Any good cheap laptops for programming?

[Erickson187]

I am looking to get into programming for the windows phone and possibly tablets or the Xbox1 and am looking for a laptop that would be in the about 14 to 15 inch size.

How good are the integrated graphics cards when it comes to handling programs like Visual Studio 2012 that allows for the phone 8 emulator. I am looking to buy one that will be able to last at least 3 years and be good for mainly programming and not much if any gaming.

Thanks in advance for your input.

 

[mase123987]

I would imagine that any new laptop with an Haswell i7 and 8gb of RAM will do you well ($700 to $800 range). Generally "cheap" and "last 3 years" don't go together when talking about a computer that is actually going to do work. What is your price point?

 

[Erickson187]

I am either looking to go real cheap or all in. I have not seen too many that really blow me away at this point so was hoping something under $400 if not will prob vo $1500 or more. Just can't believe how many now do not even come with a DVD drive or able to be upgraded in the future.

 

[mase123987]

I am either looking to go real cheap or all in. I have not seen too many that really blow me away at this point so was hoping something under $400 if not will prob vo $1500 or more. Just can't believe how many now do not even come with a DVD drive or able to be upgraded in the future.

There are plenty that do have optical drives and can be upgraded. The big movement now-a-days are ultrabooks/MacBook airs. Lose the optical drive and upgradeability for really thin and light computers. You can find i5 computers for $400 that then could be upgraded with more RAM, SSD, etc. in the future. I would look for one with Haswell though.

 

[jbigelow]

I am either looking to go real cheap or all in. I have not seen too many that really blow me away at this point so was hoping something under $400 if not will prob vo $1500 or more. Just can't believe how many now do not even come with a DVD drive or able to be upgraded in the future.

I've been toying with the idea of getting a new laptop now that developing WP8 on VS2012 is taxing my three year old i5 Lenovo Ideapad. It's mostly the Hyper V used for emulating the WP8 handset that's a *****, I've only got 4 gigs of ram though. I was on HP's site today pricing out a new 17 inch Envy laptop, top of the line 16 gigs of ram, quad core i7 and I was struggling to get the price past $1400. That was with the Blu ray reader, if you want the writer it may bump you into the 1500 dollar range. Point being, if you time a sale right you can probably get close to top of the line for 1300-ish.

 

[Erickson187]

Ok cool. I could care less about bluray would most likely just go for a DVD drive to install software and stuff on. I will definitely have to check out the i5 and i7. Might just wait a few months and see what they have on black Friday and by then they will all prob come with the 4th Gen chips

 

[mase123987]

I've been toying with the idea of getting a new laptop now that developing WP8 on VS2012 is taxing my three year old i5 Lenovo Ideapad. It's mostly the Hyper V used for emulating the WP8 handset that's a *****, I've only got 4 gigs of ram though. I was on HP's site today pricing out a new 17 inch Envy laptop, top of the line 16 gigs of ram, quad core i7 and I was struggling to get the price past $1400. That was with the Blu ray reader, if you want the writer it may bump you into the 1500 dollar range. Point being, if you time a sale right you can probably get close to top of the line for 1300-ish.

Did it have an SSD? SSD really is the upgrade that memory was back in the day. Makes life so much better.

 

[Daniel Ratcliffe]

Did it have an SSD? SSD really is the upgrade that memory was back in the day. Makes life so much better.

As a gamer I find my HDD fine. 5.9 on WEI for hard disk, graphics and gaming graphics 7.2, ram 7.6, processor 7.5. Left 4 Dead 2, 1080p max settings, straight 75fps (capped, vsync stuff). So what benefit would I get from a ssd? Bear in mind I don't care for faster boot times.

 

[jbigelow]

Nope, and I was looking for SSD too but it wasn't even a config option. Default config was a 1TB 5400 RPM. I added a SSD to my Lenovo this year but it hasn't helped in much beyond boot time and I just put my laptop to sleep most of the time (so I don't have to restart Visual Studio and open the project each day) so I'm missing the biggest benefit.

 

[mase123987]

As a gamer I find my HDD fine. 5.9 on WEI for hard disk, graphics and gaming graphics 7.2, ram 7.6, processor 7.5. Left 4 Dead 2, 1080p max settings, straight 75fps (capped, vsync stuff). So what benefit would I get from a ssd?

Initial loading time for all games will be quicker. Also, games like Skyrim and WOW that allow for long draw distances and are constantly loading new data will benefit as well.

 

[mase123987]

Nope, and I was looking for SSD too but it wasn't even a config option. Default config was a 1TB 5400 RPM. I added a SSD to my Lenovo this year but it hasn't helped in much beyond boot time and I just put my laptop to sleep most of the time (so I don't have to restart Visual Studio and open the project each day) so I'm missing the biggest benefit.

Biggest benefit isn't start up for me. It is loading time for programs and games/waking from sleep. Anything that has to initially move a lot of data from storage to memory will greatly benefit. I have a 512gb SSD in my gaming desktop and LOVE it.

 

[Kebero]

Meh, I run Server 2012 Std w/Hyper-V on a HP ProBook 4430s: i3, 16 gigs of ram, 80 gig ssd and a 500 gig spinner. I even added two more gigabit Ethernet ports via expresscard, so I could set up nic teaming (WiFi for the host, nic team for Hyper-V).

 

[Daniel Ratcliffe]

Initial loading time for all games will be quicker. Also, games like Skyrim and WOW that allow for long draw distances and are constantly loading new data will benefit as well.

Bear in mind I'm getting solid 75fps on L4D2 at max fps... I'm not sure if my gaming will be impacted too much on WoW/GW2.

 

[mase123987]

Bear in mind I'm getting solid 75fps on L4D2 at max fps... I'm not sure if my gaming will be impacted too much on WoW/GW2.

Something like L4D2 will load faster but actual gameplay won't be improved. WOW will be improved. It is a HUGE game with tons of data, esp. if you turn up all the settings and see draw distance to the furthest.

 

[Daniel Ratcliffe]

Something like L4D2 will load faster but actual gameplay won't be improved. WOW will be improved. It is a HUGE game with tons of data, esp. if you turn up all the settings and see draw distance to the furthest.

I'll turn up the settings on GW2 then with my current set up and see how it fares.

 

[mase123987]

With gaming, obviously you want to spend your money on the processor and video card first. If you are fine with your performance, then SSD isn't as important.

I don't really know what fps I get on my games. I base success on if my eye can identify any shuddering or not. I first tested my current setup by maxing out Crysis 3 and Skyrim @1080 and it was smooth as a baby's ****.

 

[Daniel Ratcliffe]

With gaming, obviously you want to spend your money on the processor and video card first. If you are fine with your performance, then SSD isn't as important.

I don't really know what fps I get on my games. I base success on if my eye can identify any shuddering or not. I first tested my current setup by maxing out Crysis 3 and Skyrim @1080 and it was smooth as a baby's ****.

Processor: Intel Core i5 Quad Core @3.1GHz
Graphics card: Asus Radeon HD6700 (2GHz clock)

 

[a5cent]

How good are the integrated graphics cards when it comes to handling programs like Visual Studio 2012 that allows for the phone 8 emulator. I am looking to buy one that will be able to last at least 3 years and be good for mainly programming and not much if any gaming.

The IGP isn't that important. Far more important is that the CPU supports VT-d and that you can enable SLAT in the BIOS. Without those two you will not be able to run the phone emulator on Windows 8. Also remember that you must have Windows 8 professional. Anything below that won't run the phone emulator either.

If you are serious about development, don't get a cheap laptop. It will ruin your experience and your productivity:

• Make sure you get a high contrast, glare free and high resolution screen (1366x786 just doesn't cut it for development). You will thank yourself later, because you will spend a lot of time reading text on that thing.
• I personally couldn't use Visual Studio on a laptop screen. The display sizes are just too small to layout all the Windows as required to work efficiently with Visual Studio. Generally, Visual Studio is always better on bigger screens.
• Having Windows and Visual Studio installed on a SSD can make development a bit snappier, but you can get by without it.

 

[kent002]

I would suggest you HCL Me core 2 dua ..I am also using since a long time and doing lots of programming with this..its performance is awesome ...and for more see here Best Laptops