What is a good computer for taking online college courses? Or better yet, which computer would be recommended for taking online courses? The best computer for taking online courses with depends largely on what your field of study is and which courses you will be taking online. The things to consider will be how heavy the workload will be and just how much of the computers resources such as hard drive space, memory, CPU load, video card, etc. will be needed to complete your projects and assignments. This site explains a little better what you may be looking for in a computer https://www.classesandcareers.com/advisor/computers-for-college-students/best-computers-for-college-students/. With these in mind here are a few computers that may fit your needs for taking online courses.
If your assignments in a course consist of lightweight assignments such as writing papers, submitting photos, creating spreadsheets, and other documents that would be typical of English courses or basic management or office and secretarial support courses, you will not need a very expensive computer. All you may need even is a simple netbook which is a smaller scaled-down version of a notebook or laptop which is suitable for basic use such as browsing the internet for information, or creating office documents, or watching videos. The downside to a netbook is it usually will not have a CD-ROM compartment with it and it usually will not support high definition videos if you have to watch them, so make sure that if you plan to purchase a netbook computer that it has the minimum requirements necessary to complete the assignments or that it meets the minimum requirements specified by your school. Probably the best computer for taking lightweight courses would be a laptop manufactured by Acer or Toshiba. Most of these kinds of laptops are less than $300 and will fit the requirements just fine. Keep in mind most schools require a Microsoft Windows operating system running on the computer and the version will usually need to be XP or later. Here’s an example of what one school requires for online courses https://online.belhaven.edu/college_computer_requirements.htm
If your assignments in a course are going to be a little heavier and involve graphic designing, working with 3D models, and other assignments that may take a little heavier use of the computer, you may want to consider purchasing a computer with higher CPU capabilities, including a dual-core processor and higher memory. This will allow you to complete your work without having issues such as the computer slowing down, freezing, or even giving you the blue screen of death when the physical memory is being drained. A good computer for this kind of class would be a more expensive HP or Asus.
If you are going into the fields of software development, networking, web development, or are going to be taking courses that involve deep studies of operating systems or that may require the use of virtual PC software or frequent use of high definition video, I would recommend getting a more expensive computer that is built to handle an extremely high load on your resources. The best computers to use for this kind of work would be high tech computers such as Asus or Sony.