How to choose a cheap laptop? What should you rely on? What features should you look for first? Can a cheap laptop be good quality? How to buy a cheap laptop suitable for gaming? These are all questions you may have without answers.
In this article, we will discover together how to acquire the right cheap laptop.
What is the use of a cheap laptop?
Very often our financial capabilities are sufficient only for buy a laptop cheap. However, we want it to have a modern and attractive look, work quickly and be reliable.
Indeed, it is necessary to immediately accept as a fact that a cheap laptop and a very expensive laptop from any manufacturer will live about 7 years; if they do not die an early violent death by falling from a height or spilling juice on the keyboard....
Why is that? Because it's beneficial for all manufacturers if you buy laptops from them as often as possible.
By the way, I would like to add that when choosing a laptop, many people believe that a cheap laptop cannot be of high quality. Therefore, they are very wary of cheap laptops. The same rule is actively supported by store managers; because their premiums directly depend on the price of the product. Although in reality, there are many decent models of cheap laptops; some buyers often take out a loan to overpay for something that is not necessary.
Buying a cheap laptop is no longer synonymous with inferior quality.
There is currently a very good selection of cheap laptops on the market. Therefore, it is worth paying attention to them, as the quality of materials and workmanship of cheap laptops of recent years is quite good considering the price offered.
Moreover, most models are distinguished by excellent design, high quality, reliability and adequate price. It is strongly not recommended to buy laptops from little-known manufacturers, as there is a very high probability that very annoying unrecoverable problems will be discovered during their operation. However, this is not an axiom and may not be true in all cases.
Surprisingly, statistics and practice show that cheap laptops are much less likely to be repaired than more expensive and more durable models. However, this is not always true. That's why it's recommended to check how to protect your laptop from breakdowns and repairs and how to choose the most reliable laptop.
Now let's talk about the features to consider
Can you save on a processor? Is it necessary to have a large hard drive and which type is better? How much RAM do you need? Is a discrete graphics card necessary for gaming? Let's try to figure out what we really need and what we can refuse.
Screen
Technology never stops, and most manufacturers install screens of quite satisfactory quality in their laptops, even in a cheap laptop.
For example, cheaper laptops may have significantly improved viewing angles or a maximum screen brightness that is well suited to your needs. Also, before buying from an online store , it is advisable to find a detailed review on the Internet. Better yet, you can go and see the selected model with your own eyes in any electronics supermarket to be sure that the image quality is at least at a satisfactory level.
It is strongly recommended that the screen surface be matte, the maximum brightness not less than 200 cd/m2 and the viewing angles not less than 170/160 (if specified).
In terms of screen resolution, almost all cheap laptops have Full HD (1920 x 1080 pixels) or HD (1366 x 768 pixels).
CPU
Since the performance of the laptop depends primarily on the processor and it will be very difficult or even impossible to upgrade it in the future; its choice should be taken with maximum responsibility.
Cheap AMD processors of the A4, A6 and A9 series (A4-9120, A4-9120e, A4-9125, A6-9225, A9-9425) have very modest performance, but it is quite enough. This already allows you to work quite comfortably in most popular programs; as well as play on the integrated video card not only almost all simple and old games, but also some modern ones.
So, which processor should you choose? Since the processor's power efficiency significantly affects the size, weight, battery life, temperature, noise emitted by a laptop, and even its expected reliability, it is recommended to buy budget laptops only based on Intel 10-11 generation or AMD Ryzen processors. However, it all depends on what you want to do with your budget laptop.
RAM
Given that a normally installed and uncluttered Windows 10 with all the necessary services and a built-in antivirus program takes 1 GB or a little more in memory; 4 GB will be enough for comfortable work with office programs; Internet and for games at low quality settings.
But, for the normal operation of heavy programs and launching modern games at high quality settings, the power of the processor or video card, and not the amount of RAM, will often not be enough.
Naturally, there is no additional RAM, but it is still better to buy a laptop with 4 GB of RAM and a faster processor than one with 8 GB of RAM and a weaker processor.
Hard drive (HDD, SSD, eMMC)
Until recently, the vast majority of laptops were equipped with conventional hard drives; which, with a more or less good speed of linear operations, had a very low access time. Therefore, very often they were the "bottleneck" that significantly slowed down the entire system.
But eventually, with the drop in SSD prices, laptop manufacturers began to massively install such drives with a capacity of 120 to 240 GB in their models, even the cheapest. It may seem that 240 GB, and even more so 120 GB, is too little. But, if you use a laptop mainly for Internet and office work, 60 GB is quite enough. To store large amounts of data, it is more convenient and reliable to use an external hard drive.
Moreover, if we take into account the speed of modern networks, it is very often easier and more convenient to store information on the Internet than on a local hard drive.
Furthermore, it is strongly recommended not to buy laptops with eMMC; as this type of media is significantly slower than SSDs.
Periphery
The Wi-Fi adapter, card reader, and Bluetooth are all of acceptable quality in almost all budget laptops. The camera and microphone are also still of acceptable quality for communication.
Since the use of optical discs is almost a thing of the past, the presence of a DVD-RW drive is not at all necessary; especially since the price of a laptop will be even lower without it.
Video card
Currently, in a cheap laptop, the integrated video card in the modern processor makes it an acceptable gaming computer. Indeed, it allows you to play many games or even most modern games.
It's worth remembering that when choosing a cheap laptop, you must first determine what you want to use it for. Gaming computers or gaming laptops are designed for gaming purposes.
Conclusion
In this article, we've covered the key factors to consider when purchasing a cheap laptop. This makes it much easier for you to choose a cheap laptop while being confident you've made the right choice.
