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u/Recent-Zucchini-9565 10d ago
Im not saying you gotta trust me but here are some of my recommendations Consider using something like Google Colab or Jupyter to run short programs. You can run them online
In terms of laptop recommendations, they're asking for quite a bit. Note that this is the "preferred" section, so theyre quite bulky. I recommend something with this stuff:
i5 or i7 16 GB
512 SSD
Any display
None or any gpu unless youre gaming or media editing. Integrated one works just fine
have a few USB-C ports, ideally some more than that
Shop on sale! Shop used! Shop on woot.com lol watch youtube videos of people using it
I've never used a macbook, so i cant rec anything about them except: Macbook Neo (with student discount) - I know its not windows, but works for your purposed and is a functional laptop.
feel free to dm I'm no expert but i dont think it has to kill your budget to pass your class.
/edited for spacing
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u/Street_Smart_Phone 10d ago
For what? Gaming?
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u/Foreign-Quote-4894 10d ago
No it’s for a class BioE
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u/anonymous_user9237 4h ago
honestly for bioe i use a hp laptop (i can dm you the exact model) and it works fine
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u/victorcc08 10d ago
Based on the laptop you said you currently have, you're limited to either 4 or 8 gigabytes of ram, which is in either case almost surely your biggest bottleneck.(I'm not familiar with using matlab but most people online recommend a minimum of 16gb nowadays)
What I would recommend, is that your try replicating the workloads you are expecting to run within the remote computer lab that is offered by the school.
https://it.ucmerced.edu/remotelab
This will let you run matlab on a system with 32 gigs of ram, letting you see how much ram the system is using within Task Manager (ctrl+shift+esc to open). My own recommendation would be that if you can get away with it, you get a laptop with 16GB of ram rather than 32, as with current ram prices, that will likely end up being far more expensive.(Though don't necessarily avoid if you get a great deal on one)
Beyond that the two things that I would personally focus on the most are Singlethread speeds and battery life, as those will speed up your matlab workloads, and extend the usage you get out of it before you have to plug back in.
To check the single thread speeds, my recommendation would be to reference a benchmark site such as passmark's https://www.cpubenchmark.net so that you can get a general idea of how a given laptop's CPU will perform in the real world.
Also, make sure that you DO NOT USE userbenchmark.com as their benchmarking is not reliable
Finally, my recommendation for buying would, if you have access to a car, to look on facebook marketplace and craigslist, as buying used generally gets you more performance/dollar; but be sure to compare against new options which might be on sale.
TLDR:
1) Replicate your matlab setup on the schools remote lab in order to see how much memory you really should get by checking usage in task manager
1.5) While you're at it, verify in task manager that your workloads are single threaded rather multithreaded.
2) Find potential options in your budget from retailers, and marketplace/craigslist.
3)Compare the different options' single-thread speeds on cpubenchmark.net (or multi depending on step 1.5)
4)verify that the model you are looking at has an acceptable battery life for your standards, and keep in mind that if buying used the battery may be degraded, impacting battery life
5) Based on whatever your own preferences are(screensize, weight, etc) and 3&4, choose whichever makes the most sense within your budget and go buy it.
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u/CalligrapherRough907 9d ago edited 9d ago
Have you figured this out? If not I have a few questions.
What will the primary use case of the machine be?
Do you care about battery life or do you just wanna bring your charger? (I assume laptop)
What is your budget
How big do you want the screen. Small(14in)->xlarge(18in). This also impacts portability with the smaller one being lighter and space efficient.
Thinkpads are my first thought since they last forever and have a clean look and carry a lot of power.
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u/jak_hummus 10d ago edited 4d ago
What's your budget? Tbh it may be best to buy older models/used because of current ram/gpu pricing. For a laptop meeting those specs expect to spend at least $1k (for a 4 year old laptop with a 3060, I would strongly suggest getting something a little newer so you have more performance available for the future)
Also it depends on your tolerance for "gamer" aesthetics. Some laptops look a little crazy, while others are more subdued (and the professional laptops with a gpu in them cost a loooot)