EAR111pt2

I purchased a new dell laptop in December to replace another dell that died a few days before (it gave me the dreaded 7 bios beeps, which means the cpu died). That one lasted five years, I did have to replace the battery, and the hard drive crashed just a couple of years after purchase. So, 5 years is about average for a laptop that gets daily usage.

glob99

Actually a HD that is starting to die can slow the computer. So before you go shopping, backup that sucker.

nkedel

Spinning rust is so last-decade!

be001

Apple's smartest business move was to not sell a cheap version of anything. Buy the $2,500 dell and it will last just as long as the apple and you will probably even get better performance out of it.

Cheap laptops <500$ expect 1.5-3 years. 500-1000$ 3-4 years $1000+ 4 or more years.

nkedel

There's a knee both in the price/performance and price/quality curves and there has been for years. They've both been creeping downward for years, and it's definitely under $1000 for the quality one now, and probably still a bit over on performance.

As for lifetime, it all depends on what you do with it, and on the generational nature of software and CPUs.

A top of the line laptop CPU from late 2005 (a ~2ghz single core Pentium M) was obsolete even for general use less than a year later.

A top of the line laptop CPU from 2008-2009 is still good for general use if you're patient, but so is a midrange one from the same period is, too, and someone who spent the price difference between a P8400 and a T9900 probably did not get their money's worth in terms of long-term lifetime -- they were both obsolete for heavy professional in early 2010.

Right now, if you're optimizing for performance, a top-of-the-line CPU from 2011 or later is still a great machine. OTOH, if you're optimizing for light weight, heat, and batter life, there's a lot of reason to upgrade.

Professional 3D video and gaming graphics change much quicker, of course.

Badenoch

That was the diagnosis on my machine. A new HD isn't expensive so it will be installed and I'll stick with what I have in the short term.