Hey guys, I'm in the market for a new trading laptop. I will use it for my charting software (Ninja), order entry and also some analysis in Excel and a custom application I have in C#. I've been recommended the HP Probook 450 G5 with Core i5-8250U, 8GB DDR4, 256GB SSD and Windows 10 Pro elsewhere. https://www.cdw.com/shop/products/HP-SB-450-G5-I5-8250U-256GB-8GB-W10P/4769616.aspx Any experiences or knowledge of these? Or other recommendations in the same price range? Thanks in advance! Howard EDIT: I forgot to mention that I will be connecting two additional 22" screens.
$870 for Those specs and only a 1366x768 resolution...Expensive laptop; You can find a way better deal on eBay for a used one....with a 17" screen, 1920 resolution, i7 CPU, SSD drive, and better video card. Search for it, they're there.
It will probably be stationary most of the time, so I considered a stationary, but I am semi-mobile, so would prefer a laptop.
Except for the very expensive ones, they tend to have less RAM, RAM upgrades are very expensive, monitor resolutions tend to be to low for trading.
HP is almost always garbage when it comes to consumer grade products. I'd get a slightly used ThinkPad P50 if your budget is below $1k.
I had that laptop for roughly 6 hours before I quickly returned it. The screen resolution is horrendous on a laptop. You need at least 1920x1080 when trading. Anything less and charts look like garbage plus you wont be able to fit much on the screen. I went to surface book and really enjoyed it. Ultimately I settled on a 15 inch MacBook. I need iMessage during the day and it’s nice not needing to keep checking my phone. Please, whatever you do... do not get that laptop. Spend a little more if you need to. Also, RAM upgrades are actually extremely cheap. Changing hard drives can be expensive (going from HD to SSD) but RAM won’t ever cost more than $100 upgrading if you need to. I’m on laptops a lot since I’m a software developer. Let me know if you have any specific questions.
Just to quickly add - Not every laptop allows you to upgrade RAM after the fact. Apple specifically solders RAM so it cannot be upgraded after you purchase it. If you’re going to get a Windows laptop then look for these features: Monitor size - Whatever you’re comfortable with Minimum resolution: 1920x1080 Minimum Processor: i5, prefer i7, minimum i3 SSD or Hard Drive: Min 128gb, prefer 256gb+ RAM: minimum 8gb, prefer 16gb Monitor size won’t really matter if you’re going to have it docked/plugged into an external monitor. Without a doubt you’ll use the laptop mobile at times so definitely go with higher resolution.
If you’re OK with a desktop, look at the intel NUC. There’s a small premium after it’s all built out but it’s very small, light and somewhat portable if you have an external monitor wherever you’re going.