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Adobe softwares tend to run best with a laptop with 16 RAM as you’ll eventually be hopping between various Adobe softwares. I don’t know of a good laptop within that budget realistically speaking, but I think 16 RAM is a good start.

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Honestly neither of those. FHD is too low a resolution for a 17" screen used for design. The other one uses an OLED and OLED screens have color reproduction issues.

If you are married to Windows, I'd steer you toward a Surface laptop instead, even if the Surface has worse specs.

Unless you really like Windows, I recommend considering an Apple laptop with M1 CPU or better. 

https://www.costco.com/macbooks.html?sortBy=item_location_pricing_salePrice%2Basc

M4 MacBook Pro completely obliterates those at Adobe apps

Dell XPS

I feel like not many mention the feature of touch screens or ram. So many times people try to touch the screen lol

But anyway, since people likely more experienced than me mention MacBooks—then I go for iPad—just for the touchscreen.

Also…Lots of clients these days use Canva and Ai and that works on anything

Either fine - do you prefer an IPS or OLED screen?

go for a nvidia gpu with 8gb of ram, thats the bare minimum in my opinion. 32 system ram if you’re multitasking. a 2k screen comes in handy as well, adobe products have a lot of UI

The cheapest MacBook Pro M4 will be your best bet based on your requirements. Or even an Air, but that’ll have fewer ports. Windows laptops are trash right now if you intend to use them on battery, but they work fine plugged in.

MacBook Pro best one you can afford. Do t worry about ports - get a dock. And get a second monitor cheap - you’ll need it. Designing on a laptop screen only is painful. I also have a full size keyboard, and wireless mouse. My Mac is 6 years old and fine.

this heavily depends on ur budget. you can get an air (which is typically cheaper) and still be able to get through your college classes just fine. the only complaint i hear from graphic designers about the air is the external display support. for whatever reason that i’m not going to dive into here, the air only supports 1 external display at best. the pro has the capability to do 2 (i’ve found that the display link docking station works best for apple products and non-apple monitors - for both the air and pro).

if this were me, i’d personally lean towards the air rather than the pro. mainly just because it’s lighter, sleek, and fits in my backpack pretty snug. there really isn’t that much of a problem with the pro, and the pro does give u more capabilities (higher processor to choose, more RAM and Memory options, etc) but, as a person with a tight budget, i’m sure i’ll be able to get through work with 1 extra monitor (cheap 2nd hand, probs from surplus), an external hard drive for storage, and a docking station for more ports.

You’ll probably need a MacBook Pro for the RAM. Double check with the campus store when their next Apple event is. Students and employees at the U don’t pay taxes on the electronics as the school pays them for you and the campus store offers different discounts. It’s one of the best Apple sales you’re going to find.

The new air with the M4 chip is an absolute beast. Unless you are planning on doing some seriously crazy stuff the air will be just fine. The M4 air is better than an M1 or maybe even an M2 MacBook pro.

Look into surface pros !

If you're a graphic design human, then you'll discover pretty quickly how important power is in your rig.

I would pick a MacBook Pro for that reason alone if you really needed portability, but I would be considering an M2.

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I would be cautious with gaming laptops. A lot of gaming laptops trade display quality/accuracy for performance and price - which obviously is not recommended if you are a graphic designer. You need a good, accurate display in order to do good work.

I've always had good experience with the Dell XPS line - though they've rebranded recently.

Anything with 32GB of ram or more. The bigger the RAM the more software you can have running at the same time without lag.

I’ve used Apple and Windows side by side professionally for graphic design, motion, and front end for a long time.

30+ years ago Apple was the default choice because of things like monitors with a 1:1 scale to print, 1px was 1pt, and because windows couldn’t run Illustrator or Photoshop. By the mid-90s those things didn’t matter.

Up until the early 2000s, Apple and Windows fonts had compatibility issues. Given the cost of font libraries at the time, this had some impact on preserving the 90s era entrenchment of Apple, since people wanted to keep their font libraries. Apple and Windows also used different File Systems which made it a pain in the ass to move from one to another.

By the 2010s, all of the previous compatibility differences had been mitigated or obsoleted (with a few exceptions like Sketch).

The only remaining differences are:

• stability
• viruses
• hardware quality*

Hardware quality demands some qualification. Apple hardware is far from perfect - there have been class action lawsuits and recalls. However, the worst of Windows builds is a basement far, far lower than any Apple product. Since many Apple products are purchased corporate, a good chunk of pro users don’t care about the price.

Anyhow, each will make their own choice.

You can get the same power for half the price. Plus lots of added conveniences in terms of software and compatibility.

I’ve been doing graphic design for 25 years. Every job I had issued Macs but I’ve never bought one myself.

I think it’s hilarious that Apple convinced an industry of advertising and marketing experts that they need their products to be “real” designers.

I've personally liked my Asus proart laptops for work and personal use.

The reason why he wants to switch can help us to recommend something.

Honestly though in the laptop market if the company is paying MacBook pros are king.

I have macbook air m2/16/256, 13inch, it works perfectly, I heavily use adobe programs and it never even got warm, the display is maybe a little small but it is the most portable laptop ever, u can always use external monitor at home.

You don't really need to 'learn' Mac, it's just an OS with a lot of overlap to Windows. The differences exist but are easy enough to learn. It's pretty much a cakewalk to adjust compared to the programs we use for design (eg Adobe).

If someone can use Photoshop but claims they have issues using either OS, that's just their own bias or mental blocks.

As either a student or professional, you can use whatever OS you prefer or fits within your budget, laptop or desktop.

It's all just about the specs. Look at the recommended specs for Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign. Include After Effects if applicable. Then find computers that meet those specs, and go as high as you can from that within your budget.

In terms of sacrifices to fit within your budget, I would avoid any 4K or touch screens. 4k screens aren't required at smaller screen sizes (such as laptops 13-15") and uses more battery life anyway, and touch is definitely not a requirement. We aren't illustrators, any drawing you actually need to do for design can be done with just a pen/pencil and a notebook.

Minimum 16GB RAM, ideally 32. Minimum 512GB SSD, ideally 1TB+. Dedicated graphics card if possible (at least for Windows machines).

No matter what OS or machine you get, I would also be sure to invest in an external drive for backup, likely $60-100. This would be a drive you keep at home, never take with you, and is used to backup files from the laptop. It's not expansion storage, it's backup only. Never travels with the laptop.

You should also make a copy of files to an online location, such as iCloud, Google Drive, OneDrive, DropBox, whatever. The rule of backups is redundancy. You have your working copy (ie on the laptop itself), a local backup (the external), and a remote backup (the online backup).

Don't be yet another story of someone who has their laptop stolen/lost/damaged and loses all their school work and photos.