Laptop for secondary school

[Bertha1924]

My grandson starts secondary school in September and I want to buy him a laptop. Any recommendations - its all so confusing when you look online.

Does he need one? What does the school provide or recommend? Will he take it to school every day or only use it at home? What is your budget?

He needs to use it at home. The school provides laptops in break time if the kids don’t have access to one at home. My budget is around £350 to £400.

Probably 15 inch screen min 256 gb hard drive 512 Gb better 8 GB memory. Something like this Asus at John Lewis:
https://www.johnlewis.com/asus-vivobook-15-x1500-laptop-intel-core-i3-processor-8gb-ram-256gb-ssd-15-6-inch-full-hd-silver/p109521941?s_share=jlappdroid

Or MESH Computers ASUS M515DA 15.6-inch Laptop, AMD Ryzen 3 3250U, 8 GB RAM, 256 GB SSD, Windows 11 Pro https://amzn.eu/d/54w4HrA

If taking to school a 13-14 inch screen would make it more portable and you would want to check battery life. We bought DS an Asus Zenbook for 6th form and it's been fine.

a chromebook would work.
son is going into A level and its fine for that

idea here

https://www.johnlewis.com/asus-chromebook-cx14-laptop-intel-celeron-processor-4gb-ram-64gb-emmc-14-0-full-hd-silver/p109796612?s_ppc=2dx92700076800542087_mixed_technology_SF&tmad=c&tmcampid=2&gad=1&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIyITak-33_wIVgurtCh1TUQ6IEAQYAiABEgKN6_D_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

I'd go for something with a SSD drive rather than EMMC. Longterm they tend to be quicker especially with multiple applications.

We have had good experience with Lenovo products and have a laptop that is a couple of years old and still feels pretty quick to use. I initially bought it for a course I was doing but dd1 - yesr 7 has been using it for homework for the past year no problem.

I'd suggest a reconditioned Lenovo from one of the many authorised reconditioners on Amazon.

I run my small business with them, got 4 on the go at the moment. I think each one only cost around £225-£275, for computers that were £750-£1000 a few years ago, so pretty high spec and comparable with what the likes of Curry's and John Lewis sell for "entry level" pricing of £300 or so, but for a lot more robust and better quality.

ThinkPad 14", shop around, eBay etc.

They don't really need laptops at secondary school other than a basic Chromebook which a lot of schools provide or an iPad

Mine only really needed their laptops for 6th Form

That said they've always had iPads so have used those for uploading any homework

But all schools are different I guess

Look at John Lewis as PP

We got my DS from there and are just about to buy DD from there too

I would check if there has been any communication from school about the specifics, but as above, it's likely all he will need is a Chromebook.

My Lenovo Think Pad is about 15 years old and still going strong albeit a bit slow! The only thing I hate about it is that the search engine is set to Bing.

Lenovo ThinkPad or IdeaPad

I'd get something like this

It's from JL

Are these laptops suitable for Computing GCSE? What’s the minimum
spec for that, does it need to be a PC?

I'd wait and see if the school provide any further information. We bought my daughter a laptop and apart from COVID lockdowns she's hardly used it. She accesses her school email and homework app on her phone but does all the work in their school books.

At her new secondary, they provide Chromebooks.

I would suggest you get in touch with the school and ask what specifications they require.

@ArcticLadybird . Windows pc/laptop (not Chromebook) probably recommended for computer science and would suggest an i5 equivalent or better processor. You could get a second hand desktop (upgradable if DC so inclined) or look at Raspberry pi as they can be used to learn programming https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/raspberry-pi-400. Good study resource here
https://adacomputerscience.org/?examBoard=all&stage=all