Here's my list of must haves:
- Professional appearance (little to no gaming BS colors, logos, lights etc)
- i7 processor (autocad, solidworks, and revit)
- Windows 7 Pro (must have for work software, may be able to live with formatting win 10 and buying a separate downgrade, if needed add to price)
- 17"+ screen
- 10 key pad
- Solid, dedicated video card
- 500 GB HDD (larger, solid state or dual HDD's a bonus)
- 1920x1080 or greater
- Under $2200, or else I go the Dell route
Preferences
- Less weight, I travel a lot (I do know that 17" screens are inherently heavy)
- Decent battery life for presentations
- VGA output jack (office projectors are wired for VGA, hdmi isn't hardwired everywhere yet), can live with using adapter pigtails if necessary
- Built in ethernet jack (again, can live with adapter pigtail if necessary)
- 8GB+ ram
Here's the benchmark rig: http://www.dell.com/...710-workstation
Things I don't like are the small-ish HDD, weight, and excessive price to upgrade HDD's to a SSD or dual.
What can you find out there?