i’m in the market for a new laptop but i’m not sure if i need an i5 or an i7. i work from home as an online tutor along with a few other online gigs and currently have an i5. however, especially with tutoring, i have noticed significant lagging and crashing of applications sometimes during sessions with students because i generally have to have multiple windows and apps running at the same time. even outside of tutoring, it also lags/crashes frequently whenever i am running my different photo editing and drawing softwares - i use corel paintshop pro and krita, along with a photo stacking software (deepskystacker). so i’m thinking i might need the i7 anyway just for these? i will admit though that i generally have a lot of chrome tabs open at all times, which i know slows down processing significantly (idk if there’s anything i can do about this because my adhd brain will literally forget about something i needed to look up/research unless i have the tab constantly open where i can see it 😅). so i’m not sure if the lagging/crashing is simply because of that, or if i do in fact need to upgrade to a faster processor. i do not game or code or otherwise use programs that require a lot of processing power.
based on all of this, would an i5 or i7 be best for my needs?
edit: also what is the difference between an i5 with 10 cores vs something like an i7 with 8 cores? would the i5 be faster in this case? and do threads play into the speed at all?
well it depends which i5 you have, bc if you have an old i5 that’s probably the reason youre lagging and not the core count
You need to look at the individual processor and not focus so much on the i7 or i5 moniker. Which specific i5 or i7 - and what generation they are from ALL make a huge difference. There are many different i5s. Just like there are many different i7s.
Would you be able to please posting your system specs to help with guidance. Click start > type MSinfo > open the system information app in the results > click edit at the top left, select all, copy, paste results here. In addition, what brand model of storage drive are you currently using for your c drive?
It’s worth starting off with an /sfc scannkw and a chkdsk first as that might help. Also, if it’s a HDD then a disc defrag could also help. Once we know your specs then that can be considered too.
Better try to update memory (RAM) also go with ssd if it’s capable
Sounds like ram problems not cpu