Buyer’s guide
Making sacrifices is inevitable when you’re spending less than a grand on a laptop, but make sure you cut your cloth in the right places
This month’s laptops aren’t the very cheapest each manufacturer has to offer – the low-end cheapies you’ll often find in supermarkets. Instead, they typically represent a basic configuration of their mid-range models. For this money, you’re not getting the fastest Intel processors, dedicated graphics chips or a massive solid-state drive, but you should also expect decent build quality and a laptop that will last a few years.
So why spend £600 when you could get away with £299? Buying at this price is all about priorities, working out what you must demand from your laptop, then the features that are must-haves, nice-to-haves and plain non-necessities.
1 Choose your screen size
Your first and most important decision is what size and style of laptop you need. If you’re planning to use the laptop on the move, around campus or between several locations, then you should buy something that’s compact and light; a 13in or 14in laptop that weighs less than 1.7kg is worth a sacrifice in terms of all-day working comfort or speed.
If you’re looking for a laptop for use in the home or in the office, then going larger should net you more performance along with a larger keyboard and screen. If you need a laptop that handles either scenario on different days, a 14in laptop is the best balance between the two.
2 Is a convertible right for you?
Two-in-one convertibles are no longer the preserve of top-end laptops. These transform between a conventional clamshell design and a touch-oriented tablet PC, which can work well if you want something for casual sofa surfing and entertainment, but a more traditional laptop when there’s work to be done.
Be aware that you may need an optional stylus – if one is available – to get any serious productivity benefits, partly because Windows and most Windows apps still aren’t all that touch-friendly.
Also note that a convertible will be heavier than an equivalent clamshell design. Don’t make sacrifices for a more versatile device than you’ll actually use.
3 How much power do you need?
It’s with performance that the trade-offs start kicking in. At this price level, it’s impossible to find a laptop with a high-powered spec, an excellent screen and a stylish, slimline design, so you have to work out how important performance is to the applications you run.
You can, for example, find thin and light Microsoft Surface Pro-style devices for under £600, but they will have low-power, low-speed Core M and Pentium CPUs. The more traditional laptops we’re looking at here cover the range between dual-core and quad-core Core i3 and i5 chips, with 4GB to 8GB of RAM.
Navigating Intel’s processor is a challenge. To maximise battery life, most laptops at this price use a processor with a U (for ultra-low power) suffix rather than an HQ (with high-performance graphics, quadcore) suffix. To illustrate the difference, the Core i5-7200U has two cores running at a base frequency of 2.5GHz, Turbo-Boost to 3.1GHz. The Core i5-7300HQ has four cores running at 2.5GHz to 3.5GHz, plus more powerful Intel HD 630 graphics.
Or compare the Core i5-7200U to the Core i3-7100U. Very little separates these two, bar the cheaper chip’s locked 2.4GHz frequency.
What’s more, while eighthgeneration Intel Core processors are beginning to emerge, Intel has yet to replace some of its seventh generation mobile CPUs (you can spot the generation via the model number – the 7200U is the seventh-gen, the 8200U is eighth-gen). This makes a significant difference when the Core i5-8250U packs in four cores running eight threads at between 1.6GHz and 3.4GHz. It’s dramatically faster in multitasking scenarios. If you plan to spend a lot of time with more
intensive image-editing or video-editing apps, then prioritise accordingly and push for a seventh or eighth-generation Core i5 processor with an HQ suffix. If not, a Core i3 runs mainstream applications at perfectly good speeds.
Discrete graphics processors will, if even available, be an optional upgrade on these machines. These laptops will cope with some games at low detail levels, but if you want serious gaming performance, you will need to reset your expectations. See our article about mid-range gaming on p90. If you’re buying a lightweight laptop for use on the move, make battery life a key priority. Smaller, more energyefficient processors, better screen tech and SSDs have dramatically increased the battery life of high-end laptops, and the same benefits have now come down to the mid-range. There’s no need to put up with a laptop that putters out after just five hours when the best on test will last for nine hours or more.
5 Take a good look at the screen
Purchasing a laptop below £600 used to mean a dull, low-contrast 1,366 x 768 resolution screen. There’s still plenty of those around, but we’re seeing more Full HD (1,920 x 1,080) screens – and some of these are getting pretty good. You won’t often get the widest colour gamut – photographers looking for close to 100% sRGB or Adobe RGB coverage will need to spend more – but you can get close, along with high levels of brightness and contrast and rich colours.
“If you can get away with a 128GB SSD and put up with the lack of storage, that’s preferable to a noisy and less reliable 1TB hard disk”
Whatever kind of laptop you’re buying, make the screen a major factor in the final decision. It can make or break the whole experience. Sound isn’t quite so crucial, but some sub-£600 laptops dish out powerful audio with a surprisingly wide soundstage. We’re certainly not talking Sonos quality, but for watching Netflix? Fine.
6 Don’t forget the basics
It’s very easy to forget about the keyboard, but a bad one will drive you crazy over the laptop’s lifespan. You will face a variety of keyboards in the £400 to £600 market: the chiclet or “Scrabble-tile” format is nigh-on universal, but such keyboards range from lightweight efforts with a nasty, spongy action to solid and welldesigned units that have the feel of a premium model.
It’s a sign of the times that we don’t criticise the touchpads on any of the laptops on test this month. As a rule, they’re both responsive and big. If you opt for a cheaper model, check before you buy: some lag or struggle with multitouch gestures.
On connectivity, we’ve reached the point where 802.11ac Wi-Fi is near-ubiquitous, and you’ll struggle to find a laptop at this price that doesn’t support at least the base 433Mbits/sec version over the 5GHz band. Likewise, Bluetooth 4.1 or above is a given. Otherwise, your physical connectivity will be directly linked to the form factor. Expect an HDMI video output, one or two USB 3 or 3.1 ports supplemented by one or two USB 2 ports. USB-C ports are also becoming more common, while some of the larger models still have a Gigabit Ethernet port.
Finally, there’s storage. As ever, we have the perpetual battle between noisy and less reliable hard disks, and their sleek, quiet and expensive solid-state disk (SSD) cousins. If you can get way with a 128GB SSD and put up with the lack of storage, that’s still preferable to a 1TB hard disk. However, it’s best to aim for an SSD that’s 250GB or larger if you can find room in your budget.