actually manufacture most of the world’s laptops!(ODMs)
Click Here To Learn More About Customer Reviews
Click on each of the tabs, to see the consumer reviews, for all of the best known vendors.
Who contract the manufacturing to the following companies.| Compal | Foxconn | Inventec | Pegatron | Quanta | Winstron |
Click the review screenshots to open the review page in a new tab.
Before you buy a computer from any vendor, at least search the reviews for that vendor’s domain name with all 3 of these consumer review websites:
TrustPilot | ResellerRatings | ConsumerAffairsApple has incredible marketing, and they’ve created a cult following. But the top MacBook Pro, which is essentially a non-upgradable Dell 9570 running a proprietary version of Unix, costs more than most of the computers that I recommend, and has many of the inferior components that I mention below, including a single non-upgradeable storage drive with no empty bays, no empty RAM slots, and a pathetic Radeon Pro 560. They were partners in Thunderbolt, so at least they have that.
Learn more about how Apple cheats their customers, by trying to prevent anyone else from repairing their products, that Apple often claims should be replaced.
Anyone can repair any other brand of technology, because the manufacturer / vendor don’t run a symbiotic operating system.
More customer reviews of Apple.
Class Action LawsuitsDid you know that Dell’s Optiplex line had a 97% failure rate?! Knowing the computers were faulty, they still fought in court for years, against huge corporations.
More customer reviews of Dell.
Alienware was bought out by Dell. They used to be the most overpriced quality laptops, with desktop CPUs. Now they are just another dell product, made by the same manufacturers.
Class Action LawsuitsIt appears that Micro-Star International (MSI) has taken some type of legal action, to have their reviews permanently removed from ResellerRatings and ConsumerAffairs. I’ve even submitted multiple requests to ResellerRatings to add both us.msi.com and msi.com, neither has been added, and probably never will be. Hmmmm… If their scores are 1.1 out of 10 on Trust Pilot, I wonder what their reviews would be on ResellerRatings & ConsumerAffairs?Although ResellerRatings is a great source for customer reviews, NewEgg’s reviews are very suspicious! Not only does NewEgg have 10 times as many reviews as all other major vendors combined (over 48 thousand), but just below ResellerRatings search box, the example used to be “e.g. Such as Newegg”; this changed in June 2018. I give much more credibility to all of my other research, Trust Pilot’s score of 1.8 out of 10, and Consumer Affairs.
Update 2019-01-19: Looks like NewEgg is doing with TrustPilot what they did with ResellerRatings. Having a bunch of suspicious 5 star reviews suddenly appear. All the suspicious reviews are 5 stars (NEVER 4 or 3) talk about a problem that was resolved (like they read my section below about good vendor vetting) and have perfect grammar, spelling and punctuation! They’ve gone from 1.8 (bad – 512 reviews) to 3.4 (poor – 631 reviews) in two weeks! Yes, I’m watching! 8-|
Class Action LawsuitsI admit, it’s strange that I don’t recommend Samsung computers, but that I configure Samsung SSD storage drives into many laptops. Samsung may burn up phones, and be a lousy vendor, but they make some of the fastest, most reliable storage drives. Different divisions have different goals.
More customer reviews of Samsung.Toshiba has been falling in quality and service the last few years.
Its financial problems and bankruptcy of Westinghouse aren’t likely to improve their customer service.
More customer reviews of Toshiba.- Info
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Click on each of the tabs, to see the consumer reviews, for all of the best known vendors.
Who contract the manufacturing to the following companies.| Compal | Foxconn | Inventec | Pegatron | Quanta | Winstron |
Click the review screenshots to open the review page in a new tab.
Before you buy a computer from any vendor, at least search the reviews for that vendor’s domain name with all 3 of these consumer review websites:
TrustPilot | ResellerRatings | ConsumerAffairs - Acer
- Apple
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Apple has incredible marketing, and they’ve created a cult following. But the top MacBook Pro, which is essentially a non-upgradable Dell 9570 running a proprietary version of Unix, costs more than most of the computers that I recommend, and has many of the inferior components that I mention below, including a single non-upgradeable storage drive with no empty bays, no empty RAM slots, and a pathetic Radeon Pro 560. They were partners in Thunderbolt, so at least they have that.
Learn more about how Apple cheats their customers, by trying to prevent anyone else from repairing their products, that Apple often claims should be replaced.
Anyone can repair any other brand of technology, because the manufacturer / vendor don’t run a symbiotic operating system.
More customer reviews of Apple.
Class Action Lawsuits - ASUS
- Dell
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Did you know that Dell’s Optiplex line had a 97% failure rate?! Knowing the computers were faulty, they still fought in court for years, against huge corporations.
More customer reviews of Dell.
Alienware was bought out by Dell. They used to be the most overpriced quality laptops, with desktop CPUs. Now they are just another dell product, made by the same manufacturers.
Class Action Lawsuits - HP
- Lenovo
- MSI
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It appears that Micro-Star International (MSI) has taken some type of legal action, to have their reviews permanently removed from ResellerRatings and ConsumerAffairs. I’ve even submitted multiple requests to ResellerRatings to add both us.msi.com and msi.com, neither has been added, and probably never will be. Hmmmm… If their scores are 1.1 out of 10 on Trust Pilot, I wonder what their reviews would be on ResellerRatings & ConsumerAffairs?
- NewEgg
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Although ResellerRatings is a great source for customer reviews, NewEgg’s reviews are very suspicious! Not only does NewEgg have 10 times as many reviews as all other major vendors combined (over 48 thousand), but just below ResellerRatings search box, the example used to be “e.g. Such as Newegg”; this changed in June 2018. I give much more credibility to all of my other research, Trust Pilot’s score of 1.8 out of 10, and Consumer Affairs.
Update 2019-01-19: Looks like NewEgg is doing with TrustPilot what they did with ResellerRatings. Having a bunch of suspicious 5 star reviews suddenly appear. All the suspicious reviews are 5 stars (NEVER 4 or 3) talk about a problem that was resolved (like they read my section below about good vendor vetting) and have perfect grammar, spelling and punctuation! They’ve gone from 1.8 (bad – 512 reviews) to 3.4 (poor – 631 reviews) in two weeks! Yes, I’m watching! 8-|
Class Action Lawsuits - Razer
- Samsung
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I admit, it’s strange that I don’t recommend Samsung computers, but that I configure Samsung SSD storage drives into many laptops. Samsung may burn up phones, and be a lousy vendor, but they make some of the fastest, most reliable storage drives. Different divisions have different goals.
More customer reviews of Samsung. - Toshiba
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Toshiba has been falling in quality and service the last few years.
Its financial problems and bankruptcy of Westinghouse aren’t likely to improve their customer service.
More customer reviews of Toshiba.
Customer Reviews are just the beginning of good vendor vetting. Learn More!
Most vendors are eliminated from our consideration by their customer review scores. Those who score at least 8 out of 10 are looked at even further. A great review score only matters if the reviews reflect a vendor’s determination to quickly resolve legitimate issues. Reviews about how great a computer was soon after purchase, mean nothing, as many people are content with slow, frustrating garbage. It’s the words of their customers, about how well problems were RESOLVED, that is one of the hallmarks of a great vendor. Some vendors will have a suspicious number of great reviews (extremely disproportionate to their percentage of the market) on one site and no reviews on another. When we check social media, many of their customers are raking them over the coals, often for legitimate issues that are still unresolved after months of fighting with the vendor! If a vendor takes care of their customers’ legitimate problems quickly, then we look at their business history. We look for deceptive advertising. (Great computer vendors typically spend very little money on marketing, relying mostly on word of mouth advertising.) We search for class action lawsuits and court records. We look at their past mergers and the likelihood of them selling out, like Alienware (who was always overpriced) did with Dell. We want to make sure that all the vendors we recommend are stable companies, who will be there to uphold their warranties. We search news articles, techie forums, and other places, for as much info as we can get about their history and business practices, e.g. do they install bloatware like most of the big vendors do? If the vendor makes it past all of that, only a dozen have so far, then we start comparing their prices. Some vendors have a higher markup on their lower end systems, because lower end systems have higher failure rates that require more customer service. While other vendors have a higher markup, on the computers typically bought by people who don’t care about cost.
There is a huge difference in reliability and longevity for similar components from different manufacturers.Although we only configure reliable, quality computers, we always care about cost. Every month we look at all of the quality computers, offered by vetted vendors, with the most reliable components, and compare their prices, determining which vendor offers the best price on out list of the best computers.

Apple Inc.
Survey doesn’t include massive number of recent Macbook keyboard problems.

Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
삼성전자

Acer Inc.
宏碁股份有限公司

HP Inc.

AsusTek Computer Inc.
華碩電腦股份有限公司

Lenovo Group Limited
联想集团有限公司

Dell Technologies Inc.

Toshiba Corporation
株式会社東芝

Microsoft Surface
Learn why most computers are cheap garbage.
In 1981 IBM introduced their first personal computer using open architecture. The BIOS was the only part that was original IBM design. In 1984 Phoenix, used the “Clean Room Design” to legally create their clone of the IBM BIOS, and sold it to other computer manufacturers. Computers were comparably reliable, improving in speed as the technology advanced. In the mid 1990s, the price for the best value desktops were around $1,500 ($2,500 adjusted for inflation).
Then in 1998, a company called eMachine put out an invitation for bids, for the cheapest computer components that anyone could manufacture, and sold the cheapest, slowest, most unreliable piece of crap computers for under $500. Within six months they had the 4th highest PC sales. So the companies who had been selling good, reliable, fast PCs (comparably speaking) for 10 years, decided to sacrifice their reputation for higher market share, and one by one, Compaq, Gateway, HP, Packard Bell, & Dell started selling cheap garbage too.
This is why the industry average service life of computers is only 4 years, instead of the 15 to 20+ years of the well researched reliable computers that we recommend.
UNDER
…over 10 years!

Even if you always have your laptop plugged in and don’t spend charging cycles, having the battery charged over 90% stresses the battery. So, unless you deplete the battery to 60%, use it only as a paperweight, and just boot it up once a year to recharge to 60% no other laptop battery will last for 10 years!
1. PCIe SSD: As mentioned further up the page, HDDs are quick to fail, and very slow. Our recommended PCIe at 2200 MB/s vs Amazon’s 140 MB/s is blazing fast. PCIe will be the standard for storage drives for the next 20+ years, just as SATA has been for the last 20 years.
2. Thunderbolt 3 USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type C combo port: Thunderbolt 3 and USB Type C are the way devices will connect for the next 20 years, just as Type A was the way for the last 20 years. But very few new laptops have these ports. Most of the ones we recommend do.
3. Desktop CPU: The i9-9900K desktop CPU is 34% faster than the fastest laptop CPU, and 137% faster than the one in Amazon’s best seller. We won’t even get into the 8 cores & 16 threads vs 2 cores & 4 threads of Amazon’s.
4. RTX 2060 GPU: This graphics processor totally blows away the GPU of every cheap laptop. It is 1200% faster (That’s NOT a typo!) than the integrated Intel HD 620 of Amazon’s best seller. Even if you don’t play VR games, having a good GPU makes a world of difference for keeping up with the resolution and refresh rates of your display.
5. 32GB of high performance DDR4 RAM: RAM gets more technical than people realize. It’s not just the amount and the Mhz, but the CAS Latency (CL) as well. The difference between the two? 119%. Our recommended laptop also has room for 64GB. Amazon’s, just 8 GB.
The list goes on and on, from 144Hz displays vs 60Hz, 4 storage drive capacity vs just 1, Mini DisplayPorts, Optical high definition audio, 6-in-1 card reader, FHD vs HD webcam, 1,730 Mbps dual band wifi vs 300 Mbps and more. Even if Amazon’s best seller would last for more than 10 years, the torture would be like riding a scooter to work, rather than driving a Tesla.
When someone says I want a laptop in this price range. They are instructing someone (who gets paid by the vendor) to eliminate current technology, reduce reliability, and decimate longevity. Which increases the cost per year of service, while decreasing performance.
The affiliates just search their vendor(s) for laptops by price. The affiliate gets paid the same percentage of the sale, whether they do any “research” or not.
The solution to remote computing, without sacrificing performance, is power inverters and power banks.
In order to make a laptop battery last longer, you have to lessen the power that the computer uses, and that is done by using lower performance components (ie. CPUs and integrated GPUs).
Our recommendation, rather than sacrifice performance, is to use a pure sine wave power inverter in the vehicle……and a pure sine wave power bank elsewhere, when you’re going to be away from an outlet.
Accessories: Cigarette lighter charging cable, Portable solar charger
Optimizing your screen brightness around 50%, turning off keyboard LEDs, Disabling wifi if you’re not solidly connected to your network, turning on Windows 10 battery saver and power saver, and using Chrome for web browsing can help too.
Disabling wifi & bluetooth (airplane mode), webcam, USB, IR, and lowering screen resolution won’t make much difference.
This battery has a capacity of 155Wh vs laptop batteries capacities of less than 82Wh.
When taking your power banks on a commercial airline, tape safety covers with electrical tape to get through security. While tape is only required for battery contacts, not power banks, it should imply that you’re safety conscious and know the precautions and regulations (links below) better than they do, and hopefully save the time of closer inspection.We recommend a quality water resistant backpack / shoulder bag / briefcase large enough to carry a 17.3″ laptop [17″ (w) x 12″ (d) x 2″ (h)] and enough room for the power supply, a couple of power banks, a power inverter, and personal items, that conforms to airline carry on dimensions [22″ (w) x 14″ (d) x 9″ (h)].
If you fly and use your laptop, read on for more information about power banks, airplanes, FAA regulations and lithium ion battery fires…
To avoid having to check your bag, it’s recommended that you board the aircraft as soon as you are allowed. If asked to check your bag, tell the flight crew that you have two power banks, and an expensive laptop with an 85 watt hour lithium ion battery and irreplaceable data, that you need for work you planned on doing during the flight. Please choose someone who doesn’t need their carry on during the flight.
Good luck! With the added seats and fully booked sardine cans, most flights require some passengers to check their carry-on.We’re still looking for a power bank that meets all of our criteria, and can be used with plugs from various countries. For international travelers with different outlet needs we recommend this travel plug…
FAA regulations limits lithium ion batteries to twenty 100Wh batteries. Or “with airline approval” two 100Wh – 160Wh. (See below about airline approval.) Wh = Watt Hour.
Power banks are allowed in carry-on bags only. They are never allowed in checked baggage.
As you may know, low quality, cheaply made lithium ion batteries can catch fire, and the energy stored in the battery can be converted into heat energy – more fire. In the passenger cabin, the flight crew can attack the fire, with water, soda, or a Halon ABC extinguisher. (Lithium ion batteries are Class B).
The regulation is in Watt Hours (Wh) because it can apply to Lead Acid, Nickel Metal Hydride, as well as Lithium Ion, and other battery technologies.
Lithium Ion batteries’ nominal voltage is 3.6 volts. which at 160Wh converts to 44,444mAh. Milliamp Hours (mAh) is the typical measurement of lithium ion capacity. So, no lithium ion battery above 44,444mAh * 3.6v = 160Wh is authorized aboard a commercial passenger aircraft.
Modified sine wave, opened a whole new can of worms, because Modified Sine Wave power sources, which are cheaper and far more common than PURE SIGN WAVE, can have a detrimental effect on electronic devices, their power supplies, and batteries within them. Finding pure sine wave power inverters and power banks that met all of our other criteria was sooo frustrating, but it was worth it!
Above, we linked to the power bank on Amazon but you can get it from their likely source in Asia on Alibaba if you dare.
(See this YouTube review for more information about the vendor branded power bank.)
The top 10 carriers in the U.S.’ pages expressing lithium ion battery policies:
Southwest Airlines – Doesn’t mention Watt Hour limits. Just quantity of 20.
Delta – Specifically mentions the 160Wh limit of 2.
American Airlines – Specifically mentions the 160Wh limit of 2.
United Airlines – Specifically mentions the 160Wh limit of 2.
JetBlue – Specifically mentions the 160Wh limit of 2.
SkyWest – Mentions policies of partner airlines, Alaska, American, Delta, & United.
Alaska Airlines – Specifically mentions the 160Wh limit of 2.
Spirit Airlines – Specifically mentions the 160Wh limit of 2.
Republic Airlines – Mentions policies of partner airlines, American, Delta, & United.
Frontier Airlines – Says to review TSA regulations which defer to the FAA regulations.A couple of 151.2Wh (42,000mAh) power banks, should multiply up to 6 times your time away from an outlet, without pulling your hair out waiting on a frustratingly slow laptop. We also recommend keeping your laptop battery charged, using your power banks first.
Most vendors won’t mention the make and model number of the components in their laptops, and they aren’t about to admit their high failure rates.
Our research of every component that we configure, such as RAM, storage drives, wireless LAN, and even thermal paste, in every laptop that we recommend, is extensive and continuous, from real world benchmarks to failure rates, from dozens of the most reliable sources.
Each component is important, like the engine, transmission, alternator, battery, etc. of a vehicle.
The failure rate of a computer is equal to the failure rate of all components added together. Even if you find one of the best vendors, with the best prices, if you choose the wrong components (like Western Digital or Seagate HDDs), you can still end up with a failure prone system.
Any honorable person doing real research would never recommend any vendor with deplorable customer service, or such high failure rates, or a laptop with an HDD, or one that lacks battery protection technology.
I don’t understand choosing 4 slow, frustrating $187 per year laptops, rather than 1 super fast, reliable $135 per year laptop.
Dirty tricks and deceptions by vendors
These are just some of the dirty tricks and deceptions committed by vendors.Mentioning SATA’s THEORETICAL maximum of 6Gbps. NO SATA SSD drive is capable of data speeds of more than 4.2Gbps, and the fastest HDD drive is only capable of 1.4Gbps. (Almost all vendors of SATA laptops are guilty of this deception.)
Calling any laptop that isn’t Virtual Reality ready a “gaming laptop”. Any true gaming laptop will have a VR ready GTX 1060 / RX 480 or better. You may have never imagined caring about games, but why just watch a movie, when you can participate in one?Installing bloatware.
Most vendors install software that waste system resources. It’s a deplorable practice, that unfortunately, even Microsoft has started doing with Windows 10. It’s just not right that you pay for a product, and that product is hindered by the company that you bought it from. Like buying a car with a 1,000 lb. weight in the trunk. Sure you can take it out, if you can figure out how.
TIP: When you see components listed without the version, assume that it is the earliest version rather than the latest:
Thunderbolt instead of Thunderbolt 3
USB ports that don’t mention 3.1 Gen 1 (5Gbps), 3.1 Gen 2 (10Gbps), 3.2 (20Gbps), USB type C,
DisplayPorts that don’t mention 1.2 or 1.3,
MicroSD reader that doesn’t mention MMC/RSMMC/SDHC/SDXC or UHS-II,
Screen resolution, without mentioning the MHz. 30Hz / Frames per second can be disappointing. 60Hz / FPS is considered good quality. Anything above 60Hz is necessary only for gaming.
RAM that doesn’t mention DDR4 the GHz and the CL, expect that it is DDR3 lower than 2133GHz soldered and not upgradable.
The ONLY reason to solder components such as CPU, GPU, RAM, Storage Drive, or Battery is to force customers to by new rather than upgrade or repair.

Just because someone seems to know more about computers than you do, doesn’t mean they are sharing knowledge altruistically.
The best vendors of the most reliable computers don’t have affiliate programs.
Unlike every other website that makes recommendations, this website contains no affiliate links, no advertisements, and accepts no sponsors. All recommendations are based on extensive research, with no influence by any vendor. Hence the name TRUSTED Consumer Consultants.
If a company doesn’t have an affiliate program, or spend a fortune on advertising, it’s as if they don’t exist. Vendors of the most reliable laptops (from the fourth largest Taiwanese exporter) are the Cinderella of the computer industry!


Local PC shops have two useful functions. Repairs of unreliable computers that are out of warranty, and renting a computer while a reliable one that matches your needs is being built.
With all due respect to all the great techies out there who can tear down and rebuild a computer, are an encyclopedia of diagnostic software programs, can diagnose almost any problem, and have gotten their friends’ computers working again, most of them are experts at solving problems rather than avoiding them in the first place.
The goal should be to avoid problems by researching failure rates as well as performance, and only recommending the most reliable computers, from the lowest priced quality vendors.
There are very few techies who conduct in depth research into failure rates, customer service reviews, hardware manufacturers, and the history of the companies that they recommend. Most of them suggest the same garbage that you find listed in magazines, or are limited to custom building a desktop, also with inadequately researched hardware.
Our obsession is reliability, performance to cost ratio, all of the information necessary to make the best choice, and recommending computers that serve their owners many times longer, without a lot of frustration.
Someone who gets paid by the vendor, without doing any real research,
With very very few exceptions, if a service is free, then YOU are the product.

Even if you don’t need to accelerate 0 to 60 in 2.4 seconds, it’s nice to have more power than necessary, rather than not enough. Why spend more on 4 cars without autopilot, than 1 with, even if you only use it on your annual vacation?

We sure would appreciate your help, please!

We’re trying to take on the corrupt and deceptive computer industry, and the only way to do that is by sharing information. So, before you leave this page to see our list of quality computers, or ask for our help in custom configuring one for you, We beg that you use the buttons on the left to help us educate others in your social network.
If you don’t yet need a new laptop, but would like to buy us a cup of coffee for our late night research sessions, or help fund our hosting, research, hardware, publicity, development, and eventual expansion into helping consumers with a multitude of other products, we’d really appreciate your support.
