Laptop for Programming

RobTang

The thing is developers can be quite picky and what might be important for one isn't for another.
It really is best just to contribute.


Brand generally defines the quality of all non-major components, which usually affects how long it will last but not performance, which I would say in real world terms roughly similar for the same spec.


While it probably wont fit into budget any of the professional lines is a safe bet (Lenovo Thinkpad, Dell Precision, HP Probook etc. Prosumer lines are also ok Vaio laptops, Apple, HP Envy etc)


Personally however my preferences are: High DPI screen (ideally 15"), SSD, build quality (inc weight and form factor), lots of ram, CPU. In that order.

debitcardmayhem

What .... 8GB to program on, JHC no wonder everyone wants 32GB + 9Zillion teraflops just to run mindlesscraft... when I was a lad effective code ran on 22KB and you wrote your own swapping routines and sort modules(based on shell sort not bubble sort) , ram is cheap, Ghz are cheap but jeeze code is not what it was:eek:

jaydeeuk1

I get by just fine on 4gb ram, and thats with IIS, sql server 2014 running with a couple of large 10gb+ databases, dreamweaver, photoshop, debugging tools, profiler and stuff like spotify and steam service. Would probably upgrade if I could, but my little x360 is coping just fine - difference between mine and a colleagues i7, 16gb ram machine is negligible.

IMO, an SSD is a must as is a full HD or greater display. And if he likes to program in the dark, a backlit keyboard (and find one that is nice to type on, not some cheapo one that bounces when you press a key)
Mine also has display port, hdmi out and widi so I can have 3 other monitors (probably more if I used USB) - really handy having different apps on different screens. Dell do some good stuff - I have a hp spectre x360, looks a little like a macbook but at near half the cost and is better in pretty much every way. Battery life is excellent at well over 10 hours.

Lakeuk

I've been coding(tinkering) for a few years on a intel 3i based laptop with 8GB memory. I went for it for the screen size 15.6" and that the keyboard was traditional layout ie proper numpad on the right, it annoys me when even one key has been placed different to normal. Battery life is an annoyance, windows is rubbish at accurately reporting battery life left.

The only thing I don't like on my laptop is the display viewing angle which looks like a negative photo unless you've looking straight on, so when it comes to look for a new laptop I'll be going down the local shop to try out how the screens look, I suspect in the budget range <£400 most displays will be the similar to what I've got at the moment but hopefully technology has moved in the last few years

Cycrow

debitcardmayhem wrote: »

What .... 8GB to program on, JHC no wonder everyone wants 32GB + 9Zillion teraflops just to run mindlesscraft... when I was a lad effective code ran on 22KB and you wrote your own swapping routines and sort modules(based on shell sort not bubble sort) , ram is cheap, Ghz are cheap but jeeze code is not what it was:eek:

It depends what you are using to code and what you are actually making.

xcode on the mac needs 8gb minimum when using source control. Any less and the mac becomes unusable. I took me about 30 mins just to open activity monitor and kill the process when using 4gb ram.

The windows based software we work on needs at least 32gb ram

benjus

I'm a software developer too.

As others have mentioned, an SSD really is a must. It's a very desirable thing on any computer, but building software uses the "disk" a LOT, so a fast drive makes a big difference.

Hi res screen so you can have lots of windows open. I have a 4K screen in my laptop. The text size can get a bit small, but I'd rather have the option to increase the text size than be stuck with a lower resolution.

My laptop has 8GB of RAM, but I'm about to upgrade to 16GB. How easy it is depends on the model, but in many cases there's a special cover just for the RAM, so you don't need to remove anything except this. Look at the maximum RAM it can take when choosing a model, not just the amount it's supplied with. Don't go for less than 16GB maximum.

CPU - I have an i7-4710HQ which works well. Could probably manage with something slower.

Cycrow makes a good point that the laptop will need to run not only the development environment (Visual Studio, xcode, whatever he uses) but also the software that he's making, and potentially other software that it interacts with. No point in being able to build software if you can't run it...

I think £350 is very optimistic... mine cost about £1000. Having said that, I was treating myself - I'd been using a much older laptop for some time, and did manage to do some development on it.

Arthien

Thanks again for all the comments and suggestions, it really is helpful. I think half the problem is that he doesn't actually know entirely what he wants himself, so me highlighting to him some of the points you've raised will probably be a good start! One minute he says just any cheapish one will do just to get things moving, he was even thinking about a netbook at one point for the portability, but then the next time we speak about it he's thinking nothing less than an i5 with minimum 16gb RAM etc etc will do!

This was half the reason I initially thought I'd just buy a half-decent one to get him started and to see if he even uses it as he's got multiple things on the go at the moment, then he could upgrade if it's worth his while. I just would hate him to feel obliged to keep and use a laptop that wasn't quite right, just because I'd bought it for a present. Ah well, fingers crossed the project takes off then he can be the one buying me fancy computers instead :T