In this post we will cover the most essential piece of hardware you will need during your studies: a notebook. Regardless what you study, be it business management, computer science, mathematics, philosophy, political science, music, physics…  – they all have one thing in common: you will need an electronic device to write reports, follow lectures, and create presentations. In what they differ, however, will be your requirements for the machine.
Today we will cover the essential parts of a notebook, what you should look out for in regard to your studies, and recommend specific models that we find to be superior. Enjoy!

The Fundamentals

A notebook has hundreds of components built into it, however, not every single one is important for your decision making. Below we have highlighted a few components you should check before buying a notebook:

• Processor
• Memory
• Graphics card
• Display
• Battery

Processor:

The processor is the brain of your notebook, it computes the tasks and calculates everything that happens on your screen. Currently there are two main manufacturer of processor chips: Intel and AMD. Both manufacturers produce high quality chips, however, Intel has a much higher presence in notebooks and thus we will highlight these in more detail. There are 4 series you will find in a notebook: m-Series, Core i3, Core i5, and Core i7. Regarding the m-Series the “m” stands for mobile which means the processors are not powerful but also do not require extensive cooling making them perfect for in-bed usage. Also, these are perfect for light tasks such as word, excel, and browsing the web. The i3 series is comparable to the m-series but a bit more powerful. If you need a powerful workstation, i5 and i7 chips are the way to go. These can vary between dual- and quad-core which means they can compute many tasks at once and are perfect if you need to run demanding programs such as video editing.

Memory:

Having the most complicated part covered, the memory is much less complicated. Basically, how much programs and tabs you can have open in your browser or in the background at once is limited by your memory available. Typically your notebook will have either 4GB, 8GB, 16GB, or 32GB. 4GB and 8GB are plenty for light tasks but if you need to do more things at once, 16GB or 32GB are definitely the way to go. Also, if you only perform light tasks but want to play video games we recommend to opt for the higher memory models as video games can use up to 6GB of memory!

Graphics card:

Being on the topic of gaming; which games you can play is determined by three factors; the processor, the memory and the graphics card. We have already covered the former 2  but what about the graphics card? Well, if you want to play games on your computer or have to edit videos and photos, we recommend looking for a dedicated graphics card. Usually manufacturers point out if they have one built-in. These cards are typically from the manufacture “Nvdia” which has a bright distinctive green logo. Once you have found out what graphics card your desired notebook has, we recommend to check its performance at  Garphics Card Benchmark. There you can also see how many frames you will achieve for your favourite game!

Display:

Having the internal components covered, we can now cover what you see and touch: The display! Displays are described according to their resolution in pixels or pixels per inch (PPI), the higher the pixel count on the horizontal and vertical axis, the sharper your image will be. We recommend to opt for 1920p*1080p or 2560p*1440p, depending on the size of your screen. But keep in mind, the higher the resolution and size of your screen the more it will drain your battery! Also, not every display is the same. There are 2 types of display panels: glare and non-glare. We at UniTech recommend you a non-glare display as this prevents the mirroring effect coming from sunlight hitting your screen sideways. However, glare displays can also come equipped with a non-reflective glass panel on top that has the same effect! Here we recommend to check if the display is either non-glare or has an non-reflective coating for best viewing pleasure.

Battery:

Last but not least is the battery. This is arguably the most important aspect because if your battery runs out of juice there is no point in having the best processor, biggest memory, and best display, right? The size of the built in battery can vary substantially, depending on the configuration of previously mentioned components. We found the average size of batteries in current models to be between 50 watt-hour and 60 watt-hour, which allows, depending on your usage, approximately 10 hours of on-screen time.

What we recommend

Now that you are familiar with the important components, we’d like to present you some of our favorite notebooks and classify them according to the best application:

The light worker

Ideal for students that only have to perform light tasks such as word, excel, and watching movies. These laptops offer great portability due to their small size, amazing battery live, and doing all that quietly:

• Apple MacBook (12-inch, 2017)
• Microsoft Surface G
• Asus Chromebook Flip

The workaholic

These machines can perform all before mentioned tasks with ease while allowing for great multitasking experience. It is absolutely no problem to have 10 tabs open in Chrome, work on a document, prepare a presentation, and listen to music at the same time!

• Asus Zen book flip S UX370
• Apple MacBook Pro with Touch Bar (13-inch, mid-2018)
• Microsoft Surface Pro 6 / Microsoft Surface Laptop 2
• Dell XPS 13

The “loading times? Never head of that”

These machines are as powerful as a normal desktop computer. They are perfect for extensive multitasking and also very demanding tasks such as video editing and Photoshop. These machines are simply powerful but have a one drawback: the battery life. The better and stronger the components of the notebook are, the higher the battery drain. However, these notebooks can easily last a full university-day when used like the models in previous tiers.

• Apple MacBook Pro with Touch Bar (15-inch, late-2018)
• Dell Inspiron 15 7000 Gaming
• Dell XPS 15

Endnote

There are a variety of options to choose from and a plenty of customization offered. You really enjoy the design of the MacBook but need more power? Simply choose the more powerful option! We hope we could showcase what things you have to look out for when buying your notebook and which components are important for which application. Also, the more powerful and bigger your notebook is the more battery it will drain so keep that in mind! With that being said, we hope you could find a notebook that suits you from our recommendations and hope you liked this post! If so, please make sure to leave a comment with your thought & suggestions and tell your friends!