Laptop for 12yr old? No idea what I'm doing

[agirlhasnonameX]

DD has asked for a laptop for her 12th birthday. Only reason I'm considering it is that she's starting high school after the summer and think she will need it for school work.

We don't have a laptop or PC, just use iPads etc and haven't owned one for ages, so really no idea what I'm looking for and don't want to get conned in PC world or wherever.

She will probably also want to play online games on it, but main purpose will be for research and homework etc.

I haven't got loads to spend, would consider second hand but DB says buying used laptops is a bit risky? Can anyone recommend something suitable or what type of thing I should be looking for? Thanks.

i would have a look here. it's a decent price, and it's in good condition after being refurbished (so a couple of signs of wear and tear but nothing more). my dc have stickers like these stuck on the front of their laptops anyway which will hide any scratching. there is adequate storage too since she has access to google drive x

Chromebooks are great but you have to be connected all the time. Check with her future school what they recommend. They might even be able to arrange a group deal.

I'm in same position op. A decent lap top is probably more than we would spend on his birthday but he sees the cheap £80 ones and thinks that will be fine. I keep telling him I don't want to waste money on something that will break or not be fit for purpose which he understands but I don't feel I know enough about lap tops to judge a good deal 😂

Thank you for the suggestions. Do you mean a chrome book has to be connected to the internet all the time sorry?

@Pinkprincess1978 a laptop is much more than we would normally spend! I wouldn't even be considering it if it wasn't for practical reasons. And yes, obviously it's going to break before it's had a years use

Most of the laptops I've looked at are £600 up which is far too much.

Best to contact school and ask if there's anything they're using that it's a good idea to be able to integrate with (I know my kids' junior school use Chromebooks quite heavily so I'm thinking if I need to get a new device it might well be one of those... another local school are iPad bonkers etc).

Realistically you aren't going to need anything massively expensive for a bit of word processing and research though - might well be a relative or friend has an old laptop going spare that would do the job at least initially... although having said all of that - I don't even use a laptop these days and just use my iPad with a bluetooth keyboard for absolutely everything (but I've looked very carefully at what I needed the technology for before I made that choice).

Thanks a lot @PantsyMcPantsface. I'm not even sure how much work happens online at secondary nowadays, but friends of friends have said most of their homework etc is online.

She has an iPad though, so maybe she's conning me, telling me she won't be able to manage with just that. I'll see what school suggest though, thanks again.