Business Laptop Buying Guide: What to Know

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When it comes to the success or failure of your small or medium-sized business, there are many potential market forces and unforeseen circumstances that you cannot control. However, you can ensure that the business laptops you purchase for your company serve their intended purposes. If the laptops you purchase and issue to your employees are not delivering efficient operations for your day-to-day and long-term business strategies, they are little more than extremely expensive paperweights. Check out this buying guide and learn more about what to know when buying the best work laptops to help your business succeed. 

Ensure Operating System Uniformity for Communications, Security, and More 

Having everyone who works for your business on the same page helps keep things running smoothly. It is equally vital that the best business laptops to facilitate the same kind of unity. While individual employees will almost certainly grouse about having to use an OS (operating system) that they are not familiar with, the benefits of all your business's laptops running the same OS cannot be overstated. Rather than having to translate communication across a patchwork of different OS's facilitated by time-consuming alterations to individual devices, you can apply software and security updates identically across the board.  

This uniformity can also make things significantly easier when applied to professional and interpersonal communication in the workplace. While it is true that many work chat apps are designed agnostically to facilitate communication, not having to rely on a software client to ensure that your employees can reach each other is one less technical issue you have to concern yourself with.  

Many forms of antivirus and anti-malware applications are designed to protect a specific OS from various cyber threats. Having laptops with different OS's can be a huge time suck and require an additional financial outlay to ensure that all laptops are appropriately protected. Should you need to reach out to technical support services to help fix issues with one or several different business laptops, it is considerably more manageable and less time-consuming to have a single phone number, email, and shipping address to deal with. 

Tech Budget, Business Type, and Employee Needs will Determine Best Value 

There are several factors to keep in mind before finalizing your purchases to get the best out of your new fleet of corporate laptops. The amount of money you feel comfortable spending is arguably one of the most influential driving factors in any business decision-making process, especially when it comes to your tech budget. Thanks to the wonders of modern technology and the continuation of Moore's Law of semiconductors, business owners have never had a better selection of laptops and other devices to help their company and its employees thrive. 

When considering how much money to spend per business laptop, you should keep away from units that cost $300 or less, if possible. Unless you are a brand-new business with a shoestring tech budget, you can get a much better and more powerful laptop for between $350 and $600. Laptops in this price range are great for tasks like social media posting and Microsoft Office and provide superior displays, processing power, and battery life than their less expensive counterparts.  

For businesses requiring greater processing power, increased physical and digital security, and complex multitasking regularly, the recommended price range is between $600 to $1,000 per laptop. If you are looking for a device to equip your chief executives to project a confident image or give an editing, design, or development team a leg up, these rarified business laptops can easily cost more than $1,000 per device but provide incredible portability and computing power in exchange. While sticking within your tech budget is paramount, you should also consider that the right technology in the right hands can help your business grow by leaps and bounds. The cost of investing in new business laptops can be well worth the results as long as you consider the needs of your business and its employees. 

Acer's TravelMate Laptop Line is Ideal for Businesses of All Kinds 

Whether you find yourself constantly traveling for work, dealing with valuable and proprietary data, or simply want to let your employees enjoy laptops with powerful CPUs, copious amounts of RAM, and excellent viewing angles for sharing with colleagues, Acer's TravelMate series of laptops may be your ideal solution. Depending on your company's needs and corporate values, you can purchase the eco-friendly Acer TravelMate Vero. It's key caps and chassis are made from PCR (post-consumer recycled) plastic and ship in recyclable packaging. For those needing additional security features like a biometric fingerprint scanner and the reliability of MIL-STD 810-H standards for impacts and drops, the Acer TravelMate P2 and Acer TravelMate P4 are great business laptops for traveling. 

If you are more interested in something ultraportable with the convenience of a 2-in-1 that comes with an impressive compliment of ports for accessibility on the go, the Acer TravelMate Spin P6 delivers. In addition, since this model comes with the option for vPro remote management, your IT department will be able to access this laptop remotely regardless of whether the OS is working or even if the computer is not turned on. 

While the prospects of buying a fleet of new business laptops can be daunting, you can get through it if you stay focused and pragmatic. Check out Acer's website to learn more about the TravelMate series and other laptops to invest in the success of your business.

*The opinions reflected in this article are the sole opinions of the author and do not reflect any official positions or claims by Acer Inc.

About Dan VanPatten: Dan is a full-time technology writer with interests in gaming, gadgetry, and all things PC tech related. He writes about a variety of topics including technology news, product reviews, and software. His experience stems from years of experience writing & producing content for technology newsletters & publications.