Geekzone: technology news, blogs, forums
Guest
Welcome Guest.
You haven't logged in yet. If you don't have an account you can register now.
To post in this sub-forum you must have made 100 posts or have Trust status or have completed our ID Verification



Forums › Offers and Wanted › WTB: Laptop with Thunderbolt 3 or newer, Intel 11th Gen CPU or newer
SEEN

216 posts

Master Geek
+1 received by user: 25

ID Verified

#323189 4-Nov-2025 15:53
Send private message

My Dad has tasked me with finding him a laptop to replace his desktop now that he's on the road permanently.

 

My requirements:

 

Intel 11th Gen CPU or newer
Upgradeable RAM (or a minimum of 32GB soldered)
Thunderbolt 3 or newer
At least one NVMe slot for his existing 4TB SSD

 

Not too worried about screen size/resolution as he will be docking it to a 32" monitor in the caravan 90% of the time, nor am I worried about dGPU as the most GPU-intensive thing he will be doing is editing photos.

 

Hoping to find something for around the $500 mark, or happy to trade for the desktop that the laptop will be replacing

 

ASRock Jupiter X300 AMD Ryzen Mini PC | Trade Me Marketplace

 

I'm located in New Plymouth, and Dad's home base is Pahiatua, so can collect from anywhere between or pay for shipping.




Spending way too much time and money on Unraid servers!
Lenovo SR630: 2x Xeon Gold 5120, 384GB RAM, 2.4TB array, NVIDIA Tesla T4
Dell EMC Isilon NL410: 2x Xeon E5-2470 v2, 96GB RAM, 83.2TB array, NVIDIA Quadro K600
Dell PowerEdge R630: 2x Xeon E5-2640 v4, 384GB RAM, 1.2TB array, NVIDIA T400

Filter this topic showing only the reply marked as answer Create new topic
mentalinc
3384 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1023

Trusted

  #3430885 4-Nov-2025 15:55
Send private message

Paging @beefholio




CPU: AMD 5900x | RAM: GSKILL Trident Z Neo RGB F4-3600C16D-32GTZNC-32-GB | MB:  Asus X570-E | GFX: EVGA FTW3 Ultra RTX 3080Ti| Monitor: LG 27GL850-B 2560x1440

 

Quic: https://account.quic.nz/refer/473833 R473833EQKIBX 



SEEN

216 posts

Master Geek
+1 received by user: 25

ID Verified

  #3432315 9-Nov-2025 08:43
Send private message

Bump!




Spending way too much time and money on Unraid servers!
Lenovo SR630: 2x Xeon Gold 5120, 384GB RAM, 2.4TB array, NVIDIA Tesla T4
Dell EMC Isilon NL410: 2x Xeon E5-2470 v2, 96GB RAM, 83.2TB array, NVIDIA Quadro K600
Dell PowerEdge R630: 2x Xeon E5-2640 v4, 384GB RAM, 1.2TB array, NVIDIA T400

KiwiSurfer
1722 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 993

ID Verified
Lifetime subscriber

  #3432468 9-Nov-2025 17:13
Send private message

Curious, why Thunderbolt 3? Could USB-C be enough? USB-C can do a lot these days including docking support and the like.

 

Nvme slots - is it doable to just replace the stock SSD with the exisiting 4GB? If so that might be easier than trying to find a laptop with two SSD slots (although I admit these do exist).

 

$500 is really not anywhere near enough to get a good laptop new these days - my guess is that $2k would be a better budget.

 

You could go used but even so still difficult as good used laptops still comand high prices.

 

I think to get the cost down to $500 means figuring out which of your requirements can be relaxed.



SEEN

216 posts

Master Geek
+1 received by user: 25

ID Verified

  #3433042 10-Nov-2025 19:36
Send private message

Thunderbolt was originally a requirement because I have a TB3 dock already, and I have managed to find something suitable within budget by relaxing the TB3/Intel requirement.

 

 




Spending way too much time and money on Unraid servers!
Lenovo SR630: 2x Xeon Gold 5120, 384GB RAM, 2.4TB array, NVIDIA Tesla T4
Dell EMC Isilon NL410: 2x Xeon E5-2470 v2, 96GB RAM, 83.2TB array, NVIDIA Quadro K600
Dell PowerEdge R630: 2x Xeon E5-2640 v4, 384GB RAM, 1.2TB array, NVIDIA T400

SEEN

216 posts

Master Geek
+1 received by user: 25

ID Verified

  #3433710 12-Nov-2025 11:05
Send private message

Alright, so the laptop I had sourced decided it no longer wanted to power on just before the seller sent it, so I the search is back on!

 

Updated requirements:

 

USB-C with Power Delivery and DP Alt Mode
Intel 12th Gen or Ryzen 5000 or newer CPU
Either user-upgradeable RAM or minimum of 32GB soldered
NVMe storage (Planning to replace with pre-existing 4TB SSD)
14 inch or larger screen
I would prefer a used EliteBook, ThinkPad, Latitude etc

 

I am also removing the price range completely, as he has said he is willing to spend more than $500 and is hoping for something that will last him a good 10 years or so. 




Spending way too much time and money on Unraid servers!
Lenovo SR630: 2x Xeon Gold 5120, 384GB RAM, 2.4TB array, NVIDIA Tesla T4
Dell EMC Isilon NL410: 2x Xeon E5-2470 v2, 96GB RAM, 83.2TB array, NVIDIA Quadro K600
Dell PowerEdge R630: 2x Xeon E5-2640 v4, 384GB RAM, 1.2TB array, NVIDIA T400

Filter this topic showing only the reply marked as answer Create new topic








Geekzone Live »

Try automatic live updates from Geekzone directly in your browser, without refreshing the page, with Geekzone Live now.


Updates »

Are you subscribed to our RSS feed? You can download the latest headlines and summaries from our stories directly to your computer or smartphone by using a feed reader.








RSS feeds
Main feed
Forums feed
Copyright
©2002-2026 Geekzone®
Site features
Geekzone BI dashboard
Geekzone Badges
Geekzone Status Page

 

Site Information
Subscribe to Geekzone
Privacy Statement
Forum Usage Guidelines (FUG)
Advertising
Trademark and copyright