Laptop computers

Start with where it will be used

A machine that lives on a desk and moves twice a year has almost nothing in common with one that goes into a bag every morning, even when the specification sheets look similar. Weight and battery life cost money that could otherwise buy processing power, so the honest first question is how often the laptop actually leaves the house.

If it rarely moves, a larger screen and a heavier chassis will give you more computer for the same outlay. If it travels daily, the reverse is true, and paying for portability is not a waste — it is the thing you are buying.

Screen size drives more than you expect

Screen size sets the size of the whole machine, which sets the size of the cooling system, which sets how much sustained work the processor can do before it slows itself down to stay cool. This is why two laptops with the same processor name can behave differently under a long task.

A 13 or 14 inch machine is comfortable to carry and adequate for documents, email, browsing and video calls. A 15 or 16 inch machine gives you room to have two windows side by side, which matters more for daily productivity than most specification differences.

• 13–14 inch: easiest to carry, good for writing, email and meetings
• 15–16 inch: room for two windows side by side, better sustained performance
• 17 inch: a desktop replacement that happens to fold

Memory and storage are the upgrades that age well

Of everything on a specification sheet, memory and storage are what most often decide whether a laptop still feels reasonable in year four. A machine that runs out of memory starts using its storage as overflow, and everything slows at once — which is the sensation people describe as a computer "getting old".

Many laptops now solder their memory to the board, so the amount you buy is the amount you will ever have. That makes it worth deciding deliberately rather than accepting whatever a configuration happened to come with.

What we can tell you that a specification sheet cannot

We repair laptops in the same building where we sell them. That means we see which designs are straightforward to open, which have keyboards and hinges that hold up, and which turn a simple repair into an expensive one because a component is bonded to something else.

If you tell us what you are trying to do, we will tell you what we would put in front of you, including when a cheaper option is genuinely enough.