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3 laptops under $1000 worth checking out

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Looking for a laptop that can handle multi-tasking but are priced below $1000? Here are the 3 best laptops that offer good performance and still carry a reasonable price tag.

Apple MacBook Pro MD101LL/A

The MacBook Pro MD101LL/A measures 12.8 x 0.3 x 0.9 inches. It features a 13.3-inch LED-backlit IPS display having a resolution of 2560×1600 resolution and a pixel density of 227 pixels per inch. The MacBook pro is powered by a dual-core Intel i5 processor with clock speed of 2.5 GHz (the clock frequency can be increased to 3.1 GHz through turbo boost mode). It has 4GB RAM and 500GB HDD space. The laptop’s chipset comes with an integrated graphic chip – Intel HD graphics 4000. The MacBook pro is loaded with OS X El Capitan and it comes fitted with Lithium Ion batteries that can give 8 hours backup. The MacBook Pro offers varied connectivity in the form of USB 3 port, Thunderbolt ports, and HDMI port for digital connectivity.

MSI Computer Corp. GP60 Leopard

The GP60 Leopard laptop from MSI measures 15.1 X1.3X 9.8 (WXHXD). It is powered by an Intel Core i5-4200M with clock speed of 2.5GHz. The laptop features a full HD Anti-Reflective display screen measuring 15.6” with an aspect ratio of 16:9. The screen resolution is 1920×1080. The GP60 Leopard comes pre-loaded with Windows 8.1 OS. It has an integrated GPU, 8GB RAM, and 500GB HDD.  The laptop comes fitted with a 6-cell battery and also has a DVD writer. It presents the user with 4 USB ports out of which 2 USB ports are USB 3.0. . The laptop is specifically designed for gaming. The GeForce 840M GPU (integrated GPU) is capable of handling multi-tasking with ease and also lets you enjoy streaming HD videos with equal ease.

 Apple MacBook Air 13.3-Inch laptop

The Apple MacBook Air 13.3-Inch is a feather-light laptop packed with performance. It measures 12.8X0.11X8.94  inches (WXHXD) and weighs around 2.96 pounds. The MacBook air features a LED back-lit glossy screen offering a resolution of 1440 X 900. It comes fitted with a 128GB PCIe-based flash storage that makes it blazingly fast.  The MacBook air is powered by 1.6GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 processor with Turbo boost technology. It has 8GB RAM and 54-watt lithium polymer battery that provides backup up to 12 hours. The laptop comes pre-loaded with macOS Sierra. Other features worth mentioning are 720 mp in-built camera that is great for video chats. The MacBook Air offers good connectivity options like USB 3, thunderbolt ports and MagSafe  ports.

How to make Windows 8.1 super fast?

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Using the default settings PCs can work reasonably fast but if you want to take your PC speed to the next level try the tweaks below:

Increase Taskbar Preview Speed

When you hover the mouse pointer over Taskbar, you see a preview of all open windows and applications which help you navigate to the right window and application. In general, the Windows Operating System takes a little time to build this preview. This registry tweak can make the preview building process faster.

  1. Bring up the Charms Bar and type Regedit in the Search Box
  2. Select Regedit from the search results and click on it to open the Registry Editor
  3. Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER > Control Panel
  4. Click on Mouse
  5. In the right panel, look for or MouseHoverTime and right-click on it and select Modify
  6. Select Decimal and enter a Value Data of 1. The value change means now your PC will take only one millisecond to build the taskbar preview
  7. Close the Registry Editor

Speed up Context Menu

By default, you experience a slight delay in expansion of the context menu when you bring the mouse pointer over any entry in the list. You can eliminate this delay and get windows to display the context menu almost instantly. Below is a registry tweak to make the context menu faster

  1. Bring up the Charms Bar and type Regedit in the Search Box
  2. Select Regedit from the search results and click on it to open the Registry Editor
  3. Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER > Control Panel and click on Desktop
  4. In the right panel, look for or MenuShowDelay and right-click on it and select Modify
  5. Select Decimal and enter a Value Data of 1. Changing the value to 1 means your PC will take only one millisecond to expand the context menu
  6. Close the Registry Editor

Disable Animations

Animations may look good, but they use a lot of resources and slow down your computer response time. In most cases, disabling animations can improve the performance of your PC. Here are the steps to disable animations completely:

  1. Open File Explorer and right-click anywhere in empty space in the window
  2. Select Properties
  3. On the left panel, click on Advanced system settings
  4. Under the Performance subtitle, click Settings
  5. You will see all the options for animations that you can disable. Uncheck the box for following options:
  • Animations in the taskbar
  • Animate windows while maximizing and minimizing
  • Animate controls and elements inside the window
  1. Close all open windows

What is Photo Stream and why should I use it?

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Photo Stream is essentially a feature which enables users to automatically share photos between iCloud-connected devices such as iPhones and iPads. Although it uses iCloud to sync these photos, Photo Stream should be considered as separate from iCloud storage, as usage does not count towards your iCloud storage limits.

It is also very different from iCloud storage in that the Photo Stream photos are only temporarily stored on iCloud for syncing purposes and it should therefore not be thought of as a backup solution. More about this later on.

First lets look at what you need to use Photo Stream and whether indeed you should be using it at all!

What do I need to use Photo Stream?

  1. you need an Apple device such as Macbook, iMac, iPad or iPhone or a PC running Windows 7 or later
  2. you will need to already have an iCloud account
  3. you will need to have Photo Stream enabled on the relevant device(s)

When you take a photo on one linked device (such as your iphone), Photo Stream automatically uploads this photo to your iCloud account and your iCloud account in turn downloads the photo to all your other linked devices such as your iPad.

This syncing will only happen over WiFi or Ethernet, so you do not need to worry about eating into your data package.

Can I use Photo Stream for backing up my photos?

In a word – no. Photo Stream is temporary storage, allowing photos to be synced to iCloud-connected devices. The photos that are downloaded through Photo Stream are stored in an Album called ‘My Photo Stream’.

Photos are stored for 30 days in iCloud in order to give all the linked devices a chance to connect and download these photos. The most recent 1000 photos are stored on individual devices. If you want to keep any of these shared photos, you should save the photo to your Camera Roll.

Saving pictures from Photo Stream to the Photos App

Go to Photos > Albums > My Photo Stream

Tap the sharing icon on the top of your screen

Tap to select the photos to copy to the Photos App 

Just ‘Save’ to save the photos to the Camera Roll or ‘Add To’ to save to a different photo album

You can also go into individual photos in the Photo Stream Album and share from there.

How can I free up space on my iPhone or iPad?

If you do not have linked devices which you want to sync photos to, then you do not need to enable Photo Stream. If you have just an iPhone for example and have Photo Stream enabled, then your most recent 1000 photographs are being unnecessarily uploaded to iCloud and downloaded to the ‘My Photo Stream’ Album. This means that you will have duplicates of your 1000 most recent photos.

Also, you may not need to share photos between devices if you sync these devices individually to iTunes for example. Photo Stream is an optional feature but may not be useful for everyone, particularly if storage space is an issue.

Only enable Photo Stream if you have multiple devices and want to view photos between these devices.