in the market for a new laptop


The best value laptop is last year's Thinkpads. Consumer laptops are built like garbage to hit a certain price. You can pick up a used Thinkpad off ebay for the same price with better specs and higher build quality. Lots of companies have a mandatory laptop refresh policy that generates great deals.

Make sure whatever you buy still has a hard drive with a valid OS installed.

THESE ARE EXAMPLES DO NOT TAKE THIS AS BUY ADVICE
 
I am not an apple guy. That being said...

I went to iPhone 3.5 years ago and am happy. I had no problem with my androids, but I like the apple better.

My school computer went to an iMac 9 months ago. Elated. I had been on HP or Lenovo for a decade plus, WinOS. I still have a pretty solid MSI at home, I haven't touched it since I got my iMac.

I was fine with it, but the mac is simply better in every way. It's an M4 macbook air, I know they cost more, worth it.

Battery, vastly superior. That was the big one for me. Light yet strong. Ergonomic is much better. I even got an imouse, wow. It mimics the trackpad! (swiping, squeezing, etc). Also a massive battery (I've charged it twice in six months).

Screen is very clean, so when I use for video it's nice. I had to learn it, obviously, but it wasn't that bad and just so many good features it's worth it. I hadn't been a regular macOS user since the early 2000s, my first job lol, but the learning curve wasn't bad at all.

Dongles aren't an issue for me. I haven't used an HDMI in a long time (they got us a USB/HDMI dongle, I used the USB once in the last year, I'd guess it costs less than $20). There is an audio port, which I do use.

Just making a pitch. Good luck.
 
I'll make the cheapskate argument: if your current laptop has an Intel core-anything CPU, especially anything from the last 10 years, consider giving a lightweight Linux a try. If course, if it's broke, please ignore my unsolicited advice.

As far as buying new, my 2 cents is that pretty much anything will be fine in terms of performance, it's really down to durability/longevity. I'm a total Thinkpad guy because as broncc pointed out, they're tanks and they're built to be upgraded and repaired. I also admit that the new MacBooks are pretty great in their own way, but whether the price for what you get is worth it... Personal decision I guess.
 

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