LaptopO: Pakistan Best Laptops Guide

Welcome to Laptops.

Buying a new laptop can be perceived as an investment, the main thing is to choose the right configuration. Whether you’re looking for a device on a tight budget or haven’t decided on the hardware yet, this guide will help you make the right choice and possibly save a few thousand rupees.

How often should you change your laptop?

On average, in Pakistan, laptops user change laptops every 3-4 years. There are three main reasons for this periodicity:

• natural wear of the device;
• moral obsolescence of components;
• the emergence of new technology for using a computer;
• significant progress in the capabilities of the models.

We will immediately stipulate that the article refers to the lines of 2020-2021 release years. If you compare the characteristics of a modern and outdated laptop, keep in mind that current components, even entry-level ones, are more productive than top-end hardware from the early 2000s.

Choose a laptop according to your needs

The most popular trend of recent years is to buy a top-end laptop and watch it become obsolete, never reaching its maximum potential. Buyers usually sin with this, who are sure that inexpensive models are always of lower quality, and the more expensive the device, the more durable it is.

Modern laptops have two key components of the price: the level of components and the class of the device. By performance, they are conditionally divided into office, home, professional, and gaming. And the class of the device is more often determined by its visual design: compact, ultra-thin, gaming, or traditional options prevail here.

To determine the optimal laptop category, answer a few simple questions.

• Will the device be used primarily indoors or in direct sunlight?
• Are you planning to play on a laptop, process content, and run resource-intensive graphics programs?
• Do you need up-to-date technologies for comfortable work with the device, for example, a fingerprint scanner or a touch screen?
• Is there a budget for buying a computer?
• What design and dimensions do you consider acceptable?
• Is there a manufacturer preference?

Honest answers to these questions will help you eliminate obviously inappropriate options and narrow your search to a few models.

CPU

Two companies are recognized as the main manufacturers of computing equipment today: Intel and AMD. Both brands offer entry-level, mid-range, and professional-grade components.

Intel’s  products, in ascending order of performance, are arranged as follows:

• Celeron;
• Pentium;
• Core i3, 5, 7, 9.

AMD ranked their chips as they grew in power in this order:

• A-series;
• Ryzen 3, 5, 7.

Chips from  Apple, obviously, can only be seen in MacBook laptops.

In addition to the number of cores and their clock speed, the year of manufacture of the component also affects the speed of the laptop – the latest models have a minimum manufacturing process, which means they produce more power with less energy consumption.

video card

The graphics adapter may be built into the processor or be a separate component. Integrated graphics cards prove to be more cost-effective solutions for work and study, while dedicated ones are ideal for gaming.

The indisputable leader in this category is NVIDIA products. Budget solutions are marked with the MX prefix and high-performance ones with GTX and RTX. The main competitor in the production of graphics processors is AMD. Moreover, your laptop model may well coexist with an AMD processor and NVIDIA graphics – choose according to your needs and wallet.

Discrete video adapters have their own memory, and the more it is, the better the device is suitable for processing complex graphics. The minimum actual amount of video memory is 1–2 GB, and the maximum has already exceeded 6 GB.

If games and graphics do not appeal to you, the integrated video will help you not only save on the purchase of a device but also avoid overheating and rapid discharge in everyday tasks.

RAM

Devices with less than 4 GB of RAM today are unlikely to cope even with elementary tasks. The DDR3 standard is already considered obsolete, and DDR4 is recognized as the most common. With an equal amount of memory, the latter is more efficient and stable, which is why it has won a significant part of the laptop market.

In the middle segment, you can count on  6 or 8 GB of RAM this will give you more options in terms of multitasking, smooth animation, and application launch speed. And gaming models get 32 ​​GB or more.

Despite the difficulties in upgrading laptops, it is RAM that can be easily changed if desired, so you can add a RAM bar after purchasing the device.

Storage device

Today, two types of storage are relevant – HDD and SSD. The first is characterized by some slowness, but impressive capacity (most models are 1 TB ), and the second offers less space (usually 256-512 GB ), but higher data transfer speeds and greater reliability. There are no moving parts in an SSD, which means that it is more difficult to damage it. Of course, there are also large SSDs with a capacity of 1-4 TB and even higher, but their price is high.

Sometimes there are models that feature both drives, in which case the software can be stored on the SSD for fast loading, and content arrays on the HDD.

The optimal capacity is now considered 256 GB and above. It is advisable to buy configurations with 128 GB or less only for working with texts and small files; for other use cases, it is better to have a certain amount of memory. It is better for a gaming laptop to have at least 1 TB of memory on board, otherwise, you will be forced to delete some games all the time in order to install new ones because modern blockbusters are very demanding on free disk space.

Display

Of course, IPS-matrices is better than TFT. They provide more realistic color reproduction, wide viewing angles, and sufficient contrast. TFT screens perform worse in direct sunlight, and besides, they make the picture dark if you look not directly but at an angle. OLED and AMOLED matrices are distinguished by brighter colors and high definition, but if you are not used to them, such a bright picture can cause discomfort. And yes, these screens are more expensive.

In terms of resolution,  Full HD (1920×1080) will give a more detailed and sharper image than HD, so for displays up to and including 17 inches, it has become a priority. Although, of course, this is not the maximum value. But the question is, do you need a large resolution on a relatively small monitor if you don’t even plan to output it to a 4K TV?

Also, laptop screens can be matte or glossy. The choice between these two options is purely individual and depends only on your perception of the image.

Battery

Battery capacity is secondary – an important point that provides a truly impressive autonomy, considering the level of energy consumption. Built-in video and a simple processor will last much longer than a discrete card in tandem with a powerful chip. In addition, you must understand that the operating time declared by the manufacturer is for some ideal conditions. But in reality, everything will depend on how exactly you use the device, how heavy applications you run, and what brightness is set on the monitor. So even if you are promised more than 13 hours of battery life, you should not count on this time.

Fast charging technologies are useful if you often move around the city or travel. They will reduce the time for replenishing the energy reserve and quickly return the device to life after active use.

Budget models

Inexpensive devices rarely become the object of desire of buyers, most often they are forced to choose them. However, it is the class of budget laptops that is greatly underestimated as a rule, their hardware is enough to complete most of the tasks of the average user.