Moore's law and choice of computer purchase

MoneySavingUser

cepheus wrote: »

I've just had my usual 'crazy pub argument' this lunchtime. This time it's about laptops or computers more generally.

My opponent's view its always worth getting a top grade computer since it will remain useful for longer. He is bragging that his laptop (bought just before XP came out possible 10 years ago?) is still better than the cheapest laptops on offer today due to the ability to upgrade. It cost him around £1300 then.

My view is that top grade computers are a waste of money. Moore's law implies speed and memory double every two years and it would be faster OR cheaper overall to buy 2 cheap computers (one every 5 years) rather than one expensive one every 10 years. Looking at the sub £300 laptop page I notice some of these models are upgradable. Reliability might be a disadvantage with cheaper brands though.

Do you have any evidence to support either view, such as a graph showing expensive and cheap models along with spec for year.

Thanks for your post - very interesting

I mostly agree except for the sub £300 price tag (which as some posters have pointed out are not so reliable) I would say consider 400-500 price range for comparison

My friend bought a sony vaio for £800 - with an i7 and all types of wonderful things saying it would last a long time - maybe but he works all week so only actually spends a couple of hours using it - and never doing much more than checking email or typing in word

I bought a laptop for £430 - just an i3 but witth 4GB RAM it can handle everything I do and I use it for most of the day

I would much rather spend approx £400 now and then £400 again in 18m/2years time than spend £800 on a single laptop - because I don't believe it is worth it

Also your friend doesn't see to have considered the cost of upgrades and the loss of the parts he removes - apart from RAM and Hard drives laptops aren't really designed with upgrades in mind