I’m having trouble deciding which laptop would be best for my engineering class. I will be taking other courses aside from engineering but I really want something that won’t struggle to much with the programs. I never had a Macbook in mind until I spoke to an apple representative at my local best buy. He told me he knew a few engineers who own Macbooks and do all of their projects on them. The laptop I did have in mind was a Razer Blade however I feel like I need something more productivity based. I will be attending Texas A&M University. They did provide a list of laptops that they recommend we buy. The Mac Book is none of them. One that I have my eye on is the HP Zbook. I did some research it seems like something I need however I am unable to get my hands on one because its only available through HP. Any thoughts?
Look at the software you are going to run. You should have a mix of OSX and Windows applications, and it also depends on which program you are in. In general, get a computer with:
Quad core CPU
16Gb or memory
512Gb+ SSD
A 3 year warranty. Paying with a major credit card should extend the warranty 1 extra year, so it will be under warranty through the end of your college.
Good local support. Apple shines here (even major repairs take < 1 week.)
Support for a 4K external monitor
Decent battery life.
In apple, that would be a 15" macbook pro w applecare. You can get the base model with a 512GB SSD. You will also need Parallels or VMWare fusion and a copy of windows 10. Those should be available at your college bookstore at academic prices. Your school should also provide a copy of Office 365. There are closeouts available on the 2016 models now too.