Best Laptop for IB?

Going to be interning this summer at an EB and currently have a MacBook. I know my bank had sent laptops to their interns but I'm taking an IB course this semester and want to just get the most suitable laptop now (perhaps later on I can forward the receipt and get reimbursed?) I know there are programs/licensing you can get for your Macbook, but I'd rather just get a cheap PC given that I have the disposable income. 

My budget is ~300 and I'm looking into the Lenovo thinkpad t series. Anyone have good recs?  

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Here are the specs I'd recommend prioritizing:

  • CPU: Intel i5/i7 8th gen or newer, ~2.5+ GHz base clock speed
  • RAM: 8 GB+. If it's not much more expensive, I'd get 12 GB or 16 GB. I don't think RAM runs up the cost that much nowadays.
  • Storage: 256 GB SSD should be plenty for a student/intern
  • Screen Size: I prefer 13.3" or 14". 15.6" is too bulky IMO. Dell has some good 14" laptops
  • Other considerations: don't bother with touch screens, 4K, or 360-degree rotation. I think they are pretty useless and will run the price up like $100 for each feature.
  • Brand: I only have experience with Dell and HP (both good), but I think Lenovo is good, too. I like Dell because they have quality, no-frills products. HP is known for shipping with a lot of bloatware, but it's not that hard to uninstall everything you don't need. All three have websites that let you filter by each spec, so I would just search for the best price matching these criteria and go from there.

$300 is pretty low, but you could maybe make it work by buying used. If it's in your range, I think $600-700 is much more realistic, especially if you wait for a deal. Happy to answer any other questions

 

These are very good spec recommendations but finding them at $300 going with Dell or HP might be tough and you could be leaving a lot on the table for the brand name. Dell is pretty good at upcharging. I have an Acer Aspire laptop, just about 3 years old with no issues despite giving it a heavy workload (it has the capability to play games and i play games on it, but it's not a discreet "gaming laptop"). I think I got it for ~$400 and have been pretty satisfied. No complaints about the brand.

 

12 GB of RAM? What decade are you living in lol. Also lol @ suggesting Intel instead of Ryzen for work / productivity. Dell is also the opposite of "no-frills" and has terrible customer service. Base clock speed is also a meaningless spec - CPUs are so good at threading and paralleling that base clock speed doesn't tell us anything about how fast a computer is anymore. 

 

I was in your situation few months ago.

In the end I bought the crappiest Huawei matebook (around 400 Euros last summer) and to be honest I’m impressed by it.

Looks much more expensive than it is and has everything I need to work, mainly modelling and drafting PPT / IM (currently interning at a good private debt/special situations fund down here in my home country).

It’s a good buy IMO, if you’re going to be at an EB then your firm will send you their PC so buy something to use to study/chill

 

Why not buy a desktop? more powerful and more storage. With wfh here to stay for some time, even in some hybrid form, it might make sense. 

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