not be picking up a speed boos that way.

[Lightning Phil]

I replaced HDD with ssd in old pc.  Mostly due to the slowness of startup and windows update.  Much snappier and recommended.  I rarely max out the cpu as I don’t game. I no longer turn it on and go for a long cup of tea before it’s ready to use.

[perpetual dan]

So, arguably I could tray and swap out the HDD for an SSD and see what happens, realistically it should be as fast as a modern i5 w/. 8GB RAM (?).
…

I would expect the modern i5 to be faster than the old one.
If you just use the machine for web & email you probably won’t notice.
In much the same way that the aero and weight benefit of top spec pedals won’t be felt on a 15km/h loaded tour.

As above, if starting and file saving are slow then the SSD is worth a go.

[fd3]

So, SSD or something like this

[Polar Bear]

An SSD will make a difference but a ten year old i5 is not a patch on a new i5 even if the headline spec sheet looks similar.  Also more ram helps with overall performance given the software we run today is far more demanding than what we ran a decade ago.

A friend of mine has my 12 year old Acer laptop which is an i5 and I upgraded that to an SSD as well as 8gb ram (from 6gb).  It performs day to day stuff acceptably well but when I run it next to my 2 year old Intel nuc with an i7 processor, an m.2 drive and 16gb ram the difference is so obvious. 

The only problem with any computer is that you get used to the performance very quickly forgetting just how much better the new one is than the old one.

[fd3]

I am seriously considering the ASUS...

[FifeingEejit]

Processor   Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4300M CPU @ 2.60GHz   2.59 GHz

The most critical number in modern intel processor naming is the one in blod
4th Generation Core i5
Latest is Gen 13

https://www.intel.co.uk/content/www/uk/en/processors/processor-numbers.html

CPU Mark for that processor is 3048
Modern laptop processors are scoring in the 20000 range

higher is better

[De Sisti]

My Hewlett Packard H250 G5 Notebook has the following:

Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-6200U CPU @ 2.30GHz   2.40 GHz

Ram: 8.00 GB (7.89 GB usable)

So it's already outdated.

[fd3]

So, I think I have pondered my way round to an i7 16GB ideally 1TB SSD (or multi storage options).  I don't want touchscreen or particularly need a huge screen (currently working on a 15" screen.
Anything in particular I should look out for?

[philip]

A glossy screen has more vivid colours but suffers more from reflections, a matte screen has less vivid colours but is less affected by reflections. I use a matte screen.

[Kim]

A glossy screen has more vivid colours but suffers more from reflections, a matte screen has less vivid colours but is less affected by reflections. I use a matte screen.

Very much this.  Maximising sharpness is all very well if it's an iMac in a carefully lit design studio.  A portable computer used in the real world has a different set of operating constraints.

For the BHPC timing laptop, we specifically tried to find a machine with an extremely bright matte screen, for readability outdoors in daylight.  It's surprising how little this aspect of readability is covered in laptop reviews compared to mobile phone reviews.


Other ergonomic aspects of laptops that I find off-putting are stupid keyboard layouts (half-height enter key, Fn and Ctrl the wrong way round, that sort of thing), bad trackpads (it's a bit of a personal thing, so nothing beats a fondle) and flimsy non-standard power connectors.

[hubner]

I don't like glossy screens. The vast majority of laptops have glossy screens so if you want a matt screen there's not much choice.

[fd3]

Really good shout on the matt screen, what with being visually challenged that's important

[Kim]

Another aspect of screens that's thankfully going out of fashion is backlight dimming by PWM at visible frequencies.  You won't find any mention of it in reviews of course, because 'humans can't see flicker above 60Hz', but manufacturers have finally realised that trying to read text that disappears n times a second is a recipe for eye-strain.