• Microsoft has blocked Secure Boot updates on some devices
• There have been issues with some devices updating from the 2011 certificate to the latest 2023 certificate
• Some older devices or those not supported by their OEM may be restricted in downloading the latest Secure Boot certificates

Microsoft has blocked some Windows 11 PCs from installing Secure Boot updates due to known issues with certificate updates.

The company is currently rolling out an update for Secure Boot on devices using certificates issued in 2011, which are now expired. The new 2023 certificate is being applied through Windows Update, but issues on devices with faulty firmware have forced Microsoft to halt the rollout.

“Devices in this group are affected by a known issue. To reduce risk, Secure Boot certificate updates are temporarily paused while Microsoft and partners work toward a supported resolution,” Microsoft said.

Secure Boot issues

Secure Boot has long been a device-saving feature when it comes to removing malicious files, as it allows the device to verify and load only authentic software before booting to Windows. However if the device cannot receive certificate updates it can fall victim to threats at the boot-level before Windows is loaded.

Microsoft is currently working with manufacturers to issue a patch that will allow affected devices to install the new Secure Boot 2023 certificate, with HP issuing a BIOS update to allow the installation of the latest certificate.

What this means in practice is that some older devices, or devices that no longer receive updates via their Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM), will not be able to apply Secure Boot and Boot Manager protections. Microsoft clarified that, “this results in a gradual reduction in long-term security—not an immediate risk or system failure. Continue to follow standard security practices, including staying current with Windows updates.”

So even if your device is blocked from installing the latest Secure Boot certificate, it will continue to work properly, other Windows updates will continue to work, and your Secure Boot version will continue to protect against known vulnerabilities. It’s just future vulnerabilities that users affected by this issue will need to be aware of.

Many users may not be aware of issues until they need to use Secure Boot, so the silver lining in Microsoft’s warning is that now is the perfect time to check if your Secure Boot is working properly.

How to check Secure Boot is up to date

To check if you are using the latest Secure Boot certificate, take the following steps:

• Open the Windows Security app using the search bar
• Navigate to the Device Security dashboard using the menu on the right hand side
• Look at the Secure Boot section, and check for the following messages:

1. "Secure Boot is on"

If you see this message, Secure Boot is likely working properly. However, this does not display your certificates’ current state. Microsoft has been rolling out an update to show if your Secure Boot is running on the latest certificate, so make sure your don't have any pending Windows updates.

2. “Devices in this group are affected by a known issue.”

Devices with this message will likely be able to install the latest certificates once a firmware update has been issued by your OEM. Check your OEM update channel for availability.

3. “Secure Boot is on, but your device does not support the automated Secure Boot certificate update due to hardware or firmware limitations.”

Devices with this message may no longer be supported by your OEM, or the OEM might no longer be able to provide the firmware updates needed. Microsoft recommends checking your OEM’s Secure Boot support page to confirm whether your device is out of support.

Via WindowsLatest

When I think of the best Dell laptops (and Dell in general), two memories come to mind: the "Dude, you're getting a Dell" commercial from the early 2000s, and my dad's first and only laptop — a 2012 Dell Inspiron.

My nostalgic feelings aside, Dell is a brand that sticks in many people's minds, particularly the iconic XPS series. The company has had a solid reputation since its first laptop was released in 1989, and you'll typically find a Dell among Laptop Mag's lists of best laptops, best budget laptops, best gaming laptops, and laptops with the best battery life. We've reviewed several of Dell's newest releases and expect to review more as 2025 marches on.

An important note: if you're considering buying a new 2025 Dell, I highly recommend reading my handy guide on how to find the right Dell laptop to understand the new product names. Dell laptops now have a naming convention closer to how Apple differentiates its MacBooks (XPS, Inspiron, Precision, and Latitude are no more, unfortunately), but my current recommendations still have those familiar, now-former names. It may also be a good time to find discounts on the old models among the best laptop deals.

Whether you've never owned a Dell or you've used Dell laptops for years and are ready to upgrade, this page is regularly updated with our latest reviews to reflect Laptop Mag’s top picks for 2025.

Update Log

5/30/25: Updated introduction, "recently reviewed," and FAQ sections.

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Best for most people

The Snapdragon-configured Dell Inspiron 14 Plus has many major qualities and features a modern laptop should have: incredible multitasking performance, seemingly endless battery life, a bright display — all packed into a reasonably light and thin chassis. It's a super-likable laptop.

The Inspiron's entry-level Snapdragon X Plus X1P-64-100 processor stands toe to toe (more like shin to knee, really) with higher-end chips from Intel and Apple of its generation. With a Geekbench 6 multicore benchmark score of 13,281, (22% faster than the average premium laptop score of 10,435) it did "well juggling a couple dozen Google Chrome tabs and a handful of YouTube videos," as Rami Tabari, Laptop Mag's editor, said in he review. He also recommends this laptop for remote workers.

It's also 9% faster than the MacBook Air M3 (12,087) and 5% faster than the Intel Core Ultra 7 155H (12,729) inside our pick for best budget Dell budget laptop — also an Inspiron 14 Plus!

The SSD is zippy, too. It can transfer a 25GB multimedia file at 1,510 megabytes per second, about 14% faster than the average laptop in its class (1,311 MBps.) It's 11% faster than the Asus Zenbook S14 (1,236 MBps) and 7% faster compared to one of its Snapdragon competitors, the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7x (1,416 MBps).

Battery life and heat management are equally impressive. In our battery rundown test, it lasted a substantial 18 hours and 20 minutes — well beyond the average 13 hours and 23 minutes. I'd be comfortable putting this laptop on my bare skin, too, as it doesn't exceed 88 degrees on the underside.

PlusItsIt's display doesn't produce miracles, though. Covering just 69.1% of the DCI-P3 color gamut, everything on the screen looks drained of color. Some of this laptop's rivals, like the Zenbook 14 and MacBook Air M3, fare much better, 79.8% and 77.8%, respectively — and they're still below the 84.7% average. However, the Inspiron 14 Plus' display can get really bright, up to 470 nits.

See our full Dell Inspiron 14 Plus (7441) review.

Best budget

Even among laptops with Intel's new Lunar Lake chips, its last-gen chips are still nothing to brush off. This Dell Inspiron 14 Plus is a textbook example of why. It has just as much performance (especially for multitasking) and outstanding battery life, but its graphic capabilities are also far more powerful.

It scored 12,729 in the Geekbench 6 multicore benchmark, 9% faster than the average premium laptop (10,435). "The laptop easily kept up with my daily workload and task switching between email, text editing, and Photoshop," Laptop Mag's staff writer, Madeline Ricchiuto, wrote in her review. It's also 6% faster than the MacBook Pro M3 (11,968) and 3% faster than our favorite 2-in-1 laptop, the HP Spectre x360 14 (12,358), with the same chip.

When it comes to its graphics capabilities, this laptop also outshines its rivals, particularly the Snapdragon's Qualcomm Adreno iGPU. On Medium settings at 1080p, its Intel Arc integrated graphics averaged 34 frames per second in the Sid Meier’s Civilization VI: Gathering Storm benchmark. Our playability threshold is 30 fps, so it passed that — but the Snapdragon Inspiron 14 Plus mustered only 21 fps.

That difference is starker in 3DMark’s Fire Strike synthetic graphics benchmark: the Intel Inspiron scored 8082, where the Snapdragon Inspiron scored 5965 — a 27% difference.

This laptop doesn't get as much battery life compared to the Snapdragon Inspiron 14 Plus, but it still gets 15 hour and 6 minutes, a couple hours more than the average premium laptop. It does outlast both the Spectre (11:01) and the Asus Zenbook 14 OLED (15:52), and sneaks past the 15-inch MacBook Air M3 by 3 minutes, too.

Like the Snapdragon model, this laptop's display is dull, covering only 68.4% of the DCI-P3 color gamut. It doesn't get nearly as bright, either, topping out at 367 nits. However, that's on par or better than some of its other rivals, like the Spectre x360 14 (367 nits) and the Zenbook 14 OLED (339 nits).

The Inspiron 14 Plus' heat management isn't great, either, most likely because Intel mobile processors tend to run the hottest out of any Windows laptop chip — its surface warmed up to 108 degrees, well past our comfort threshold.

See our full Dell Inspiron 14 Plus (7440) review.

Best gaming

Budget gaming laptops have been steadily disappearing from the laptop market over the last few years — so when one that packs a ton of performance and costs less than $1,000 falls into our hands, it's a great day at Laptop Mag. Like our editor, Rami Tabari, said in his review: "For its current price of $949, the Dell G16 (7630) is an absolute stunner."

Graphically intensive games like Cyberpunk 2077 achieved 33 frames per second at 1080p on Ultra settings, slightly higher than the Asus TUF Gaming A14 (30 fps) and Acer Predator Helios Neo 16 (32 fps) with the same RTX 4060 graphics card. In Assassin’s Creed Mirage (Ultra, 1080p), the G16 did exceptionally well (88 fps), and remained on par with the A14 and Neo 16.

One feature that surprised us is the quality of its display. Its 2560 x 1600, 240Hz screen is a common feature in gaming laptops — but not the quality of the IPS panel itself. It covers a massive 114% of the DCI-P3 color gamut, soaring past the average budget gaming laptop (79.1%). Even the TUF Gaming A14 (81%) and Predator Helios Neo 16 (92%) fall far behind it.

Unfortunately, its display doesn't get all that bright. At a max 310 nits, its close to the overall average (317), but is much dimmer than the A14 (411 nits) and Neo 16 (370 nits).

But there is one more thing that the G16 has that its closest rivals don't: a Cherry MX tactile mechanical keyboard. Revered for their longevity, travel distance and actuation point, sound, and feel, these switches are more commonly found in desktop gaming keyboards —and there are gaming laptops twice the price of the G16 that don't have them!

Its battery life is decent, too. At 5 hours and 4 minutes, it outlasts the average budget gaming laptop and the Predator Helios Neo 16 by an hour It's no TUF Gaming A14 (10:04), but that laptop's battery life is an exception to the rule.

In that light, the gripes we have with this laptop seem relatively minor compared to the higher-end features it offers. If you already have a gaming headset you can easily avoid the speakers harsh, hallow sounds. And if you already have a gaming mouse, you'll never need to touch the tiny trackpad.

See our full Dell G16 (7630) review.

Best display

The Dell XPS 13 — a long-time Laptop Mag favorite. We've reviewed many configurations over the years, and each stood out for various reasons. Though I'd describe its new, minimalist design with a "touch bar" and "invisible" trackpad among reviewers as a love/hate relationship, we adore the OLED display on this iteration. There are plenty of other great things about the Dell XPS 13. From "solid performance and respectable integrated graphics to impressive battery life and impactful speakers," our staff writer, Madeline Ricchiuto, talks about this in her review.

We wouldn't recommend it for having the best display if it didn't stun us with a kaleidoscope of colors. The panel covers 144.60% of the DCI-P3 color gamut, way beyond this laptop's base, IPS panel (69.9%). Some of its closest competitors, like the 13-inch MacBook Air M3 (77.8%) and Asus Zenbook S 14 (82.0%), aren't on the same wavelength, either.

Though it was not the dimmest OLED display we've tested, we wish it was a bit brighter; an average peak brightness of 377 nits is enough to cut through most lighting glare, though not all of it. It's still brighter than its IPS counterpart (357 nits) and the Zenbook S 14 (342 nits), but the MacBook Air is the brightest out of all of them (476 nits).

Its chassis is as thin and light as ever, with the OLED model at 0.6 inches thick and weighing the same 2.6 pounds as the non-OLED. It's not as slim as the MacBook Air M3 (0.44 inches) or Asus Zenbook S 14 (0.47 ~ 0.51 inches), but it weighs the same amount.

One major sacrifice that comes with the XPS 13 OLED: its tandem display sucks up a lot of power, leaving the laptop with 8 hours and 40 minutes of battery life. That's 5 hours less than the average premium laptop (13:23), and way, way less than the non-OLED's outstanding 18 hours and 43 minutes.

At least you won't have to worry about this laptop's performance. In the Geekbench 6 single-core benchmark, it held its own (2,772) against the Snapdragon Dell XPS 13 (2,797) and Asus Zenbook S 14 (2,751). Paired with Intel's current-gen Arc integrated graphics, this laptop can function as a decent gaming laptop if you casually play games that don't push the graphics too hard.

In the Sid Mieier’s Civilization VI: Gathering Storm (1080p, Medium) benchmark, it averaged 53 fps — behind what the Asus Zenbook S 16 with an AMD Ryzen AI 9 chip can do (63 fps) but beyond the Snapdragon XPS 13 (22 fps), which didn't meet our minimum 30 fps playability threshold.

See our full Dell XPS 13 OLED (9350) review.

Best battery life

Having endured years of bartering with college classmates and random coffee shop patrons for a seat next to a wall outlet, long battery life is one of my must-have features in a laptop. It could have a horrible display but over 15 hours of battery life, and I'll still look at it like, "Yeah, but that battery life!" That's the Dell XPS 13 (9345) in a nutshell.

It had phenomenal battery life before we updated the BIOS during our testing, increasing it from 19 hours and 1 minute to 20 hours and 51 minutes. That's way beyond the average premium laptop average (13:23) and the MacBook Air M3 (15:13), Asus Zenbook S14 (13:51), and HP Spectre x360 14 (11:01) with an Intel Core Ultra 7 155H chip.

That also puts this laptop in the same league as the MacBook Pro 16 M4 Pro (20:46) and Lenovo ThinkBook 16 Gen 7 (21:02) — and none of them are direct competitors!

As a heavy multitasker, performance also matters a lot to me. I need my laptop to handle dozens of open browser tabs while Slack and Discord run in the foreground and Spotify loops through my favorite songs. This laptop's Snapdragon X Elite X1E-80-100 processor has some of the best multicore processing power to handle all that.

In the Geekbench 6 overall performance benchmark it scored 14,635, making it 29% faster than the average premium laptop (10,492). It's also 8% faster than the MacBook Air M3 (12,087), 14% faster than the Zenbook S14 (11,157), and 6% faster than the Spectre x360 14 (12,358).

Remember what I said about a horrible display? This XPS 13s' is a let-down. It covers just 66.9% of the DCI-P3 color gamut, which is 20% lower than the average premium laptop (86.8%) — and duller than its MacBook Air M3 (77.8%), Zenbook S14 (82.0%), and Spectre x360 (85.8%) rivals.

When our editor, Rami Tabari, watched the Borderlands trailer during his testing process, he noticed the "entire horizon beyond the crew was washed out due to the terrible contrast" and "deep orange-colored canyons were reduced to a pale yellow devoid of life."

But at least the display is bright! Its max 456 nits comes close to the average premium laptop (467 nits), and it's just a tad dimmer than the MacBook Air M3 (476 nits). It literally outshines both the Zenbook S 14 (342 nits) and Spectre x360 (366 nits), too.

See our full Dell XPS 13 (9345) review.

Benchmark comparisons

Recently reviewed

Not every laptop can make the best Dell laptops page. (We wouldn't be doing you that much good if that were the case!) We review new laptops every week and over 100 laptops yearly, so here's a look at our most recently reviewed laptops that didn't make this page either due to a fault, battery life, performance, price, or something else.

How to find the right Dell laptop

In January of 2025, Dell announced name changes impacting its entire lineup. We've already reviewed several models with the new names (with more to come), so we put together a table to help anyone shopping for a new Dell laptop understand how the old model names translate to the new ones.

It's important to note that while the names are changing, the basic product lines remain the same, and in most cases, the designs are unchanged for 2025.

The most affordable Dell laptops were the Inspiron and Inspiron Plus lines, starting for well under $1,000. In 2025, those will just be known as Dell and Dell Plus. If you are looking for an affordable laptop that can handle basic web browsing, productivity tasks, and entertainment, these laptops are typically a perfect fit.

The premium consumer laptop line was XPS, and it is now Dell Premium. These laptops go head-to-head with the best MacBooks and fall into similar pricing, starting just below $1,000 and ranging above $3,000 for the top configurations. These laptops are for people who want a more premium fit and finish to the laptop or those with more robust needs, whether that's more performance for massive multitasking or tasks like photo editing or video editing.

Those are Dell's consumer laptops. Now, we move into the business and workstation-class laptops, where things get a little more complicated with multiple tiers, but you also can see the benefit of Dell's new naming.

Dell's business laptops were known as Latitude. Starting at just above $500 and ranging up to around $2,500 for the top configurations, these catered to businesses of almost any size. Going forward, these are the Dell Pro models with three tiers: Dell Pro, Dell Pro Plus, and Dell Pro Premium. Performance and quality improve as you move up the line, so finding the best business laptop for you is just a matter of your budget.

Finally, we have the Dell Precision lineup, which are Dell's workstations, now known as Dell Pro Max. Again, there are three tiers to this lineup: Dell Pro Max, Dell Pro Max Plus, and Dell Pro Max Premium. Now, the names start to feel a little long, but it remains very simple to understand. You can spend as little as around $1,300 for the Dell Pro Max, and it scales up to $4,000 for a high-end Dell Pro Max Premium. The best workstations are designed for people with intensive performance needs, such as rendering 3D graphics, simulations, 4K or 8K video, etc.

FAQs

Q: Are Dell laptops good for gaming?

A: While Alienware is the dedicated gaming laptop brand that is a part of Dell, some Dell laptops cater to gamers. The Dell G16 (7630) is one of our selections for the best gaming laptops and the best cheap gaming laptops. If you are wondering if a specific Dell laptop is good for gaming, check out our review. We have a dedicated section on gaming in every review we publish.

Q: Do Dell laptops come with Microsoft Office?

A: No. You may receive a trial of Microsoft Office software through Microsoft 365, but the software is not free with a new Dell laptop.

Q: Are Dell laptops good for students?

A: It depends! Some Dell laptops are certainly candidates to be the best student laptops; it just depends on your course of study and budget. Most bachelor of arts students would likely be happy with an Inspiron or Inspiron Plus (Dell, Dell Plus) laptop. Students with more intensive needs, such as those in engineering, programming, or even film, should consider the XPS (Dell Premium) or even the Precision (Dell Pro Max).

Q: Where are Dell laptops are manufactured?

A: Dell manufactures its laptops in various cities across Europe, the Americas, and Asia-Pacific region. Its US-based facility is located in Austin, Texas, where the company was originally founded in 1984.

Its Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Chengdu (China) and Limerick, Ireland facilities are arguably the company's most important hubs for manufacturing and distributing laptops and other computing devices outside of the United States.

How we test laptops

We put each laptop through extensive benchmark testing — both synthetic and real-world — before they end up in the hands of our reviewers. We evaluate each aspect of the laptop, including its performance, battery life, display, speakers, and heat management.

In our benchmark testing, we use a Klein K10 colorimeter to detect the brightness and DCI-P3 color gamut of the laptop's display. For performance testing, we run the laptop through a gauntlet of benchmarks, including Geekbench 6 and 3DMark professional graphics tests.

To determine real-world performance, we convert a 4K video to 1080p resolution and duplicate a 25GB file. Our real-world graphics test is Cid Meier's Civilization V: Gathering Storm benchmark at 1080p resolution and Medium graphics. We also run heat tests by playing a 15-minute full-screen video and measuring temperatures in different areas of the laptop. For gaming laptops, we test Red Dead Redemption 2, Assassin's Creed Mirage, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Borderlands 3, Far Cry 6, and others.

For our battery test, we continuously web surfing over WiFi at 150 nits of brightness. For Windows 11 laptops, a runtime of over 10 hours is considered a good result, whereas gaming laptops and workstations that can stay powered longer than 5 hours deserve praise.

Following these tests, the laptop is given to our expert reviewers for extensive hands-on testing. Our reviewers will spend days using the laptop as part of their typical workflow to get a sense of the real-world performance and live with the laptop to come away with a thorough understanding of the hardware and software experience. This blended lab testing and hands-on approach allows us to offer you a clear and comprehensive view of every laptop that comes through Laptop Mag.

See this page on How We Test Laptops for more details on our benchmarking procedures.

Why trust Laptop Mag

Laptop Mag reviews over a hundred different laptops every year, from paperweight ultralights to everyday workhorses to lumbering gaming notebooks that scorch the frame rates of even the hottest AAA games. We're not just experts in the laptop field, as we go one step further by meticulously testing smartphones, tablets, headphones, PC accessories, software, and even the latest in gaming.

We are 100% independent and have decades of experience to help you buy with confidence. In fact, Laptop Mag has been testing and reviewing products for three decades, and we continue to deliver trustworthy reviews you can rely on.

Our experienced team of writers and editors scour the available information about the laptop and put it through its paces to determine which is best for you. But before they start, the testing team subjects each system to a rigorous regimen of synthetic and real-world tests to see how a system handles the type of work and games you’re most likely to throw at it.

Our editorial trustworthiness is enforced by one of the world's largest technology publishers, Future Publishing. As a company, we have unrivaled experience across every tech sector — and we're the group's specialist for all things mobile tech.

My Dad introduced me to computers with a Windows 3.1 work laptop when I was in elementary school, and I’ve been a Windows fanboy ever since — well, almost ever since.

When Apple released its M1 processor in 2020, I finally caved and bought my first MacBook. I used it for light work while traveling because it only had a 13-inch display and couldn’t run my three external monitors. That meant I spent 80% of my working time on my Windows PC.

I eventually upgraded to the 15-inch MacBook Air when it arrived, but I still put off using it as my daily driver until I finally found a way to use my triple-monitor workstation with it.

But now that I have a DisplayLink dock to work around that monitor problem, I knew I had to try using it as my main machine — and after a week, I don’t think I’m sold on the Apple ecosystem.

Amazing battery life and sleek form factor

The extended battery life and sleek form factor that Apple silicon delivers is a game changer for me, as it allows me to work between three to four hours without needing to charge my laptop. Aside from that, the laptop is thin and light enough that it’s actually convenient to bring anywhere I go, making me second-guess my iPad Air purchase.

This is impossible with my Windows laptop, which could barely last over an hour. Granted, that’s a gaming PC I bought in 2020, and many newer and better options have come out since then, but the best MacBooks are still among the laptops with the best battery life.

macOS has its own quirks and features

As a long-time Windows user, I know my way around the operating system and have memorized the apps and hotkeys that let me work much faster. But when I switched over to macOS, I had to relearn a lot of things, like how to take a screenshot and getting used to the placement of the Option and Command keys.

Finder is one of the Mac apps that I had a hard time getting used to. For example, I open apps, files, and programs by hitting Enter and delete them by pressing Delete on File Explorer in Windows; these intuitive hotkeys make navigating my drive much easier. But Apple requires you to press Command + Down Arrow and Command + Backspace to do the same actions, adding one more keypress to what should’ve been a simple single step. I solved this by downloading third-party apps that helped me get the Windows feel on my MacBook.

Despite that, macOS does a couple of things much better than Windows. I love Spotlight Search as it gives me nearly everything I need in an instant. This feature is often faster and more accurate than Windows Search straight from the Start Menu. Furthermore, I love how macOS lets you calculate and convert figures straight from the search bar. You can also do this with Windows, but it’s just not as fast.

Installing and managing apps is also less complicated, especially if you stick to the App Store. But even if you download apps from a website and not through Apple’s own marketplace, adding software to your Mac could be as simple as dragging and dropping its icon to the Applications folder.

Apple’s trackpad is also so good that I invested in a separate Magic Trackpad for use when I’m at home. The gestures are just plain intuitive, and gliding your finger on its glass surface is just heaven. It’s something many Windows laptops tried (and failed) to copy.

No, 8GB is not enough RAM

Apple VP for worldwide product marketing Bob Borchers once said in an interview on BiliBili that 8GB of RAM was good enough for macOS because of how efficient it is — but my experience says otherwise. I only chose the base specs of the 15-inch MacBook Air because I will mostly use it as a travel and backup device.

It had no problems then when I was running just a couple of apps. But now that I’m using it as my main work laptop with my usual workflow, my MacBook Air is stuttering. When I checked the Memory tab in Activity Monitor, it showed my device using more than 7GB out of the 8GB RAM that it had.

This is a problem, especially since I haven’t launched Trello yet, which could use up a lot of memory. When I edit images in Photoshop and Lightroom, the lag gets so severe that I must close some of the browser tabs I need or even restart the computer.

Upgrades not allowed

My Windows laptop’s old memory sticks, plus the packaging of the SSDs I recently installed on it.

This is the biggest drawback for me with MacBooks — you need to spec the hardware you’d need in the future at the time of purchase, as you can’t upgrade the storage and memory on these devices. Since I initially bought my MacBook as a backup device, it only has 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage.

This was more than enough for its original purpose, but now that I’m using it as my main computer, I’m struggling with the available hardware. I wish I could bump this up to 32GB of RAM and at least 1TB of storage, but it’s just impossible with Apple silicon Macs.

I can’t help but compare this with my Windows laptop. It had 16GB of RAM, a 512GB SSD, and a 1TB HDD when I bought it, but I’ve since upgraded it to 32GB of RAM and 2.5TB of SSD storage. This added more life to my already five-year-old laptop, and the upgrades cost me less than $200.

If I wanted to level up my current Mac, I’d have to sell it or trade it in. Apple currently values it at $540, but I still have to pay at least $1,200 if I’m getting the MacBook Air 15-inch M4. This will give me 16GB of unified memory and 256GB of storage, but if I want to upgrade it to 32GB of RAM and 2TB SSD, I need to pay $1,200 more. This essentially doubles the price of the laptop to $2,400.

Even with the discount, I’ll shell out over $1,900 just to get the memory and storage I need. Sure, I’ll get a new processor (that I don’t really need) — but at nearly 10 times more than what I paid to upgrade my Windows laptop. It’s not worth it.

I’m still sticking with Windows

MacBooks are great devices, and Apple offers an option at nearly every price range. They’re easy to lug around everywhere I go, and the efficiency of M-series chips changed my life.

But after 30 years of using Windows, macOS is actually slowing me down. I could get used to the operating system, but it will likely take a year or two of using it full-time before I can hit the same efficiency I have with Windows. Yes, Windows is imperfect and has its fair share of bugs, but at least I can operate it in my sleep.

More importantly, economics is holding me back from going all-in with macOS. I can buy a Windows laptop that delivers similar performance to a MacBook at a fraction of the price. In addition, I have the option to get an upgradeable Windows laptop, allowing me to use it for years to come.

Still, that doesn’t mean I’m ditching my MacBook Air. It’s a great travel laptop and also serves as my backup device for my main PC. Maybe I’ll be a full Apple convert when it can run GTA 6 natively. Maybe.

More from Laptop Mag

• I ditched Windows 11 for Linux — and you should, too
• I’m a longtime Windows fan, but this shocking discovery pushed me to MacBooks
• Microsoft Surface Laptop 7th Edition vs. MacBook Pro 14 M3: Which is better?