Looking for a Uni Laptop (Budget $1,000)

Hey guys,

I've been searching through the recent laptop bargains but struggling to make a choice! I just need a laptop that can run SPSS, word, excel and like 50 chrome tabs all at the same time. Lighter is better but don't need anything extremely light. Just looking for a laptop that can can get me through a science postgrad degree. It'd be great to do some basic gaming but again, mostly just focused on being able to handle running a bunch of software (not games) at once. I have a budget of $1000.

I'm also looking to put the purchase on creditline, so I can go through the following retailers, although I'm pretty sure they will price match an advertised deal:

Harvey Norman
The Good Guys
Godfreys
Beds R Us
Betta
Bing Lee
Dick Smith Electronics
Domayne
Furniture Court
Generic Electrical
JB Hi Fi
Joyce Mayne
Kogan.com
Leading Appliances
Retravision

Anyway, any help would be greatly appreciated! Also happy to provide further info if I've missed something

Thanks Ozbargainers!

Comments

  • +7

    Beds R Us

    Just get whatever laptop they have there

    But seriously, what's your budget?
    It's hard to recommend a laptop without knowing how much you're willing to spend

    • $1000 budget.

      • +3

        Lenovo Thinkpad E15 for $888. I would probably get the 16GB model for $935 since you're a fan of Google Chrome

        • +1

          haha posted before reading this.
          Yep that would be more power than OP requires.

          Chrome just sits on whatever ram you have to certain extent. I think going to 16gb ram for that price is worth it but wouldn't do for chrome haha!

          • @[Deactivated]: True, it was just a bit of a jab at chrome. I'd get 16GB to future-proof it. I believe it's soldered so you won't be able to upgrade later.

            • @FireRunner: yep if it soldered on. then definitely worth it!

            • @FireRunner: haha i know what you mean.
              Sometimes i like to check how much ram some of data analysis use. Usually, chrome is using more of my ram than my work haha!

        • +2

          100% get the 16gb instead, Chrome is heavy on the RAM usage. $50 now is a good investment, over having to pay $100 later.

  • -2

    Get the quad MacBook Air for $1699. I ran SPSS and all that on my MacBook no problem, and honestly SPSS is way easier to pirate for Mac than it is for PC.

    • lol. not sure how serious you are.

      SPSS is pretty easy to run. Don't need high specs

      Also if you are post grad(research) student many uni's provide spss.

    • That's way overpriced and for that price, you can get a much better laptop anyway…

      • Better is subjective if you’re used to those feature.

        • Better:
          - More power
          - Able to play games :) - They did say they would want to play casual games after all, and Macs are definitely not known to play games lol
          - Possibly better keyboard
          - More RAM

          Basically better spec wise

  • +6

    Looking for a Uni Laptop

    Where did you last see it?

    • +2

      Have you been taking comedy lessons from JV?

      • LOL def from the JV play book

  • SPSS can run on more or less any windows laptop.
    If you are using SPSS I suspect you probably are not working with huge data sets.

    p.s. what kinda post grad degree are you doing.
    If you are or will be doing a PhD many university departments make funding available to purchase a laptop.

    Something like this https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/553352 would be more power than you need. So you could probably get something cheaper if you wanted.

    • Not huge datasets, although sometimes my ecology spreadsheets are pretty big.

      My undergrad is Science/Arts but my postgrad will be in psychology. The E14 looks like it will be even better then what I need which is - as mentioned in this thread - great for future proofing.

      • You’ll be fine. I did biology and you can throw anything at it. Unless you’ve got millions of rows or something you’ll be fine.

  • +9

    Hey Everyone thanks heaps for the recommendations. I went with the E14 deal with the extra ram. It looks great!

    Thanks again!

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