Why the big brick laptops?

fishgutzy

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Just curious. I have noticed that some employers/ managers think a 17" laptop when these are almost universally connected to a docking station and big monitors.
The 17" is a lot heavier to lug around on those occasional trips.
When I can choose my business laptop I choose small.
For my previous employer I had an X1 Carbon. Super light. But a high res screen. Had it hooked up to a dock and 43" 4K monitor.

Any Corp IT guys here that have insight to the Brick mentality?

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We have thousands of 14" laptops in our work environment. Some guys still think bigger is better in the IT world (and it is when speaking of specs, but never weight) and they need that 17" screen to watch movies on or whatever.

I have an XPS 13 and it does everything I need it to do once I plug that USB-C cord into the side of it from the dock. I have twin 24" monitors and can stream to the 60" 4K TV if I need to do a presentation or whatever. The XPS series is underrated for what you get value vs power wise.

When I really wanna go light, I take an iPad air or just use my phone. 90% of all IT correspondence can be done via smartphone nowadays.
 
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It depends but it's probably due to processing and compute power. Typically smaller laptops have less cores and memory.
 
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I have an x1 carbon, there is a new one coming out any day now.
 
I run a X1 Carbon as well. docked into 2 - 24" monitors.
Have to use a portable harddrive for file storage, otherwise is really runs slow.
 
I chose a 17" Lenovo Brick,,,, I mean P71 ThinkPad for a few reasons.
1. I have 27" monitors at home and in the office, but when I do use the laptop outside of those locations I need a larger monitor for design, modeling and drafting. The tool palettes for these types of programs often take a lot of screen space. A 17" monitor leaves you with enough workspace to still be useful.
2. The 17" brick has more options for powerful CPUs, graphics, memory and battery. I need that.
 
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Had 14" thinkpads for my two daughters, circa 2006 off IBM lease, I got them X1 Carbon Gen 3 few months ago, also off IBM lease.
They like them, SSD, long batter life, SUPER THIN.
 
I chose a 17" Lenovo Brick,,,, I mean P71 ThinkPad for a few reasons.
1. I have 27" monitors at home and in the office, but when I do use the laptop outside of those locations I need a larger monitor for design, modeling and drafting. The tool palettes for these types of programs often take a lot of screen space. A 17" monitor leaves you with enough workspace to still be useful.
2. The 17" brick has more options for powerful CPUs, graphics, memory and battery. I need that.
My OP was pointed more at those who rarely ever use it away from the desk and dock station.
For those like you who use it often away from the desk I understand.
In the desk I'd rather have 1 43" 4k than 2 27" 1080.


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If you normally have multiple applications open and need to go back and forth all day, screen size is a bonus. Right now I have twelve tabs open in a browser and twelve more applications open. Yeah I counted.

I'm running two monitors and some folks around here run four. I'm thinking I'm a slacker, I should get at least one more monitor.

As to laptop size, it's only a detriment to the people who have to bring it home overnight because they don't provide locking docking stations and security cables but we'd be held responsible if it walked away with the cleaning crew, very few of whom speak any English.

No habla, y no tiene verde tajarta.
 
I miss my 17 Dell Precision. At first I didn't like it but quickly got used to it. I used to work in between classes and it was nice to have extra screen size. I also used to do a lot of heavy processing and having the ability to do it anywhere was nice.
 
My experience is the user wants a number pad when they choose a larger laptop.

I work with accounting software...this is a real need for me when on-site with a client. But, I use a USB key pad and keep the laptop smaller.
 
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