Re: New writer looking for advice

[Helen OBoyle <hoboyle -at- gmail -dot- com>]

I agree with Robert about the Dell Latitude laptops and the benefits of
upgradeability.  The E64x0 series is also pretty sturdy, although that
comes at the cost of being heavier than average.

After using one at work for a couple years, I bought a used Dell E6420 that
cost all of $300 from a local company getting rid of the 6420's to switch
to the 7 series.  I upgraded it to 16gb of RAM (not officially supported,
but does work -- I have NEVER experienced a blue screen on this system) and
a 1TB SSD.  I later bought an aftermarket "carrier" that fits in the slot
that also holds the optional removable DVD drive, from "HDD SSD Solutions"
on ebay, and put another 512GB of SSD there.  If you go this route, look
for one with nVidia rather than Intel video, so that (as another poster
pointed out) you don't waste CPU time on graphics.  If you anticipate using
an external hard drive frequently, look for a newer Latitude that offers
USB 3.0.  The E6420's only offer USB 2.0.

This provides plenty of space and plenty of speed for text and video work.
How much memory you really need depends greatly on the applications you
must use.  My system would run like a slug if it only had 4GB of RAM, given
the database software, Camtasia, multiple XML editor windows, and so on,
that I have open.

On Sat, Apr 18, 2015 at 5:14 AM, Robert Lauriston <robert -at- lauriston -dot- com>
wrote:

> Another plus of Dell Latitude systems is that they're designed to be
> easily upgradeable. I upgraded the RAM and hard drive on my E5420,
> both procedures were very easy and well documented.
>
> I only needed to upgrade that system because I use it to run
> digital-audio musical applications that are particularly demanding.
> 4GB is plenty for most things.
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