Pretty much three to five years. At the end of three years you start seeing more and more issues, especially if compared to a newer machine. This is due to computers doubling in power every 18 to 24 months. In three years you will have a machine that is 1/4 of a new machine, in the same class. This of course is assuming that the machine is being taken care of properly.
Like any other thing, it depends on the quality of manufacture and how it is treated. I'd expect sony to have decent manufacturing standards and you say you've been trying to treat it well (traveling can be an issue in itself). I have some old laptops still chugging around. I still have my OLD 2003/4ish HP laptop that came with one of the first Athlon 64 CPUs. It works but it's not the greatest anymore.
My oldest that's still functional is likely the one I regularly use now. It's an Acer 5315 series. It came with a Celeron and maybe a gig of RAM. I've since added a T9300 CPU, 2GB of RAM and an older Intel SSD. The SSD didn't make as big of an improvement as I expected, might be either one's age but the CPU sure made one hell of an improvement over that Celeron.
The point is, unless the thing has MAJOR issues, you can keep them around for a long time. That HP laptop I mentioned? It has 256MB of RAM soldered on. Not only does that limit my upgrade options but if that RAM goes bad I'm SOL.
What issues are you having? Are you sure it isn't something that could be corrected by a doing a reinstall/restoring the machine to the factory state and starting fresh?
What issues are you having? Are you sure it isn't something that could be corrected by a doing a reinstall/restoring the machine to the factory state and starting fresh?
Based on what I'm seeing at work with HP laptops (ProBooks - Elitebooks ...the better of the 2), Lenovo, ASUS, I can say laptops will last approximately 2 to 5 years. And this all depends on Brand, model, usage, handling.
We purchase either one of those brands but always making sure it has at least an i5 processor. If i7 is available for cheap we go with that. And at least 4 GB of RAM. Most we buy are coming with 6GB now. And we purchase maybe 5 to 10 laptops 4 times a year. (we have over 400 employees so we tend to go through them at odd times in the year)
With that said, we usually start seeing slow down and sluggish systems within about a year of usage. If not taken care of, it gets worse and eventually the laptop regardless of brand, RAM, and processor, just sucks. But again, depending on if it's a decent brand/model, you can run cleaners on it scan it up and end up with a still decently running device after a year or 2 of use. I have an Elitebook in my office now that is about 5 years old and it's still pretty quick and has been used hard. But then there's another Elitebook of the same model and it's total garbage and looks better than the other one. It almost seems to be luck of the draw sometimes.
I've grown tired of the shit with having to fix slow laptops, and then having to deal with my own sluggishness with my own Dell. And the fact that it's power supply died out on me twice, having to have a Dell Tech come out and fix it. And then the video started showing signs of failing. It just wasn't fun and ended up frustrating me more and more.
So I ended up getting a Macbook Pro put in 16GB of RAM and work is much less stressful. And now I only have the line staff computers to deal with and not my own as well. It was a pain in the ass to have to deal with a users slow computer and then also have to deal with my slow ass Dell as well.
I've had it for year now and it's still speedy as hell. No crashing, no slowing down, no updates every 3 friggin days. If there is an update there is no error upon rebooting saying another programs is preventing it from shutting down allowing me to force it down...that other program is... Windows Update...the same program that told me to shutdown in the first place. Ugh...yeah I still have to work with windows, but I'm much happier with a Macbook while doing it.
This is due to computers doubling in power every 18 to 24 months.
This has not been true for the past 4-5 years.
But not all software is. I am happily using older computers for most uses like internet and office etc. Sure if a computer gets clogged down with crap but same can be said of a desktop. Now maybe aaking say on average will normal use and carrying around before somethingjiggles loose or a hard drive fails.
It was the absolute cheapest Dell Laptop I could get. 1.4ghz celleron, 512 ram, 40 gig hd. Dvd-rom with cd burner.
I never even took the clear plastic protector off the screen. I taped it so it would stay on. The screen is flawless
Now, nice thing about being a older laptop, is upgrades are cheaper
I upgraded it from 512 to 2 gigs (maxed) ram for about $6 free shipping on the ram. Fried the Mobo when the power supply failed. So got a refurb mobo off ebay for $20 free shipping, swapped that out. After doing that, I picked up a P4 1.7ghz processor off ebay for $3 free shipping, that made a HUGE difference. Not going to do High Def video or extreme gaming, but it does rather well I am happy for what I use it for (ebay sales, uploading my videos to youtube, email, netflix and browsing).
About the only thing I CANT do with it is video editing, or extreme gaming. Still even has the original battery, which is only showing a 39% ware level after 8 years 2 months of ownership and regular use.
Very happy with my $300 purchase. Can see a reason to upgrade yet. HD has been giving some clicks occasionally, so I backed up everything and have crash plan backing it up to my desktop as well. When the 40gig hd fails, I will be poping a 120gig in from my sisters Toshiba that toasted royally after 2 years..... the HD is fine, I pulled it and scanned the crap and formatted it a few dozen times. Maybe I should just mirror the 40 to the 120 now before it fails :0
I got my wife a Dell 17R 5270 w/ 8 gig of memory two Christmas's ago and it is still rock solid with windows 8.1. I did replace the WLAN card with a Intel 7260 AC card which has improved wireless and blue tooth connectivity. Not say the other wlan card had issues only that I wanted it to connect at ac.
I bought my Acer 5738Z laptop new back in 2009. It came with Win7 Home Premium, 2.1GHz Intel dual-core, 4GB DDR3 ram, 320GB drive. It has traveled with me all over the world, including 4 extended (2 and 3 months at a time) trips to China. Last year I swapped out the drive for a new WD hybrid SSD/HDD (120GB SSD/1TB HDD) and reinstalled Windows 7. It is like a new computer, boots up from complete power off to Win7 desktop in less than 10 seconds. Runs cooler, too. I'll probably upgrade it to Win8.1 later, but for now it serves its purpose and still looks great with just a few minor scratches on the lid. The battery still holds enough charge to last a good 3.5 hours, too.
I've got a Compaq LTE Elite Notebook PC 4/75 running 486 CPU, 16MB Memory, 3.25GB IBM Hard Drive, 9.5in LCD screen with Windows 3.11 and it still operates like new (except the battery). Got it from work in 1996.
I picked up a Dell D630 for my wife. I got it used and dirt cheap because it had a bad HDD in it and the owner didn't want to fuss with it. I replaced the HDD and the thing runs like a champ. It is now 6 or 7 years old and has been dropped down the stairs ( and did not suffer any damage) and still runs very well. No issues.
In three years you will have a machine that is 1/4 of a new machine, in the same class.
But that doesn't change 'how long it will last'. It is still as powerful as it was when you bought it and still does what it did when you bought it.
You may want a more powerful machine or you may need to do new things with it that cannot be done on your old machine, but that's a different question.
However I've had a 4 laptops continually come back for work and lots fail on power inputs and usb ports from the cord plug and associated stresses. I can't believe more aren't here asking on lead/computer connection damage.