[SOLVED] Intel i7 worth the extra $500 over i5?

[velocci]

Hi all, i’m looking for a laptop. The laptop will be used by my son at school (grade 11 and 12 and hopefully beyond) and used by me when he’s not using it. I will use it mainly for email, web browsing and youtube. The Dell XPS 15 with i7-10750h is about $500 more than the one with intel i5-10300h. Is it worth the extra money or is it overkill?

 

[Barty1884]

For what your son is looking to do with it, it's not 'worth it'....... at least not on the face of it.

Assuming you're in Canada? As the i5 to i7 delta is $500 CAD.
However, even the cheapest i7 variant adds a discreet GPU (1650TI) over the integrated graphics, in addition to the i7 step up.

If your son has no intention of gaming, then it's still a 'no' in terms of worth - but resale value & long-term viability should be improved by a fair margin.

 

[velocci]

Yes i'm in canada. Would the battery on the i5 last longer?

 

[Barty1884]

Yes i'm in canada. Would the battery on the i5 last longer?

Can't find anything spec'd out for the battery. In theory, if they had the same battery, the i5 will last longer (no additional power draw from the GPU) - but typically a laptop with a dedicated GPU will be spec'd out with a larger battery than it's iGP counterpart.... so would probably be very similar, with the i7 likely to last longer if the dedicated GPU isn't being utilized.

EDIT the i7 + 1650TI has an 86 watt hour battery, the i5 has a 56WHr.
With no dedicated GPU usage, the i7 would last longer. If the GPU is utilized, they'd likely end up similar overall.

 

[geofelt]

The i5-10300h processor has 8 processing threads.
That in enough for any normal work.
We mostly do things one thing at a time.
You might expect the unit to last 12 hours for the activity you stated.
Of much importance to me is that the laptop have a ssd and not a slow HDD.
Laptop vendors usually stick it to you on ssd size increases so one strategy is to buy the minimal drive setup and plan to replace with your own unit.
Ditto for ram.

You may also want to consider the display options.
You can often opt for brighter or higher resolutions.

Lastly, consider the weight if the unit is to be transported around.