Is this a good laptop for an electrical engineering student?

Colleges & Universities A-Z The University of Texas at Austin
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<p>I'm a senior in High School and my current laptop battery and charger just died. It's a dell and i looked online to buy another battery and charger, but it would cost me about 250 dollars. I was planning on buying a laptop when I graduated, but am thinking that I may want to go ahead and just upgrade now. would this laptop be a good choice? it also happens to be about 200 dollars off.</p>

<p>Inspiron</a> 14z Laptop Details | Dell</p>

<p>its got a 2.2 GHZ Processor ( I could upgrade to 2.4, would that be worth another 100?)</p>

<p>and quite a bit of ram, atleast 4 GB</p>

<p>Thoughts?</p>

2

<p>Any computer nowadays will work for EE. Windows is strongly preferred but not completely necessary. From there, it’s just a matter of personal preference.</p>

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<p>I’m a Computer Science major and I got the cheapest non-Netbook possible. It hasn’t affected my coursework at all.</p>

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<p>I am a Freshman EE major and it appears that 50% of every one has a MacBook Pro. The Cockrell School of Engineering gives you a free copy of Windows 7 Pro and you can dual boot it on a Mac. That is the current setup most people have. However the Inspiron sounds good and saves the hassle of having to install Windows on a Mac. Spring for the RAM and CPU upgrades as you will be running LabView which is a heavy program. Buy something that you won’t mind lugging around campus. Your EE 302 will need it every lab and your EE 306 will need it when you start using the LC-3 Simulator. Thats the experience I’ve had so far. Oh and I have the entry level MBP with 8GB of RAM. Get something you will be proud of.
Check out the campus computer store before you buy. Its best to wait till orientation and use your student discount. They will give you stuff for free and the computers usually will come with some type of extended warranty.</p>

5

<p>Free Windows 7 is news to me. But as hsabogal said, portability is a huge factor in laptop shopping. I would put portability and battery life on the same level as speed/RAM. It’s always annoying when that one person in the group has the short battery and makes the whole group move to any outlet haha</p>

<p>But addressing the whole Mac/PC debate, I would say it is still advantageous to invest in a PC. Though one could manage with a Mac, having a PC is less of a hassle. You’ll be using a whole host of applications throughout your stay here and it’s always that Mac users that have the installation problems/bugs. <em>ahem PC-for-life bias</em></p>