Onslaught of the 17 inch Laptop

A big screen laptop is pretty hard to find. With the world moving to smartphone and tablets, who would go beyond the 15 inch standard for laptops. Yes, we did have the gaming models of a few manufacturers with large screens. But they too went back to the safe 15 inch size. But now in the first half of 2017 we suddenly have a wave of models in the 17 inch category from manufacturers like HP, Dell and Lenovo.

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Why is 17 inch laptop or notebook important for some

17 inch is the max what is available today. It is 17.3 inch to be exact. A full two inch more than the standard 15 inch size. It is a boon for users who work on spread sheets, photo editing and practically any other work which involves lots of scrolling. It is also a suitable enough desktop replacement. Believe me, there are a lot of people who do not have space for a chunky desktop.

A 17 inch notebook will be heavier. A full 3 kgs as compared to the 2.2 kg of a standard 15 inch. Sure to give the pain while chugging it around. The screen is what consumes most amount of battery juice. So you are going to get lesser battery life on 17 inch than 15 inch. But you are not going to buy a 17 inch laptop for portability.

And yes, not to forget, you will get a full size keyboard. A dedicated number pad for number crunching and well spaced keys for long hours of typing.

The Lineup of 17 inch Laptops

The first choice

If you plan to spend some dough, why not spend on the best. The highest priced model is almost double of that of the lowest priced one. But with all that money you get features worth it.

 

• Intel i7-6700 Quad Core Processor
• NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960M to handle graphics
• 1920 x 1080 resolution screen
• 16 GB RAM
• 2 TB HDD and 128 GB SDD
• 6 Cell battery
• DVD writer

This laptop is heavy at 3.2 KGs because of the larger battery.

The next model features Intel i5-7200 which is a low voltage mobile processor. HDD capacity drops to 1 TB and RAM to 6 GB. Rest of the specs remain same. Due to the reduced specs, this model gets a drastic price drop.

Another model with Intel i3-5005 processor is also available. The price drop is meager, and so will be the performance drop. Rest specs remain same.

The AMD connection

AMD have come up with their APU concept where the processor and graphics are on the same chip. This has reduced space and power requirements for mobile devices. It has the A10-9600P Quad-Core APU processor. On the downside, it just has 4 GB RAM and 500 GB HDD. This means that it will require hardware upgrades immediately on purchase. 

The Lenovo Lineup for 17 inch laptop

The top end of the Lenovo lineup has got gaming written all over it. Top of the line graphics, cooling fans, a wonderful screen and a massive 256 GB SDD. And because of all that, it more costly than the HP top model.

As you go for lesser powered processors, the price drops drastically. Here is another top model from Acer.

Before we sign off, let us have a look at the ultimate beast, a gaming laptop from HP. This is a first.