So, Mr. SK has always purchased his laptops during a trip to Japan, but between covid and other problems, we think it's probably better for him to buy his next laptop in the US. But he's not familiar with the US brands, so any advice about how to choose would be appreciated.

His last few laptops have been Toshiba Dynabooks, but those don't seem super popular in the US.

BTW, he uses some heavy software (e.g., Illustrator) so I guess he needs a fast processor and a lot of RAM. He doesn't care about a touch screen.

Beyond going through reviews in PC Mag, does anyone have any other advice about how to choose?

TIA!

I just bought a new laptop and I love it!

ASUS ProArt StudioBook 16 Laptop, 16” 2560x1600 120Hz Display, AMD Ryzen 7, 32GB DDR4, 1TB PCIe SSD, Nvidia Geforce RTX 3060, Windows 11 Home

$1,649.99

Went the "creator" route this time. Although I suspect it will a decent light gaming machine.





16'' (2560*1600) 16:10 120Hz display; 100% Adobe RGB; Pantone validated color accuracy; 500 nits; Delta E <2
AMD R7 5800H processor 3.2 GHz(16M Cache, up to 4.4GHz) with Windows 11 Home
NVIDIA Geforce RTX 3060 with 6GB GDDR6 VRAM - RTX Studio Ready
Fast storage and memory(upgradable) featuring 1TB PCIe NVMe RAID0 SSD and 32GB DDR4 Memory

This is my very first PC laptop ever. lol I have only ever owned Apple laptops until now. My last one being a 2015 MacBook Pro which is still running but the battery is about shot.

I have upgraded the memory (very easy to DIY!) to 64GB and will eventually install a 2TB NVMe SSD in the second slot.

https://www.amazon.com/ASUS-St..._product_top?ie=UTF8

Memory Upgrade:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08H...dt_b_product_details

You can buy Toshiba Dynabook in the USA.
Some online retailers sell them here.
E.g.,

https://www.tigerdirect.com/ap...sp?keywords=Dynabook

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c...ialSearch=yes&sts=ma

Personally I use Macs and have a Windows Surface Pro (and older Dell stuff before that), but if Mr.SK is already happy with Toshiba Dynabooks, there is no reason why he cannot continue with them.

Good luck!

Mark, yikes! I'm hoping we can stay under $1000. But I'll take a look at Asus.

Ax, I thought he should consider other brands since Toshiba doesn't seem to be all that popular in the US, which makes me wonder about the quality and reliability of the models sold here. And also the competitiveness re pricing. It's hard for Mr. SK to evaluate since they don't sell the same models in Japan as they do in the US....

Anyway, we'll certainly keep Toshiba on our list.

There are so many options it's always kind of overwhelming!

Also, your two links (TigerDirect and BHPhoto) bring up another question: where to purchase!

Too many options, ugh.

It looks like all the Toshiba Dynabooks (actually I think all of their PCs) are manufactured in Japan and imported to the USA. It's possible that the specs might be different between the ones you could buy in Japan vs in the USA, but that's an easy check.

quote:

It looks like all the Toshiba Dynabooks (actually I think all of their PCs) are manufactured in Japan and imported to the USA.

Well, that's encouraging....

Maybe I'll just keep my mouth shut and let him get what he wants! That would certainly be easier than reading one gajillion reviews...

Bought an MSI gaming computer because the Microsoft Flight Simulator software requires a lot in the way of graphics and computing power.
It managed the software well, as far as I took it.
Found that I did not want to devote my life to learning the software.
Now I have a lot more computer than I need.

quote:

Originally posted by ShiroKuro:
Mark, yikes! I'm hoping we can stay under $1000. But I'll take a look at Asus.

Ax, I thought he should consider other brands since Toshiba doesn't seem to be all that popular in the US, which makes me wonder about the quality and reliability of the models sold here. And also the competitiveness re pricing. It's hard for Mr. SK to evaluate since they don't sell the same models in Japan as they do in the US....

Anyway, we'll certainly keep Toshiba on our list.

There are so many options it's always kind of overwhelming!

Also, your two links (TigerDirect and BHPhoto) bring up another question: where to purchase!

Too many options, ugh.

That ASUS is a great performer for the Adobe suite. It comes with 3 months of Adobe Suite included. I am even using the Adobe software on other computers during the trial. lol

Mark, good to know!

I’ve been using my sisters laptop and it’s an impressive piece of technology. It’s an HP, if that makes any difference.

I’m not sure it does. The key seems to be an I7 processor and at least 32 GB ram. I don’t know what the equivalent AMD processor is but Ax and Mark probably do. 64K ram doesn’t cost much more and would probably be worth the cost. Drive size doesn’t seem to matter as external hard drives, and flash drives are dirt cheap.

YMMV.

If I were researching laptops, I’d start here:

https://www.nytimes.com/wirecu...eviews/best-laptops/

Steve, I was suggesting he do 16 GB for ram, but I'll check out 32 instead.

Quirt, thanks! I'll take a look there.

You mentioned that he uses “heavy” software, like Adobe Illustrator and such.

Yeah, for that, if he sticks to the Intel line of processors, get the i7 or better.

16 GB of RAM is good, but 32 GB is better if you can swing it. I assume most laptops come with SSD (as opposed to traditional spinning hard disk drive, HDD) these days, but if he’s looking at laptops with HDD, I’d recommend deploying any extra budget to upgrading to SSD first before upgrading to more RAM beyond 16 GB.

My last 2 laptops were Lenovo Yogas and we just bought another one for LL#2 to go to college.

My previous Yoga lasted like 4 years and I only replaced it because I literally WORE A HOLE THROUGH THE SPACE BAR from typing so much. That machine was a beast.

I've been using my new one for about a year now and it too is rock solid. My previous one was a 7i, the new one is a 9i (basically the same except for a nicer speaker/sound setup), and we just bought LL#2 a 7i. Prices have gone up a LOT. My top of the line 9i was under $1000 when I bought it a year ago (we did get a screaming Memorial Day sale deal) and now they sell for $1500 and up.

There seem to be only 2 places you can get the Yoga for some reason - Lenovo's own website and Best Buy. Honestly, I recommend Best Buy for ease of customer service -- I had to deal with a customer service issue with the Lenovo website on my laptop order last year (not related to the computer, it was a billing issue) and they were a pain in the rear to deal with.

The 9i is currently on sale at Best Buy: https://www.bestbuy.com/site/l...9683.p?skuId=6479683. This is basically the model I have only I have a 1TB disk.

I do wish they had more ports - you get like 2 or 3 USB-Cs and one old style USB and that's it. I wish there was an HDMI out and more old style USBs. That is the price you pay for sleekness, I guess -- the thing is thin and light and gorgeous! And you can get USB-C to pretty much anything adapters on Amazon - you get used to the limited ports. Good luck!

We've been using Yogas since 2018 too. My four year old one got coffee spilled on the keyboard, rendering it basically unusable. You have to tear the entire thing apart to get the keyboard out, so replacement is not an option.

I also understand they have hinge problems. A friend had hers break. Luckily it never goes anywhere and still works, so no problem.

Other than those things I really like them. But I never use the touchscreen.