Question Need help choosing a new laptop. Would you recommend yours?

[mgistr]

Trying to decide on a new laptop and I'll appreciate recommendations from actual users. Budget is under $2k.

I want a brand new Windows PC with great speakers, excellent display (15" to 16" with minimum 1080 resolution), 16GB RAM (or more), 500GB SDD (or more). Would be nice if it has a touchscreen but that's not a dealbreaker.

One thing that IS a dealbreaker is the fan noise. I need something that's absolutely silent most of the time except on the extremely rare occasion when I'm running a heavy task.

I'll mostly use the laptop for Browsing, Excel, Word Processing, and content consumption. There might be the occasional video editing but I already have another [much noisier] laptop for that. If I can get away with an internal GPU, I'll take it.

Games I need to play? Solitaire perhaps. And Sudoku. Or Monopoly, if I can find a good game.

It doesn't need to be thin, light or portable, and a 3-hour battery life would do just fine. It's going to be plugged in most of the time and I'd only unplug to connect with my TV for the occasional movie.

Speaking of TVs, I'll definitely need an HDMI port. USB-A and USB-C ports would also be nice.

Some models I'm looking at already include:

• Lenovo Yoga Slim 7 Pro 16
• Lenovo ThinkPad P15s
• HP ZBook Firefly G8
• Dell Latitude 5521

If you own any one of these, please let me know what you love or hate about it. Again, I'm concerned about noise.

Only used Lenovo at work but they seem quite reliable. Plus the keyboards are lit. Speaking of keyboards, I need one that's backlit with a numpad. The numpad is a dealbreaker.

I'm open to most PC brands but I get the feeling (from speaking with friends who've used them) that HP laptops are not quite reliable. Any long-term HP user that's happy with their purchase should please correct this notion.

 

[jhona48]

Satisfying with a macBook

 

[mgistr]

Yeah, missed that part. My bad.

Still, recommendation stands for anyone else. I am really pleased with this notebook.

Tbf my ASUS would have been a great laptop if all worked well.

Great screen, excellent speakers, backlit keyboard with numpad...

But what's the point of the nice speakers if the fans spin louder than any movie I can play? Or a numpad if the keys start dying one after the other?

 

[Tech Junky]

Before discovering clevo's I stick with Dell or Lenovo. There's been a couple more models that showed up today. One matches my criteria but it's a 17" screen and I prefer 15.6". Barebones though at $1300 which is nice because I have the parts on hand and don't need to pay for them again. The only need would be 32gb ram at 3200mhz which on Amazon is $130 vs the OEM wanting $240. I would probably upgrade the screen as well to 4K like I did on my current model.

 

[lakedude]

 

[lakedude]

 

[mgistr]

Thanks for sharing these videos. I found them a while back and was able to reduce the CPU fan noise but the GPU fan noise never really stops. I even disabled the 2060 completely (I'm currently using just the internal GPU rn) and the GPU fan still stays on... humming loud enough to disturb a movie watching experience.

ASUS Armory Crate actually allows you to tweak settings and rn I'm in Silent mode (with the GPU disabled from BIOS settings) and it's still buzzing.

And that's just the work I've done on the fan noise; there's also the keyboard - 2 keys faulty in 2 years (my 8-year old Toshiba still has ALL the keys functioning). So, it's not been a great experience.

I just need a laptop that works, not something I'll have to spend weeks tweaking. It shouldn't be so difficult.

 

[lakedude]

Get a new keyboard and unplug the GPU fan. 😁

 

[lakedude]

Silly question, how exactly are you using you laptop?

When we are home we use them "docked" to a USB keyboard/mouse and the video goes to a 27" monitor or a 55" TV.

When I travel I carry a wireless keyboard/trackpad and an hdmi cable. When I get to a hotel I plug the hdmi into the hotel's TV...

 

[igor_kavinski]

12 Top Fan Speed Control Software for Computer CPU/GPU/CASE (2022) (tech21century.com)

Check if any of these utilities help you in reducing the fan speed.

 

[mgistr]

Silly question, how exactly are you using you laptop?

When we are home we use them "docked" to a USB keyboard/mouse and the video goes to a 27" monitor or a 55" TV.

When I travel I carry a wireless keyboard/trackpad and an hdmi cable. When I get to a hotel I plug the hdmi into the hotel's TV...

Occasionally [when I want to see a movie] I connect the laptop to my TV screen. But most of the time I simply use the laptop as is. The 15" screen and a full keyboard is plenty fine for me and that also means I can use it in bed (as I do most of time). The only accessory I use [sometimes] is a Bluetooth mouse.

 

[mgistr]

12 Top Fan Speed Control Software for Computer CPU/GPU/CASE (2022) (tech21century.com)

Check if any of these utilities help you in reducing the fan speed.

Thanks, I'll check them out.

 

[sdifox]

Is there any difference on fan speed if you put it on the table compared to in bed? Blankets are designed to retain heat and putting laptop directly on blanket will make the fan kick in in no time.

You just need a mid tier cpu like ryzen 5 or i5 with integrated graphics and a good touchscreen display panel.

 

[mgistr]

Is there any difference on fan speed if you put it on the table compared to in bed? Blankets are designed to retain heat and putting laptop directly on blanket will make the fan kick in in no time.

You just need a mid tier cpu like ryzen 5 or i5 with integrated graphics and a good touchscreen display panel.

Let's just say I should have factored fan noise into my criteria the first time.

 

[igor_kavinski]

If you haven't bought a laptop yet, this looks like a good deal:

HP ENVY x360 2-in-1 13.3" OLED Touch-Screen Laptop Intel Evo Core i7 8GB Memory 512GB SSD Natural Silver 13m-bd1033dx - Best Buy

OLED / touchscreen / 5 GHz Turbo boost

The OLED should be amazing for movies. However, if you do a lot of static screen work, you will need to manually keep running the screensaver every 10 or 15 minutes, just to be sure that the static image doesn't get burned into the display.