<div dir="ltr"><div><RAMBLING></div><div><br></div>From my own experience, that's a mixed bag.<div><br></div><div>On the one hand, it's become obvious to my over the years that, in general, lower consumer grade computers usually...well...suck. Especially in the more recent years, they're pretty much a commodity item expected to have a 1-2 year useful lifespan, if that. When you dive into the guts, especially on desktop computers, you find that the computers are cheaper for a reason. Cheap motherboards, cheap/slow RAM, low-quality hard drives, lesser CPUs, etc. Definitely lower performing over-all. Naturally, the lesser parts are cheaper to buy so the prices are cheaper and profit margins are maximized. Just economics.</div><div><br></div><div>On the other hand, the business lines are generally made from better components and expected to have longer useful lifespans...hence the bigger price. Again, economics.</div><div><br></div><div>On the other other hand, just because it's cheaper and made with parts that are more at risk of failure sooner doesn't mean they actually WILL fail. If the performance is exactly what you want for the now and the desired lifetime of your computer/laptop, then maybe it's a good trade-off. Conversely, just because there are high-quality components doesn't mean you're not going to get a run of bad luck. You might spend a little extra for a commercial line of product just to find that they're failing in a year and a half. It stinks, but it does happen on occasion. (But failure definitely doesn't occur as often in the business lines as in consumer lines, in my own experience.)</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>What I've learned is that it generally seems to save money in the long term if you put a little extra money in up front for a better performing, hopefully longer-lasting computer/laptop/server/wrench/widget/yo-yo/whatever.</div><div><br></div><div>You're going to spend a fair lot of time configuring them initially. Very likely slightly longer than you would with the better laptops, actually, because the better ones would likely be faster. ...Which will become more and more apparent as time marches on and you continue to invest time in them with updates and maintenance.</div><div><br></div><div>For simplicity, let's say the cheaper laptops end up outliving their one year warranty and have a useful lifespan of two years. Around then people are noticing that they're really slow and start to not use them any more. So you soon decide to start the process over and get new laptops...and spend all the money and initial time again to configure them, etc.</div><div><br></div><div>The commercial line might be more expensive up front, but you elongate the cycle, often greatly. Over years, you end up saving a fair bit of money and a whole lot of time. The time factor is especially notable for my own clients because they're usually paying ME to configure the computers in addition to buying them, so there is a very direct relationship between the time and money. If a library employee is doing the configuring, though, that can be abstracted a little bit and rolled into "less time to do other things". It's still a notable cost to the library if someone cares to look, but it's obscured more and so easier to dismiss.</div><div><br></div><div>Having worked with smaller libraries with no IT staff for a very long time, I definitely recommend spending a little more up front for better equipment to increase the projected lifespan of the computers. They very easily save thousands of dollars over the extra years of service and lower maintenance costs they get from the equipment.</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>Two cents. I like to take the long-term view of things.</div><div><br></div><div>(And yes, it's been pointed out to me before that it's a little counter-productive for me! I should be recommending shorter-lifespan devices to maximize my service dollars...where I make my real profits! Oops. My bad. LOL!)</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>HTH,</div><div>Chad</div><div><br></div><div>Ps. One of the easiest things you can do to hugely increase the useful lifespan of your laptop/computer is to go with SSD drives in lieu of the hard drive. If you size the SSD realistically and not try to blindly match the 500GB or 1TB 5,400RPM drive the manufacture puts in, you can keep the cost the same or similar but increase the performance by orders of magnitude! That's a key component in changing a 4-year computer to a 6-year computer for no or almost no extra cost. Especially on an average desktop patron computer, do you really need a 500GB spinning hard drive when a 180GB SSD gives more than plenty adequate storage capacity.</div><div><br></div><div>PPs. Many/most laptops get pretty hot. There just isn't a lot of room in them for effective heat dissipation. Modern mobile CPUs have helped a lot, though, as have SSDs. The processor and the (traditional spinning) hard drive are probably the biggest heat sources. So an SSD will help keep it cool, as might a latest-generation mobile processor.</div><div><br></div><div>PPPs. For what it's worth, when my custom "whitebox" ASUS laptop died I think maybe four or five years ago, I ran out to MicroCenter because I needed a replacement immediately and could afford to wait. I needed a powerful laptop and simply asked the nearest salesman to show me his top three laptops with the fastest CPU, largest display, most RAM capacity, and biggest hard drive (pretty much in that order). I'd consider the Toshiba Qosmio gaming laptop I ended up with to be more a pro-sumer device than a consumer or business device, so somewhere between. But at maybe five years later, it's still my daily driver and easily runs rings around many of the newest consumer-grade laptops. No reason to replace it. Thinking about putting a bigger capacity SSD in it some day, but that's about it.</div><div><br></div><div></RAMBLING></div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br clear="all"><div><div class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div>______________________________<br><b>Chad Neeper</b><br><font size="1">Senior Systems Engineer</font><br><br><b>Level 9 Networks</b><br><font size="1">740-548-8070 (voice)<br>866-214-6607 (fax)</font><br><br><font size="1"><i>Full IT/Computer consulting services -- Specialized in libraries and schools</i></font><br></div></div></div></div>
<br><div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, May 5, 2015 at 12:45 PM, Fred Miller Jr <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:fmiller@auglaizelibraries.org" target="_blank">fmiller@auglaizelibraries.org</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt">We’re getting ready to order some admin staff laptops and was wondering everyone’s opinion on comsumer vs. commercial grade laptops. I’m not a big fan of HP laptops since they do seem to get hot/warm after
leaving running for extended period of time. I do like ASUS laptops, but they don’t have very many commercial grade laptops. Is the business commercial grade laptops worth the extra money to get them for a small library system? Comments and thoughts much appreciated.<u></u><u></u></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt">Thanks again,<u></u><u></u></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif;color:#002060">Fred Miller Jr<u></u><u></u></span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif;color:#002060">IT Service Manager<u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif;color:#002060">Auglaize County Public District Library System<u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif;color:#002060">p: <a href="tel:419-738-2921%20ext.%201011" value="+14197382921" target="_blank">419-738-2921 ext. 1011</a><u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif;color:#002060">f: <a href="tel:419-738-5168" value="+14197385168" target="_blank">419-738-5168</a><u></u><u></u></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma",sans-serif;color:#002060">w:
<a href="http://www.auglaizelibraries.org" target="_blank">www.auglaizelibraries.org</a><u></u><u></u></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><b><u><span style="font-size:12.0pt;color:#0322bd"><a href="http://auglaize.oplin.org/" target="_blank">Visit our Library Website!</a><u></u><u></u></span></u></b></p>
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