When buying a laptop, most people prefer to buy a popular model from a reputable brand since popularity usually means a good product. However, in absolute terms, the best and most reliable laptops are in the lesser-known business section of reputable companies such as HP, Lenovo or Dell.
There is a good reason why laptops are divided into two sections, consumer (home and home office) and business.
Most consumers, who buy laptops for personal use, want their machines to look nice, be portable and have many features, at an affordable price. Reliability is still a factor but is not the main criteria. For personal use, if a laptop breaks and has to be sent in for a 1-2 week repair job, though unpleasant, it is usually not a deal breaker.
Examples of popular consumer grade laptops: Lenovo Ideapad 720S-13, HP Spectre x360 15t, Dell XPS 15 9570 .
However, for the business sector, things are very different. Imagine you are a well-paid manager who costs your company $450 a day. Imagine your company laptop breaks and you need to send it in for repairs for a few days. Without your laptop, you will probably be nowhere near as productive and as efficient, and your inefficiency is going to cost your company money. If you are missing your laptop for just 3 days, then your company could be looking at a productivity loss anywhere from $500 to $1000. That is probably half the price of that laptop.
Alternatively, imagine you are a company employee sent to make a product presentation to a client and your laptop breaks during the presentation. Losing that client will possibly far outweigh the price of the laptop.
Most companies want to avoid unexpected hardware failures by any means necessary and this way high-end business machines are primarily built for reliability. In theory, these machines undergo more thorough testing, have better cooling and overall better internal design. However, all of this comes at a cost.
Business class machines are more expensive than “normal” consumer laptops, even though they might have the same technical specifications.
The most reliable machines that usually last you a few years are high-end business class machines like:
– Dell Latitude/Precision series
– Lenovo ThinkPad T/P/X series
– HP Elitebook/zBook
Other lesser-known brands that also have good business grade machines are Fujitsu, Vaio and Toshiba.
Apple is also an option, but their target has more to do with the high-end consumer market rather than large enterprises.
Here is a complete and updated list with most business grade machines on the market: business grade laptops.
If reliability is the main criteria for buying a laptop, it is highly advisable to buy a business grade laptop. High-end consumer grade laptops can also last a fair bit if taken good care of, but they usually have a higher chance of failure and hidden factory defects.
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