About 5 years ago I spent the most money I ever had on a laptop I'd hoped I wouldn't have to replace; HP Envy 17" with 16g ram, 2tb SSD and it's downfall, a dvd writer. I've never used the DVD drive but now all that ram and hard drive are wasted on a computer that is literally, physically falling apart. The right hand corner near the hinge where the drive lives is separating, plastic is breaking and a tiny screw fell out. I took it to A Local Geek (the actual name of his business) and he said with a thicker laptop he could have put bolts and nuts through that corner to hold it together but this was too slim a design so he glued it all back together and that lasted about a month.
So now I'm looking at spending another couple-three grand and decided to ask for advice this time. I'm looking at either a refurbished Panasonic Toughbook FZ-55 or a new Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon which, while it's not a military grade rugged laptop like the Panasonic, is made of carbon fiber and from all accounts is by every other measure quite rugged in and of itself.
I'll probably spec 32g of ram and 2 tb SDD on either but while on the Lenovo site I started looking at a portable 2 tb SDD and now am wondering can I save on the cost of the internal drive and go with a 512 internal drive and the 2tb external? Does it function the same?
Anyone know much about this I'd be interested to hear from you, just don't get too techy in the explanation, I'm a knuckle dragger, not an IT guy.
Thanks in advance.