Advice for New Laptop for My Mom

[tcprix]

Hi I know computer parts and what not but it's hard to know how well some of these cheaper builds will run as 'less expensive' laptops.
First of all we are in Canada and she is looking to spend around 500-600.

My Mom uses her laptop just for browsing the internet (emails, looking at websites, the odd video). Integrated graphics will be fine for her.

Things I think it 'Must Have':
-SSD for OS (this is more a nice to have, not essential, price is more important)
-1TB Storage
-bluetooth card for printing, etc.
-wifi card (which i'm sure they all have)
-8GB RAM
-Windows 10 Home

I'm thinking it would be nice to be 1920x1080 so more can fit on screen but I guess 1600x900 is fine too.

Any other info needed let me know. Thank you.

 

[cryoburner]

-SSD for OS (this is more a nice to have, not essential, price is more important)
-1TB Storage

Unless she has lots of bulk data to store (like video) she could probably get away with less storage than that. With a 500GB or maybe even 250GB SSD, additional hard drive storage likely wouldn't be needed, and with most systems the SSD could be upgraded to a larger model down the line, if needed. An SSD should be quite beneficial to overall system performance compared to a slow laptop hard drive, so I would likely prioritize that over having tons of storage that will probably sit unused.

As for Bluetooth, it should come standard with just about any wifi chipset these days, and of course wifi should be standard on any modern laptop.

1920x1080 is likely a good option, but have you thought about screen size? Smaller screens will likely require Windows scaling to be enabled to prevent everything from appearing tiny. Even on a 15.5" display, 1920x1080 can be a bit small, and you might want to use 120% scaling or so, particularly if her vision isn't the best. That can eat into available desktop space compared to what you would get from 1080p without scaling, but the higher-res screen will still benefit from things like sharper text in scaling-aware applications.

 

[hang-the-9]

Hi I know computer parts and what not but it's hard to know how well some of these cheaper builds will run as 'less expensive' laptops.
First of all we are in Canada and she is looking to spend around 500-600.

My Mom uses her laptop just for browsing the internet (emails, looking at websites, the odd video). Integrated graphics will be fine for her.

Things I think it 'Must Have':
-SSD for OS (this is more a nice to have, not essential, price is more important)
-1TB Storage
-bluetooth card for printing, etc.
-wifi card (which i'm sure they all have)
-8GB RAM
-Windows 10 Home

I'm thinking it would be nice to be 1920x1080 so more can fit on screen but I guess 1600x900 is fine too.

Any other info needed let me know. Thank you.

There are dozens of systems that fall in this range. You don't need such a large drive, way better to have a 250 gb solid state than a larger platter drive unless you are installing many games or storing your 100 DVDs on it.

Not sure about the bluetooth comment for printing, printing over bluetooth is very very rare, most of the time bluetooth is just used for audio with a bit of use for keyboards/mice.

Really the only things you want to check on is the screen and build quality, for that you would need to check what is available in your area and read some reviews. In general Lenovo and Asus are some of the top ones in the lower end of laptops. I've had too many issues with Dell systems over last 5 years to recommend them, HP and Toshiba, etc.. are OK but not as solid as Lenovo. In this price and use you need it for, the speed of the system is not as important as the screen. If you have some stores near you to look at systems that may be a way to go so you can see the screens.

 

[Encryption+]

Something like the Lenovo S340 should be fine. If you want a 1TB drive you can easily replace the factory 250 GB drive with something like this.

 

[tcprix]

Thanks for all the advice guys. Do you have any concerns with this pick? https://www.bestbuy.ca/en-ca/produc...5-8265u-128gb-ssd-8gb-ram-windows-10/13392505

I kinda forgot to mention I was looking for people to recommend laptops from Canadian websites :|