Spec me a laptop..

MotherMayI · 30 Mar 2013 at 20:55

I am new to the world of laptops, always having preferred desktop machines and the only laptops I have owned been given to my by work/inherited.

I am however just about to start an MA, while working, and need a laptop for it to allow me to work on the go that is something like:

- Around 14" screen size. Smaller would be no problem, as long as the keyboard is large enough to type on for extended periods.

- Have hardware with good Linux driver support.

- Is light, thin and easy to carry around. It will have to fit in the same bag as my work laptop (Dell Latitute E6410) quite frequently.

- Ideally SSD, but not vital.

- Good battery life.

- Around £600 ideally, but willing to pay more if it is worth it.

I thought such a laptop would be quite easy to find, and perhaps it is just my inexperience with them that is slowing me down, but Im finding it much harder than expected.

Any suggestions would be much appreciated.

LiamJ · 30 Mar 2013 at 21:19

I'd probably check out the Dell Outlet for their 14" ultrabooks, which tend to have decent reviews.

(I'm not sure about Linux though? Do you want a PC without Windows which you can install Linux on yourself?)

brendy · 30 Mar 2013 at 21:21

Samsung 5 series ultrabooks, 13.3" 530u3c or the slightly larger 14" 530u4c.
I have bought them both in recently at users requests and have to say, they are so thin and lightweight and both come with a core i5, 500gb sata drive and 20gb ssd cache too which makes it pretty much as quick as a regular ssd setup.

Super-Spy · 30 Mar 2013 at 22:09

I had a quick look at HotUKDeals for you and came across these:

HP Spectre XT

Dell Inspiron 14Z

MotherMayI · 31 Mar 2013 at 11:11

Thanks for your suggestions guys, it is much appreciated. Regarding Linux, it does not matter if the laptop comes preinstalled with Windows or not - But there must be good Linux driver support for the hardware it uses.

The Samsung Series 5 and 9 were my original thoughts, but the 9 being a bit too pricey for me to justify and the 5 seems to get fairly middling reviews from a lot of places. They do however look very nice.

The specs of the Inspiron 14Z are nice, but the whole line just looks badly designed to me. While I know it shouldn't really matter, I guess Im shallow..

The Spectre XT is looking like the winner at the moment, and not one I'd heard of before, thanks!

cymatty · 31 Mar 2013 at 13:19

A Variant of this perhaps?

Have to see if they have one in the outlet as it is a little over budget.