Justifying "non-consumer grade" laptops....

That's so true.

 

The cost of business grade machines are justified because:

1. Better service and warranty turn around time.
2. Parts are usually compatible across some model range.
3. There some backward compatibility of parts for at least one to two release cycle.
4. Higher grade construction material.
5. Built with serviceability in mind.
6. Stronger and tougher
-----------------------------------

Also, many business grade laptops can be used for at least 3 to 5 years (some manufacturers like Lenovo/IBM even offer 5 years warranty on previous laptops), which is somewhat difficult with many cheaper consumer grade laptops (some struggle to get to their 2nd birthday before kicking the bucket).

 

Just one more comment on this topic: It appears to me that the people who cannot understand that someone would spend a bit more on a business-class laptop do really have a fairly parochial, and even naive, view of the usage of these machines. As an example, yes, the $7,000 (roughly) I spent on my M6400 is a significant chunk of change. It may be interesting to note, however, that the software that I run on this machine is worth several times that money. Think about it.

 

The question is: can you still work reasonably well if you ran them on a cheaper laptop?
Cost effectiveness is vital.

 

There are way to many generalizations, assumptions, and anecdotes in this thread and not a lot of solid evidence supporting these claims. There are consumer laptops that meet one or more of these generalized differences of business class laptops, and there are business class laptops that fail to meet one or more of the various generalized differences as well. If business class laptops dropped the business class moniker, would forming laptops into the two camps really be that easy anymore? I really don't think so.

The company my dad works for has always used Dell computers. The laptops they use outside of the regular workplace used to be top of the line XPS's, and are now top of the line Alienwares.

 

My point exactly there is no "standard" for business laptop. So no point comparing them if you wish compare the specific models instead.

 

Usually money is not an issue for business notebooks as the end user isn't paying for it all the time.

My mom's company got rid of all their crappy old HP business tier notebook and my mom got a new Latitude E6400 which is worth like 1200 but did she pay for it? No.

As for the business notebook quality/feel moniker, I asked my mom who has used multiple business notebooks and consumer models and construction doesn't matter, she just needs a notebook that can do her work. But her company provides her notebooks and they so happened to buy new Latitude with extended warranties.

 

Why is the standard in all these examples a 3000 dollar dell precision. That's not the only business class laptop in the world! Many, most purchased are cheaper configs. Those things go to the engineers and artists. But lots of consumers simply prefer business class laptops for themselves as well. Why buy an Asus/Acer/MSI, or even an Inspiron/Pavilion, when I can find a ThinkPad/Latitude/ProBook instead? I may not be a business but I'll pay a marginally higher price, or sometimes the same price if you buy wisely, for better build quality and warranty support. I used to work for dell sales waaaaaay back as a student, B2B was king, consumer was customer number 432840932787432.

 

Apart from from quality and serviceability differences between the general consumer and business laptops, the warranty services are also different.

With Thinkpads, some customer were able to get 5 years special bid warranty from the laptop company. There were also other warranty plan, where all laptop parts can be express couriered to the customer, and the repair can be carried out by trained IT technician within the customer's organisation. i will be surprised if consumer laptops would have warranty coverage like this

Furthermore, if my thinkpad key break within warranty, i can just call up Lenovo warranty service, and they would express courier the keyboard to my house or work the next day, where i can swap out the keyboard myself. I haven't seen a consumer laptop range, where this sort of services are available.

 

Maybe yes, maybe no? I don't propose to speak for Pirx, but in my experience when business applications are concerned, the added security and reliability far outweigh the savings in product price. There are contracts you could lose forever if you fail to produce the product at the time it was promised.

No, but it's the most recognizable. And for the record, the three grand you refer to is just an average. The entry price is around $1700--although the limit is somewhere in the stratosphere.

 

Correct. Think about it this way: You spend $50k on a system including software and possibly accessories, which is going to be used by a professional whose time is going to cost you anywhere between 3 and 5 grand a day. In other words, one hour of this guy's time will cost you more than the price difference between the business-class product, and some crummy ASUS, say And, make no mistake: Once you compare laptops with equal specs, the price difference between a cheap consumer-grade laptop and a business-class machine will be of the order of a few hundred dollars at the very most, sometimes as low as around 100 bucks.

Now, how would you decide in a case like that? Do you think you are going to try and save a few hundred bucks at the very most? Of course, it all depends. Some employees may be served perfectly well by a cheaper laptop, but for some, not investing the money would be a profoundly stupid decision.

 

But you are making the assumption that business class laptops entail more security and reliability over consumer laptops. You can say they are made to a high quality standard (but not higher than all consumer laptops, just some), and you can say that they have an excellent warranty (but not better than all consumer laptops, and often consumer laptops are offered as business laptops), but you cannot make any conclusion that business class laptops offer superior reliability over all consumer laptops. You are pulling this out of thin air.

My dad uses a company-supplied Alienware laptop for working from home. Every now and then in the field, the company rests its future on their Alienware laptops running for mere minutes. Also Alienware is a DoD contractor and used in by many universities. And besides the federal government, the company my dad works for, and educational institutions, I am sure there are probably other companies around the world that use Alienware. This is a case like I touched on in the previous paragraph of consumer laptops sold to business with the only difference being the business warranty.

Like I've said before in this thread, Dell apparently does the same exact thing with their consumer laptops!

 

Putting it like that, many end users still don't pay for their laptops their business/company/organization does, so given a choice

Would you take a 3000 dollar Dell Precision or a 400 dollar Acer if you didn't have to pay for it?

 

That is not a realistic option.

 

Correct, it's complete nonsense. The choice is more like between a $2000 consumer machine, and a $2200 business laptop.

 

I wouldn't say just some. I would say the business class notebooks are of higher quality than MOST consumer class notebooks. They're simply built better and sturdier. While this might not be important to regular home user i.e. the consumer, for businesses a tiny error/damage to the laptops that might cost the business a lot of money like a lost contract or lost customer does matter.

Similarly to the service offered. It might be alright for a home user to not have a computer for a day, I mean, what is there to lose? But for a business, that might means the company going down under. And besides, while there is the same number of repair time for a small number of consumer class laptops like you mentioned, that's most likely because they purchased the extra warranty, not the standard warranty. Which in turn brings, warranty wise, the consumer service to the same level as the business service level..a.k.a. you get what you pay for. As for the overnight service, it is only an example of user replaceable parts. Try a huge warranty work. See how long that takes.

And for the record, the alienware systems, while being considered consumer class laptops, are really expensive, even more expensive than some business class machines.

 

I am seeing some common themes in this thread. Let me try to recap.
A business laptop makes sense when the time of the person using the laptop is very expensive. This happens in situations such as
--the laptop is out in the field and there isnt a backup laptop readily available.
--a backup laptop is available, but the 3-4 hours it would take to configure the laptop and install programs poses an unacceptable time loss.

Note the time of all personnel in a business is not that important...only certain people.

 

Agree 100%. I've seen the difference in customer service for non-business customers from a few companies, the parity is such that I whenever I'm buying a laptop for my parents or someone else, it's always a "business" purchase.

 

But is it worth paying much much more for business laptops just for the warranty? How often is the warranty being invoked?

If its not being invoked frequently, then it might make sense to buy a consumer laptop and just replace it more often when it breaks. My parents have been using a dell inspiron for 4 years (granted it always stays at home.

 

This has less to do with the warranty and more to do with phone support. If the phone support sucks, they're going to call me for help. Having friends/family be able to deal with the company themselves instead of coming running to me is something I'll happily pay a premium for.

 

Plus, there are a lot of other things that go in to buying a fleet of machines for your employees. And from an accounting perspective... it's better financially to buy an expensive business machines, depreciate it and sell it off-lease than to flood your employees a bunch of cheap computers and have no recoverable assets. No one is going to buy an abused inspiron or take it off lease. Many off lease machines are still under warranty, while an equivalent consumer machine won't be covered because often consumer machines come with shorter standard warranties.

My point is it's there's a lot more to the cost benefit analysis here than just warranty quality and how often you think you may use it.

And what about business specific things, like TPM and AMT and VPro? Many "prosumer" laptops come with these features, but not all consumer laptops do.

 

Do you know if companies get any tax deductions for buying laptops?

 

Are you sure this post isn't fueled by your feelings and personal anecdotes instead of hard data on the subject?

 

IS there even any hard data on the subject tbh though?

 

Today I played around with an HP DV8t.
Its a consumer laptop with a reasonable screen and components (apart from the screen being all shiniy).

Its reasonably made...It is no dell precision but it feels solid enough when carrying around. However, the plastic creaks when pressed in certain places, the keyboard has massive flex in some places, and this all gives the feeling that the laptop is not meant to be abused like an elitebook. But if someone is careful with the laptop, it seems that it will do the job.

 

How much benifit is there to such techniques and materials for the average business user?

 

Is there much benefit to a Macbook Pro being made of aluminum as opposed to the regular Macbook being made of glossy plastic? Idk, go ask the Apple users who rave about it

I think the better point is simple that companies sometimes can't afford(whether money or time wise) to make constant shifts in their machines. The fact that some companies still run Pentium 4s with XP(if not earlier OSes like 2000) shows how companies are willing to stick with what works so long as it still works for them. Therefore, selling them a computer which may last longer is a plus to them as opposed to telling them to swap computers every 2 years.

 

Well, metal feels nicer, but TBH, I tinkered about with an MBP in store, and it wasnt something I would pay that much of a premium for (but then I am not consireding OSX)

How about individuals who administer their own machines --- there is no such incentive for them. Is it optimal for them to pay a premium for business machines?

 

Well my point was that "materials" is a relative/personal question sometimes more so than an actual practical one.

Yes, I'm pretty sure the Thinkpads being able to withstand x amount of kilograms of force on the lid without breaking is nice, but rare are the occasions where people would encounter such a situation. Nonetheless, Lenovo makes and advertises this as an aspect of their computers because if 1% of the population DOES take note of it, it's good enough for them. Just as some cars can withstand ridiculous amounts of stress compared to the average road accident. Take the guys who drive hummers in town for example. Just because the product(aka a laptop) isn't necessarily a threat to your life doesn't mean you can't byplay "sturdiness" as a selling point.

I think that lots of people are being very pragmatist, and that's fine, but the fact is that the consumer world is about artificial or superficial needs/wants and the ability to induce them and manage them. Whether most of these are worth the money is up to the person buying.

The term basically says it "Business" laptop. It's meant and oriented towards businesses(or so says the product branding scheme). Sure, as an individual consumer you can buy one, but the product & market isn't catered for you. I remember speaking with an HP rep once and the sales department for that segment is mostly concentrated on bulk selling, not individual selling.

 

This thread has run its course and is now closed.

Poster "DexterM" -- I don't know what your motivation is for asking all these odd questions about price justification . . . it's not getting anywhere hence the thread is EOL. They have been answered already and now it's just a waste of members' time.