any preference in screen size? you can get high performance stuff anywhere from 13" 'light' laptops to 17" massive heavy desktop replacement stuff.

I was in the same position you were a few weeks ago and basically narrowed it down to the Thinkpad X1 Carbon, Dell XPS 13/15, and the Huawei Matebook X Pro. I went with the Matebook because of the lighter weight and better screen. I might have gone with the Thinkpad if it was my only computer I'd have because of the better keyboard.

I don't particularly like tablet-sized screens nor giant mini-TVs.

See, I didn't even know Huawei did PCs. I'll look into those 3. Thanks

What kind of work are you doing? Are you in a program that requires a lot of tech work or is the laptop going to be used less for heavy processing and more for average note taking and projects? When I got my laptop I had to go into a heavier "gaming" style laptop because I am in a broadcast program and doing a lot of video / audio editing, but you might not require something like that if you are in a business program.

If its your first year of college and you live on campus, I'd honestly probably recommend you doing your own research and getting a chromebook. Most of them are tiny enough to fit on any desk/in your backpack. You can use google drive for whatever essays/powerpoints you need to do and then any other softwares I would just go to the library/computer lab to get your work done. I usually bring my computer to uni and use that for programming in Visual Studio and download any other class specific programs I need, and then use the computer labs for Photoshop 3DS Max, or whatever artsy fartsy class im taking.

The huge benefit of Chromebooks are how quick it will boot up, it wont get too hot because there isn't really much running in the background, and most of them are less than $400. People really overlook them and spend $2k on their macbooks just to watch netflix and write papers because "I like apple" or they just want to be able to use iMessage in class.

edit: I would just like to add I walked dogs in highschool to save up $300 and I bought the Acer c720p Chromebook with a touchscreen and have had it for almost 4-5 years now and it still runs like a champ. I have dropped and abused it and was able to replace the screen for $20.

What about a refurbished professionnal office laptop with linux? You could get a 15" with decent battery life for much less than $1500.

I'm not specifically looking to spend 1500$. That's way too much. It's just how high I'm willing to go if I need to. I have a slight understanding that I'm probably not going to need a 1500$ laptop for the type of stuff I'm going to do.

Mainly mundane paperwork and a lot of reading, really. Going to be handling a lot of data for research and stuff. I'm mostly looking for a good laptop that can run simple things well, has a rly good hard drive and doesn't slow down with age for mysterious reasons. Durability and consistency is something I want. If I'm not going to be running games and dumb stuff on it, thus I assume its lifespan will increase by a lot.

I can see four people using macs to my right, two MSIs in front of me, three girls with keyboarded tablets a bit further in front and I can hear an Alienware laptop behind me. There's a lot of mainstream brands on this campus...

I bought a Dell XPS 15 (i5-7300HQ, 8 GB RAM, 3840x2160, GTX 1050, 256 GB SSD) for grad school when it was on sale and really like it. The performance for typical tasks is great, and text looks really sharp. I read a lot and also program, so I really value the screen. I wouldn't recommend playing games like TF2 on this laptop, but in my experience the XPS 15 is capable of running TF2 between 40-80 FPS at 1920x1080. If I had my desktop and 144 Hz monitor here with me, I wouldn't really have bothered to try playing scrims on the XPS 15. It's not worth it, and, as you mentioned, it's best to keep your laptop focused on productive applications. Nevertheless, many people have chosen to repaste and/or undervolt their XPS 15s for better gaming performance.

Pros:
- great display
- fingerprint sensor has been surprisingly convenient, especially with 1Password
- good performance
- good battery life
- solid design
- keyboard backlight if you want it (I keep it off)

Cons:
- webcam position is suboptimal (note: I don't think I've ever used the webcam on this laptop)
- GTX 1050 isn't really necessary for standard use

I've heard great things about the MateBook X Pro as well. A Chromebook may be sufficient for your needs, but I personally wouldn't want to use one as my main computer.

Dont touch a chromebook, they are piles of junk that will make your life hell.