Businesses normally buy laptops with Core i5 processors because they are better value than the faster Core i7 versions. Faster but more expensive chips use Intel’s Core design. Most Atoms are now branded as Pentium or Celeron chips, though not all Pentiums and Celerons are Atoms. The cheapest and slowest are based on the Atom design. Intel offers two main ranges of processors for affordable laptops. Intel typically releases new Core chips each year. Big, complex spreadsheets with hundreds of columns and thousands of rows can stress even powerful laptops. These are relatively lightweight compared to resource-gobblers like Google Chrome, but it depends on the size of your Excel spreadsheets. The saving grace of netbooks is that – unlike smartphones and tablets – they can run the full Microsoft Office desktop programs. This is the absolute minimum you should consider. (Again, this is typical of smartphones and tablets.) However, you can find models with 4GB and 64GB if you shop around. Netbooks usually have only 2GB of memory and 32GB of eMMC chip storage, which runs at much the same speed as an SD storage card.

Indeed, many have 360-degree hinges or detachable keyboards for tablet-style use. They are designed to use apps, web-based applications and cloud storage, much like smartphones and tablets. Most cheap laptops nowadays are really netbooks. Ideally, you should be able to upgrade both memory and storage, but ultrathin laptops may be impossible to upgrade and are consequently hard to repair. Having an SSD makes a laptop feel much more responsive. The minimum specification should include 4GB or preferably 8GB of memory and either a 320GB or larger hard drive, or a 128GB or 256GB SSD (solid-state drive). However, you can buy something that will do the job for that sort of money, as long as it’s a proper laptop rather than a netbook.īy a “proper laptop,” I mean the sort of machine that can do much the same job as a desktop PC, but in a portable form factor. See an earlier answer for more information on that idea. At £300 or less, you have to compromise on everything, and the best compromise might be to buy a refurbished laptop from a supplier such as Tier1Online, rather than a new one. If you buy a laptop for £700 then you have to compromise on something.

Best budget laptops 2017 under 300