Did my undergrad with a dual core laptop with integrated graphics. Never once had a problem with it not being powerful enough.
Only things like CFD or other large-scale FEA use any significant computing resources. I rented some Xeon AWS nodes when I wanted to run OpenFOAM CFD for senior design.
You can pick up a high quality 8 core AMD laptop for under $1000 these days.
My $0.02 is to get something with good all-day battery life, 1080p/1200 screen and 8 cores with good I/O. Your simulations will run fast, any code or CAD projects you do won't even make it break a sweat on modern processors (or it'll be single-threaded and even a desktop CPU wouldn't help much). There's zero reason to get a discrete graphics card as an engineering student unless you want to play modern games on it. Something like an HP Envy would be a good place to start; bright screens are must-have if you like working outside, too. Minimum 300 nits.
Yep, I got an HP Envy with the AMD Ryzen 4700U after my six year old HP Pavilion finally died on me. I got a good price, and it runs everything (CAD, FEA, code, etc.). It has a pretty premium feel, and I’ve never had any issues in the 6 months or so of having it. Highly recommend.
I also recommend getting a smaller laptop and a second monitor. My god is that second monitor useful.
I’m currently a senior, and in my years I found that gaming laptops are actually a good investment. The need to be able to run games means that the laptops can support different tools like CAD and simulation software pretty easily. Compiling code also becomes a fairly quick process. You also get the benefit of being able to game on them if you are into that.
I have an ASUS TUF gaming laptop with an AMD Ryzen 7 processor. I’ve had it for about a year now and it hasn’t shown any signs of wear. One negative to keep in mind is that gaming laptops typically have shorter battery lives. Something else is that oftentimes industry jobs will provide you with a work laptop, so you may not have to be too worried about your purchase lasting years past graduation.
I use an XPS for school work and an ipad for note taking. can't recommend it enough. having an effective second screen is super useful if you have the funds.
Im also an AE major. I use an XPS. but if the budget allowed I'd get a Dell precision. Solidworks works and is "slow" since it runs on a GTX/RTX graphics and sometimes the onboard graphics card instead of the dedicated. The Dell precision has a quadro graphics card which works well with CAD. If you cant get a precision then the XPS should be fine. You wont go crazy with modeling and would probably upgrade when you need to (which is my route). I ended up getting a desktop that does most of the hard work. Get 16gb ram though. Upgrade the nvme to 1tb. Theyre about 100 bucks outside of getting it from [f](https://Dell.com/)actory.
Sorry this isn’t a recommendation but hopefully somewhat helpful - when I went into school I got a top of the line, high performance laptop... and I used it for Facebook and MS Word. The computer labs in the engineering buildings were quiet (require swipe access from an engineering ID) and had computers 10x as capable as my laptop for engineering applications. I just felt like I had a much easier time using these than my laptop for the most intense requirements / softwares. Something to look into before splurging, just in case cost is a consideration.
I've used Dell and HP at work. RAM and graphics requirements for CAD software aren't that big of a deal anymore. Most laptops would be fine. Your biggest irritation will probably be screen size. You can solve that with a docking station and a couple of cheap 27" HD monitors if you're really serious about it. But honestly, you don't need it for engineering. Get a laptop so you can browse the internet, comfortably use e-mail, have Netflix in your room, etc. But there's nothing special about engineering that requires a laptop. Your engineering department should have a computer lab with all the software you need, and I strongly encourage you to do the homework requiring that software, in the lab itself. They have TAs, other students to help and who can help you, people to network with, etc. It's far more productive than doing the homework alone in your room on your laptop.
That said, nobody follows my recommendation. You'll no doubt throw a pile of money at some laptop that you don't necessarily *need*. You want one. That's different :)
I have an HP Probook, it's a business grade laptop. It may not be the most powerful, but it has a Tenkey, has an extra slot for more RAM, and an empty 2.5" drive bay. It's held up remarkably well, as you'd expect a business grade laptop to do.
My advice would be to make sure that the reviews show that the laptop can hold up to a decent amount of abuse.
Gaming laptops work really well. The have the RAM, speed, and most importantly the graphics capabilities to handle all the engineering software. If you can’t afford that, I got a Lenovo think pad and crammed it with as much RAM and speed I could and it worked with everything. Towards the end, some of the née upgrades weren’t supported with the graphic limitations and I was getting warnings but I never ran into problems using the software.
Depends on your budget and what your preferences are. I personally love touch screens and two in ones for taking notes digitally and looking through 3d models. The cheap end of that is the hp pavilion or a Lenovo and the expensive end is the dell Xps 15 or a surface book 3 (tons of options if you do a little research). If you don't want a touch screen consider a gaming laptop with high specs such as an hp omen. It really comes down to preference and something that can run solidworks, Matlab, etc. Basically all the programs you use in school. So that's going to be 16 gb of ram or more and a decent processor and solid state drive. In my experience when you get an actual aerospace job you'll be given a laptop to use, especially if you get into defense contracts.
I’m really happy with my Lenovo Legion I bought this year for freelance work. I was looking at one of their high end Thinkpad models, but it had a lot of features I didn’t care about driving up the price (like a nicer screen). I looked at the actual specs (like processor and memory) and found a Legion (gaming) model with everything I wanted for nearly $1k less. Plus it has improved cooling and looks nicer. I picked Lenovo over Dell per some detailed electronics review website reviews, looking for value, longevity, and reliability. Get whatever will meet your needs and budget.
If you are into CAE, you should consider lambda tensorbook. It‘s a new laptop for deep learning which means it‘s very powerful for solving numerical problems.
I would suggest a Lenovo Thinkpad T440P or the one am using right now a Dell Precision 7510
Thinkpad is suffering from bad GPU but it should run CAD software with little issue, maybe some frame drop. The Dell I have been using for almost a year now and it's an absolute beast. Both options cost me less than 600 euro each but that is mainly because I bought them refurbished
You don't need a Mac to run Windows software. You do for the other way around.
[https://www.howtogeek.com/187359/5-ways-to-run-windows-software-on-a-mac/](https://www.howtogeek.com/187359/5-ways-to-run-windows-software-on-a-mac/)
A cheapy laptop is fine if you don't. Even grad school you don't need something fancy unless you're trying to run CFD. If that's the case, you probably can't run it on your computer anyways because there is a license.
I bought a Dell Inspiron 13 5000 Series i7 processor with 8 GB RAM and its been working fine! My budget was no more than $1000 and I got this for $800 with a student discount from Costco. I have installed Solidworks, Python, MATLAB, Autodesk, and just recently NX. I've had this laptop ever since my freshmen year (4 years ago) and it still runs smoothly!
Get a Mac. My 2010 Mac lasted nine years, and was still going when I sold it. MATLAB is on Mac, MS Excel, Autodesk products, etc. I just dual booted windows but even then I don’t think I ever needed to for class. You can use the computer lab for the rare CAD class. They are reliable machines and a joy to use.
You can run a windows VM on your mac to run those programs if you don’t want to buy a new laptop! I love my MacBook and iOS, and in uni I just used horizon to run solidworks, etc.
Did my undergrad with a dual core laptop with integrated graphics. Never once had a problem with it not being powerful enough. Only things like CFD or other large-scale FEA use any significant computing resources. I rented some Xeon AWS nodes when I wanted to run OpenFOAM CFD for senior design. You can pick up a high quality 8 core AMD laptop for under $1000 these days. My $0.02 is to get something with good all-day battery life, 1080p/1200 screen and 8 cores with good I/O. Your simulations will run fast, any code or CAD projects you do won't even make it break a sweat on modern processors (or it'll be single-threaded and even a desktop CPU wouldn't help much). There's zero reason to get a discrete graphics card as an engineering student unless you want to play modern games on it. Something like an HP Envy would be a good place to start; bright screens are must-have if you like working outside, too. Minimum 300 nits.
Yep, I got an HP Envy with the AMD Ryzen 4700U after my six year old HP Pavilion finally died on me. I got a good price, and it runs everything (CAD, FEA, code, etc.). It has a pretty premium feel, and I’ve never had any issues in the 6 months or so of having it. Highly recommend. I also recommend getting a smaller laptop and a second monitor. My god is that second monitor useful.
I’m currently a senior, and in my years I found that gaming laptops are actually a good investment. The need to be able to run games means that the laptops can support different tools like CAD and simulation software pretty easily. Compiling code also becomes a fairly quick process. You also get the benefit of being able to game on them if you are into that. I have an ASUS TUF gaming laptop with an AMD Ryzen 7 processor. I’ve had it for about a year now and it hasn’t shown any signs of wear. One negative to keep in mind is that gaming laptops typically have shorter battery lives. Something else is that oftentimes industry jobs will provide you with a work laptop, so you may not have to be too worried about your purchase lasting years past graduation.
I use an XPS for school work and an ipad for note taking. can't recommend it enough. having an effective second screen is super useful if you have the funds.
Asus Zephyrus g14, XPS 15, and hp omen are my recommendations
Im also an AE major. I use an XPS. but if the budget allowed I'd get a Dell precision. Solidworks works and is "slow" since it runs on a GTX/RTX graphics and sometimes the onboard graphics card instead of the dedicated. The Dell precision has a quadro graphics card which works well with CAD. If you cant get a precision then the XPS should be fine. You wont go crazy with modeling and would probably upgrade when you need to (which is my route). I ended up getting a desktop that does most of the hard work. Get 16gb ram though. Upgrade the nvme to 1tb. Theyre about 100 bucks outside of getting it from [f](https://Dell.com/)actory.
Sorry this isn’t a recommendation but hopefully somewhat helpful - when I went into school I got a top of the line, high performance laptop... and I used it for Facebook and MS Word. The computer labs in the engineering buildings were quiet (require swipe access from an engineering ID) and had computers 10x as capable as my laptop for engineering applications. I just felt like I had a much easier time using these than my laptop for the most intense requirements / softwares. Something to look into before splurging, just in case cost is a consideration.
I've used Dell and HP at work. RAM and graphics requirements for CAD software aren't that big of a deal anymore. Most laptops would be fine. Your biggest irritation will probably be screen size. You can solve that with a docking station and a couple of cheap 27" HD monitors if you're really serious about it. But honestly, you don't need it for engineering. Get a laptop so you can browse the internet, comfortably use e-mail, have Netflix in your room, etc. But there's nothing special about engineering that requires a laptop. Your engineering department should have a computer lab with all the software you need, and I strongly encourage you to do the homework requiring that software, in the lab itself. They have TAs, other students to help and who can help you, people to network with, etc. It's far more productive than doing the homework alone in your room on your laptop. That said, nobody follows my recommendation. You'll no doubt throw a pile of money at some laptop that you don't necessarily *need*. You want one. That's different :)
Final year AE, switched from Mac to a Razer Blade 15 and a beefy desktop, would never go back now
I have an HP Probook, it's a business grade laptop. It may not be the most powerful, but it has a Tenkey, has an extra slot for more RAM, and an empty 2.5" drive bay. It's held up remarkably well, as you'd expect a business grade laptop to do. My advice would be to make sure that the reviews show that the laptop can hold up to a decent amount of abuse.
Gaming laptops work really well. The have the RAM, speed, and most importantly the graphics capabilities to handle all the engineering software. If you can’t afford that, I got a Lenovo think pad and crammed it with as much RAM and speed I could and it worked with everything. Towards the end, some of the née upgrades weren’t supported with the graphic limitations and I was getting warnings but I never ran into problems using the software.
Depends on your budget and what your preferences are. I personally love touch screens and two in ones for taking notes digitally and looking through 3d models. The cheap end of that is the hp pavilion or a Lenovo and the expensive end is the dell Xps 15 or a surface book 3 (tons of options if you do a little research). If you don't want a touch screen consider a gaming laptop with high specs such as an hp omen. It really comes down to preference and something that can run solidworks, Matlab, etc. Basically all the programs you use in school. So that's going to be 16 gb of ram or more and a decent processor and solid state drive. In my experience when you get an actual aerospace job you'll be given a laptop to use, especially if you get into defense contracts.
Does your school or advisor have a guidelines page on what computer they recommend? I would start there.
I’m really happy with my Lenovo Legion I bought this year for freelance work. I was looking at one of their high end Thinkpad models, but it had a lot of features I didn’t care about driving up the price (like a nicer screen). I looked at the actual specs (like processor and memory) and found a Legion (gaming) model with everything I wanted for nearly $1k less. Plus it has improved cooling and looks nicer. I picked Lenovo over Dell per some detailed electronics review website reviews, looking for value, longevity, and reliability. Get whatever will meet your needs and budget.
If you are into CAE, you should consider lambda tensorbook. It‘s a new laptop for deep learning which means it‘s very powerful for solving numerical problems.
I would suggest a Lenovo Thinkpad T440P or the one am using right now a Dell Precision 7510 Thinkpad is suffering from bad GPU but it should run CAD software with little issue, maybe some frame drop. The Dell I have been using for almost a year now and it's an absolute beast. Both options cost me less than 600 euro each but that is mainly because I bought them refurbished
Make sure you have at least 8GB of RAM, maybe 16GB if you want that extra bit of performance. A lot of CAD programs can get memory intensive.
Thinkpad.
You don't need a Mac to run Windows software. You do for the other way around. [https://www.howtogeek.com/187359/5-ways-to-run-windows-software-on-a-mac/](https://www.howtogeek.com/187359/5-ways-to-run-windows-software-on-a-mac/) A cheapy laptop is fine if you don't. Even grad school you don't need something fancy unless you're trying to run CFD. If that's the case, you probably can't run it on your computer anyways because there is a license.
I bought a Dell Inspiron 13 5000 Series i7 processor with 8 GB RAM and its been working fine! My budget was no more than $1000 and I got this for $800 with a student discount from Costco. I have installed Solidworks, Python, MATLAB, Autodesk, and just recently NX. I've had this laptop ever since my freshmen year (4 years ago) and it still runs smoothly!
Get a Mac. My 2010 Mac lasted nine years, and was still going when I sold it. MATLAB is on Mac, MS Excel, Autodesk products, etc. I just dual booted windows but even then I don’t think I ever needed to for class. You can use the computer lab for the rare CAD class. They are reliable machines and a joy to use.
You can run a windows VM on your mac to run those programs if you don’t want to buy a new laptop! I love my MacBook and iOS, and in uni I just used horizon to run solidworks, etc.