Laptop suggestions for a lawyer

[Londt]

I’d like to surprise DD with a new laptop for her birthday. I’m not a tech person at all and will be buying online so could really do with some advice please

She’s currently borrowing one as hers broke and she uses it all day for work along with an iPad. She does video hearings so I’ll need one that’s good for that. She’s always travelling too so one that’s small and light would be helpful.

My budget is £1000. I’d like to get her something that will last so she doesn’t have to think about it again for a while but obviously the less I can spend the better.

I’ve looked at some online reviews and comparison articles but so far have found it all a bit overwhelming.

Help please

A lawyer is going to have the same needs as any other knowledge worker. 1000 GBP should get you a really nice laptop. Buy the highest rated Dell or HP that fits in your budget. My DH, who works in IT, got our son a Dell XPS-13 for Christmas and that's a really first-class machine. I'm in the US so I don't know what they sell it for in the UK, but it might be in your budget.

I'd have a chat with her. If she uses an iPad and an iPhone, she might prefer a MacBook but that's out of your price range. She therefore might prefer a contribution towards a MacBook.

Just ensure it doesn't have a kitty filter on it!

Does she work for a law firm? If so I'd be very surprised if she has to buy her own laptops.

I have a Microsoft Surface Book 2 laptop and I absolutely love it. It’s really quick and responsive and also has a touchscreen; very useful if I’m in meetings and need to share my screen - I can enlarge my screen the same as you would on an iPad/iPhone. The screen is also detachable, so can be used as a tablet. It also has a pen, so you can annotate pdfs straight onto the screen.

@MechantGourmet

Just ensure it doesn't have a kitty filter on it!

Thank you for your helpful replies.

She works freelance so has to buy and replace her own equipment. She’s been saving for a while to buy one but has had to regularly empty the savings pot on other sensible things.

From looking online, I can’t see a difference in the £500 and £1000 models but guess they must be more expensive for a reason.
I think I’ll do as suggested and have a chat with her. Maybe pretend a friend is buying one and needs advice.

Thank you, you’ve given me a lot to go on

I would always recommend a Mac (still have my 10 year old one being used for home learning now). My office laptop is Lenovo and needs constant upgrades and I have had many issues with windows laptops in the past. For this budget you can get a MacBook Air.

Forgot to add it's really light weight and integrates well with iPad (your can share files via iCloud).

With a £1k budget, and assuming you want a Windows PC rather than a Mac, I would probably go for something like this HP. Good build quality, good tech spec with 16mb RAM which will help with multi-tasking across multiple windows. Has touchscreen functionality too which If she is flipping between an IPad and laptop will be helpful.

https://store.hp.com/UKStore/Merch/Product.aspx?id=197T2EA&opt=ABU&sel=NTB

I've bought many HP laptops over the years and have always been pleased with them.

The (screen) size is a key question. Smaller screens give you a smaller, more portable laptop, bigger screens are easier on the eyes. My wife has a 13 inch laptop, which isn't really suitable for long term use, but when working from home she plugs it into a 21 inch monitor.

My preference is Dell Latitudes. Business grade laptops are tougher and last better than consumer grade laptops. In the Dell range, the Latitudes are their business grade laptops.

MacBook Air! You could get one for £999 at Currys...

Grr earlier link not working properly - it's this one, from the HP business range hence a ProBook:

https://store.hp.com/UKStore/Merch/Product.aspx?id=197T2EA&opt=ABU&sel=NTB

Still doesn't work! If you scroll down the list it's the ProBook x360 which is £982.80!

Sorry for the double link fail!

Goodness me, I didn’t even consider things like screen size. Who’d have thought buying a computer would be such a mine field

Thank you all. I’ll use the models recommended here as suggestions for the ‘friend’ and get her opinions on them. It shouldn’t ruin the surprise, she knows I normally steer clear of buying technology.

I'm a lawyer and with online hearings then as well as the actual hearing there is a need for often v large electronic bundles, so the laptop needs fast processing power and large cache memory. I like to be able to split my screen to see the bundle at the same time as the hearing or a word document so I have a large monitor for all of that. The laptop I have for when I used to travel to court (oh for those days again...) is a Dell XPS 13 with a UHD screen (my monitor is also UHD) the quality of the screen is v important when focussing on documents all day long. I would definitely ask your daughter - even though she's freelance (so am I) the firm I contract to as certain requirements for devices (for security purposes - eg it must have windows pro not home etc).

Thank you @laburnumtree I didn’t think of things like that (the security requirements).

Maybe I’d be better giving her a voucher, that way it can’t go on boring house things and she can get the model she wants. Hmmmm. I’ll see how my probe goes.

I love my new matebook 14, available in a decent range of specifications (£1000 will get you the top spec), very decent battery, extremely nice screen in a more business orientated squarer 3:2 aspect screen (much better for documents) than the 16:9 widescreens you usually get. Plus, its a nice, bright, sharp screen.

The keyboard is also really good , and its basically ripped of the macbook for design, so no complaints there either.

The only downside for me is the webcam at the bottom of the screen (in the keyboard) which isn't unusable, but isn't ideal. The matebook 13 has the webcam in a better place, but has worse battery life and slower processor.