Need guidance on picking a laptop?
Need guidance on picking a laptop?
I need a compact portable laptop for work tasks like MS Word, web browsing, and watching movies. I discovered two options at reasonable prices, but which one performs better? The X1 Carbon Gen 6 with an i5-8350U, 8GB DDR3, SSD 512, and the Dell Latitude 7390 with an i5-8350U, 8GB DDR4, 256GB SSD. Is having 8GB DDR3 outdated in 2023?
This situation isn't about DDR3 versus DDR4 but rather about having only 8GB of RAM in 2023. The best choice is to aim for at least 16GB of RAM on any system. If upgrading to 16GB is not possible with either option, consider alternatives since 8GB is insufficient now.
For your laptop's purpose, it's acceptable. MS Word and movies don't demand much RAM. Browsing the web needs some RAM, but 8GB suffices for everyday use unless you're handling tasks requiring many open tabs. If necessary, consider doing it on a desktop.
Modern web pages consume a significant amount of RAM. With nine tabs open on my laptop, I’m already exceeding 1GB of memory usage. Once the system reaches around 6GB on an 8GB machine, it begins swapping pages and slows down noticeably. I’d prefer a device that supports up to 16GB RAM; if neither is available, it’s a clear indication. A laptop in this condition could still function for another five to seven years with proper care, but at 8GB it would be nearly equivalent to a 4GB Windows 10 machine today—completely unusable.
Not all laptops can have their RAM upgraded. Since these are business laptops, the chances are better that it can have upgraded RAM but that still isn't guaranteed.
Yes all systems use page file. That doesn't mean that having 10GB RAM free is a waste. First the OS will expand more services into RAM when there is enough free RAM. That causes the system to feel snappier. Second it also allows you overhead before you start going to the page file for basic processes. Remember if you are writing to the page file all the time, this happens once you hit 6GB (75%) RAM usage on an 8GB system, you are using R/W cycles on your SSD and causing unneeded ware. Third getting to 6GB RAM usage on an 8GB system doesn't take much in 2023. It is exacerbated if the iGPU is set to say 1GB RAM in BIOS and you cannot change it. Overall the only reason to go with 8GB RAM in 2023 is if you have an extremely tight budget. However, with RAM prices what they are right now I don't see how you cannot fit 16GB into any budget. Especially since 2x4GB SODIMMs new cost the same as 2x8GB SODIMMs right now.