<p>I am still not sure what I'm gonna major in college this fall.</p>
<p>Right now it's either Economics, Computer Science, Math... Maybe International Relations. Maybe double-major in two of them.</p>
<p>What is a good starter computer?
My budget is about $1200</p>
<p>I was thinking about getting a Lenovo Thinkpad T-Series....</p>
<p>Computer Science makes it a bit more tricky since I'm gonna need better specs for CS, but if I ended up not majoring in CS, that will be a waste of money.</p>
<p>And I'm not gonna buy Macs (don't like it, and way off budget), and there's no way I'm gonna get two laptops during the four year of college. I might get a desktop in addition to laptop though.</p>
<p>Also, this is what a CS Major at the school I'm going to says...</p>
<p>"The college uses Mac for computer science classes. But there is no big problem even if you are a windows user.
Some of the softwares we use work only for Mac. However, there is a computer science lab room in the college with all Mac pro's. If you are a CS major, you have 24-7 access to the room, so it should be fine."</p>
This is true. Since you are undecided about your major, may I suggest sticking it out one more year (assuming you’re a Freshman) and waiting to buy a new computer until that is decided? A good portion of your first year classes will either be general core courses or lower div major courses, many of which don’t require too much computing power beyond a word processor. Do you have a computer now that you can try to drag out for one more year? Would you be willing to use the school’s library and computer lab machines throughout this first year until you’re more definitive on your major? That would help narrow down your choices quite a bit and will potentially save some money.</p>
<p>The T series is really a workhorse, you can not go wrong. Get an ultrathin but wait until the end of the summer as there are always many offers with various bundles for students during that time and the ultrathins are still expensive as they just came out. You will also probably get a rebate for free upgrade to windows 8 that will come out in October.</p>
<p>Flame, have you already visited the school you will be attending? If so, did you get a chance to see the computer labs or computers for use in the library? Of course it isn’t ideal, but I’ve kown a couple students to just use the school computers for a few terms. Be sure to take note of the library and comp lab hours so you’re not being kicked out in the middle of an important assignment.</p>
<p>Another suggestion I’ll offer in way of holding out for one more year to save money: will you be living in the dorms? If so, you can try explaining to your roommate if you could use theirs at times, if they’re not in need of it when you’d like to of course. I understand that some people like to keep their computers very private, and rightfully so since a lot of personal data gets passed through them constantly, but some roommates might be nice enough to undetrstand where you’re coming from and as long as you always ask before hand and their in the room with you while you work, then they may not see a problem with it. It’s archaic, but you could take the time to write out some portions of your paper by hand and just take the time to transcribe into text later on their comp. This takes more time, so it’s only doable if you know you have the extra time. Just be respectful of their property and it they may help you out a lot for the times that the library or comp lab are unavailable.</p>
<p>And yet another suggestion: This kind of just came into my head, but keep an eye out for used computer sale ads on campus once you get there. Sometimes, other students upgrade their computers (buy a better one or get a new one as a gift) and try to get rid of their older one. Sometimes outgoing seniors especially try to sell their used equiptment to upgrade as they move into the professional workforce after school. If you pay attention and ask around, then you may be able to snag an extremely low cost used computer for under $300 (or even less - whatever may be affordable) and that could also hold you over for the rest of the year or maybe even two before upgrading for your major if needed. Just be careful to examine it with a second opinion (friend that knows a lot about computers perhaps) before buying used so that you know you’re getting a fair price and that it’ll last the time you need it to. The thing I like about this option is still the fact that in your first year you may not need a computer to do anything more than some web browsing and word processing which literally almost any computer can do these days so your options when looking used are as great is there is availability which may give you some good cheap used options.</p>
<p>Then you can move to the T ;)</p>
<p>I agree, BTW, that a lot of the Lenovo series’ are great machines, including the T. I think I like the X1 myself the most out of their line-up.</p>
<p>Another thought if you’re not adverse with hacking with your laptop/operating system…turn it into a dual/triple-booting hackintosh/Windows/Linux machine. </p>
<p>Yes, this path isn’t for the technically faint of heart or those who don’t want to spend hours mucking around with hardware…but as a prospective CS major…could be educational in some senses. :)</p>