Laptop Recommendations

[Guest]

I don't see the point in buying new honestly unless you really need to play relatively demanding games on the go, which is usually a bad idea anyway. Any old laptop of the last 10 years can very comfortably run a good GNU/Linux distribution and you can make even older ones run decently as a daily driver with a little know-how.

If I really had to, I could use my Pentium III laptop from 2001 for daily driving.

[Cobra!]

I feel like this is the perfect laptop for this thread! Its retro looking its got a disk drive and it runs all modern hardware  Iv no idea how you'd get one since its Japan only - but it's super cool!

I would absolutely love this laptop! I should be looking for a new one myself. Maybe I could find a way to get an imported unit?

[Salty]

For second hand stuff; Id find something that used to be top-of-the-line expensive but is now cheap, it will have aged well and should have a serious screen n stuff. For web design and art Id put all my focus on getting a great screen with good colour accuracy. Maybe a fancy business laptop - you can often get those cheap because businesses sell them off in bulk. Dell XPSs are almost always solid and very reliable (if a bit boring) :omg:k: Lenovo Thinkpads are good too because they are kinda chunky and retro, but often very powerful because their for professional use. (Id get a Thinkpad )

I second this! My daily driver is a Thinkpad L470 (which is quite a few years old) and I LOVE IT. Thinkpads are beautifully built, have the absolute best laptop keyboard in the world, and tend to last "forever" in laptop terms. I still have a Thinkpad made in 1998 that works just fine! Not really practical now, but still pretty cool!  I think I paid $40 at my local electronics recycling center for the one I use now, then I upgraded it with an SSD and some additional RAM for maybe another $100. It works just as well (if not better) than an $800 laptop you'll find in a retail store. I'm running Debian, but it could definitely run Windows without a problem.

I'm an IT bro by trade, so I have truly used just about every commercial/enterprise-grade laptop you could think of, and Thinkpads win for me every time. If you don't have a used PC store or recycling center near you, I would recommend looking on Ebay for a used one that's in working order. Additionally, the Facebook Marketplace is a great place to find a deal.