Advice for buying a laptop or computer

Razer.com

Processor

Intel i3, i5, i7 (or i9)

Do not get Celeron or Pentium

Check the performance on www.passmark.com. Highest rating is 20,000 which is a Xeon. In 2018 you'll want a minimum of 3,000.

RAM

4GB RAM minimum

Other specs

• SSD is 10x faster than HDD. Also consider NVMe rather than SCSI
• WiFi: ac compatible, 4x MIMO is better
• Bluetooth 5.1 is the latest
• Storage: Windows needs at least 50GB to upgrade on its own. Some games can be 200GB. Office takes 10GB.

Manufacturer

Dell, HP, Lenovo, Toshiba, Asus, Acer, in that order

For gaming laptops: Razer, Alienware, Zoostorm

Resellers

Amazon, eBuyer, Overclockers, John Lewis, Currys/PC World

Developer truths

• This proved to be non-trivial
• I wouldn't trust what I just said
• Does this need to be insanely complicated?
• X people are like Y people. They have no interest in getting a system working
• I think the mistake was looking at it
• We just assume magic happens
• It looks quite good if you don't read it
• We're laying the groundwork for winning the most improved project award
• It's not the complete answer
• They want to hear about problems early, but if you tell them, they panic
• I seem to be spending every day more and more confused
• This has a long, varied and ugly history