Best 15.6 Inch Laptops and Notebooks (2013 update)

If your looking for a laptop that works well both as a primary computer at home and that you can easily carry around with you, then you should look into the best 15.6 inch laptops and notebooks available.

Dell Inspiron 15 i15RV-6190BLK 15.6-Inch LaptopWhenever you need to buy a laptop, you need to map out what and how you will be using your laptop. You need to look at the best value for your money that fits your needs, not just the cheapest or the most fully loaded laptop.

A gamer will need quite a different laptop from someone who works at home or a business man on the move. Sometimes roles might overlap, but you should at least consider your primary use with consideration to all your other needs.

In this article I have sourced out some of the best rated laptops on Amazon for your consideration.

These are the best-selling and most popular 15.6 inch laptops you can find on Amazon. I am amazed at the very affordable prices of many of these laptops with many of them between $300 and $500. Of course there are also those that are more expensive, but unless you need the extra power for gaming or extensive multimedia use you will probably be fine with the cheaper models.

Below are some laptops with 15.6 inch screens that have close to a 5 star rating, but may not be the newest models. The short reviews later in the article are some of the best rated models that have come out in the last 6 months or so.

If your looking at 15 inch laptops, then you probably want it for the extra screen real estate, yet still be able to carry the laptop around without too much strain.

The best laptop for you really depends on your main use. Choosing between the capabilities, component and price will garner you the best 15.6" laptop for the money.

Some of the things to consider when choosing a 15.6" laptop:

1. RAM: At current prices, getting less than 4 GB of RAM is just not worth any perceived savings. With the way newer programs expect more memory on computers you will only have to upgrade sooner, and for more than whatever you may have saved. Also you should try to get a laptop where you can expand the memory, for most laptops in this category you will be able to expand your memory to 8 GB or 16 GB of RAM.
2. Graphics card: Get the best you can for the money, if you will be rendering video animations and or playing highly graphic games this is more important, but even for regular use you do want to have the best graphics card you can get.
3. USB Ports: You will probably want to get a laptop with both USB 3.0 port(s) and USB 2.0 port(s) for some backward comparability.
4. SD Card Slot: This will greatly expand your storage options, SD memory cards can be stored or filed away.
5. Bluetooth: Not only should you look to have bluetooth on your laptop, but get at the very least Bluetooth 3.0--This is by far the best way to connect headphones, mouse and other peripherals
6. Optical Drive: At this size, you really should be able to get an internal CD drive, so check that the laptop you choose has one, while this is not a deal breaker, it is unlikely that the money you save on this will buy you an external drive unless you already have one.

Buy Now

This is a surprisingly good laptop for just over $400. It has some of the best reviews you will find for any of the newer laptops in the market. It seems to be a sturdy laptop that not only works well but is fast, lightweight and looks good.

With its 3rd Generation i5-3337U processor, with a 500GB HD, and a decent graphics card this laptop is good for running most office programs, most games that do not need top specs, browsing of course, as well as general photo and video editing--at least for editing, rendering of videos may be on the slow side.

This laptop will definitely work well for most home and business use, but will also work well for a moderate gamer.

Feature Summary

• Processor: i5-3337U processor (3M Cache, up to 2.7 GHz)

• Display: 15.6 HD (720p) WLED with Truelife (1366x768)

• RAM: 4Gb, 1 DIMM, 1600MHz, DDR3

• Hard drive: 500GB 5400rpm HDD

• Optical drive: 8X CD / DVD Burner

• Video graphics: Intel HD Graphics

• Media card reader: 8-in-1 Media Card Reader and USB 3.0

• Bluetooth: Bluetooth tied to wireless card

• Audio: Waves MaxxAudio

• Operating system: Windows 8 Home

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More than worth the price, this laptop comes in at just over $300. It is fast and efficient, able to run most everyday programs well, such as office programs, surfing, watching movies and more. Moderate gaming should be fine as well.

It comes with a AMD E-300 Accelerated dual core processor which is super fast and efficient without the price tag of an Intel processor. You also get 320 GB HD, reasonable video display and OK audio.

This laptop will definitely work well for most home and business use, but will also work well for a moderate gamer.

Feature Summary

• Processor: Power efficient AMD E-300 Accelerated Dual Core Processor (1MB L2 Cache)

• Display: 15.6" HD BrightView LED-backlit display (1366x768)

• RAM: 4GB DDR3 SDRAM (1 DIMM) (expandable to 8GB)

• Hard drive: 320GB HD

• Optical drive: SuperMulti DVD burner
  reads and writes CDs and DVDs

• Video graphics: AMD Radeon HD 6310

• Media card reader: Multi-format digital media card reader

• Operating system: Windows

Buy Now

If you need a laptop that not only runs your basic every day programs like browsers, word processors, etc., but also has the ability to smoothly run graphic intensive programs like Photoshop and video editors as well as being an effective gaming machine, then the ASUS VivoBook S550CA-DS51T 15.6-Inch Touchscreen Ultrabook Laptop is a great choice. It is fast, powerful enough to run several programs at one time, extremely lightweight and has a nice sleek look.

This 15.6 inch ultrabook comes loaded with the latest Intel Core i5 3317U 1.7 GHz, 6 GB of RAM to start with that can be expanded if you should ever need the extra memory, a 500 GB hard disk as well as a reasonably good graphics card.

This laptop is great buy for any college student, work from home or business user.

Feature Summary

• Processor: Intel Core i5-3317U Processor (1.7 GHz)

• Display: 15.6" LED backlit HD (1366x768) capacitive touch panel

• RAM: 6 GB DDR3

• Hard drive: 500GB HD, 24 GB Solid-State Drive

• Optical drive: DL DVD±RW/CD-RW

• Video graphics: Intel GMA HD

• Media card reader: 1x SD Card Reader

• Operating system: Windows 8

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A great laptop for the price, this excellent business laptop has a big enough screen for easy use of most applications, but at the same time the laptop is not so big that it is too heavy or cumbersome to carry around.

With its i5 processor and 4GB, it is powerful and fast enough to run most programs. And with the 500GB you have enough space to store both your programs and files easily.

This laptop will definitely work well for business use and is also great for most college students.

Feature Summary

• Processor: Intel Core i5-3210M (2.50 GHz, 3 MB L3 cache)

• Display: 15.6-inch HD LED-back-lit anti-glare (1366 x 768)

• RAM: 4 GB SO-DIMM DDR3 (expandable to 16 GB)

• Hard drive: 500GB HD

• Optical drive: DVD+/-RW SuperMulti DL

• Video graphics: Integrated Intel HD Graphics 4000

• Operating system: Windows 7 Professional

Buy Now

This slim Ultrabook laptop is lightweight and very powerful, it's getting rave reviews except for one user who seems more frustrated with windows 8 as opposed to the laptop itself.

If you need a reasonably large screen but do not want the extra weight a regular laptop usually carries, then this ultra light Ultrabook only weighs 5.3 lbs. So it is easy to carry around despite its size.

It comes with an intel Core i3-2377M 1.5 GHz (3 MB Cache) processor and with 8GB of RAM you will find that it it is both extremely powerful and fast. You also get a full 750 GB HD that is more than enough for most people.

This laptop will definitely work well for most home and business use, college students as well as for a moderate gamer.

Feature Summary

• Processor: Intel Core i3-2377M 1.5 GHz (3 MB Cache)

• Display: 15.6" HD LED-backlit display: (1366 x 768)

  Multi-touch screen, supporting 10 finger touch

• RAM: 8 GB DDR3 RAM

• Hard drive: 750GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive

• Optical drive: 8X DVD-Super Multi Double-Layer Drive

• Video graphics: Intel HD Graphics with 128MB of dedicated system memory

• Media card reader: Multi-in-1 Digital Media Card Reader

• Bluetooth: Bluetooth 4.0+HS

• Audio: Optimized Dolby® Advanced Audio® v2 audio enhancement

• Operating system: Windows 8 Home

Buy Now

For those who require a gaming laptop that can handle even the newest graphics intensive games, you will need a laptop that has a processor that can handle the intensive processing, enough memory, a heavy duty graphics card that reduces any lagging.

The MSI Computer Corp. Notebook GE60 0ND-257US fits the bill with its 3rd gen i7-3630QM, a full 8 GB RAM out of the box that you can expand to 16 GB, a superb graphics and the generous 750 GB HD make it easy to load up all your programs.

Feature Summary

• Processor: Intel Core i7-3630QM Processor (2.4GHz)

• Display: 15.6" Full HD Anti-reflective Display (16:9, 1920 x 1080)

• RAM: 8 GB DDR3

• Hard drive: 750 GB SATA

• Optical drive: 8X SuperMulti CD/DVD drive

• Video graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GTX660M

• Operating system: Windows 8

Do you need your 15.6 inch laptop for everyday use or gaming?