We recommend that Willamette students bring their own computers to campus. While WU offers computer lab facilities, many of these spaces are limited to students enrolled in specific courses or majors. Owning your own computer will allow you to work on your course work at your own schedule. These guidelines can help you make sure that the computer you bring to Willamette will be able to meet your needs for at least 4 years.
1. Mac vs. Windows
Depending on your area of study you may need a Mac or Windows based laptop, this can enhance file and software compatibility between Willamette’s lab systems and your personal device. For Apple devices this can also give you the ability to AirPlay to the A/V setups provided in PNCA classrooms. Windows and Apple laptops are included in our recommendations below as a way to provide a range of options for students to consider. Don’t forget that most vendors will give an education discount which could provide significant savings.
We highly encourage you to reach out to your department to ensure that you choose the machine that is best suited for your area of study.
2. Baseline recommendations for a Laptop new computer
Minimum recommended specs for PC
- i5 10th/12th gen Intel / AMD Ryzen variant
- 16GB RAM
- 512GB SSD
Minimum recommended specs for Mac
- Apple M3 chip with 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU
- 8GB unified memory
- 512GB SSD
High performance specs for PC
- Intel Core i7
- 18GB RAM
- 1TB SSD
High performance specs for Mac
- M3 Pro, 12-Core CPU, 18-Core GPU
- 36GB RAM
- 512GB SSD
3. File Storage
We recommend that students do not store any important files or projects locally on their computers. Instead, plan on storing and backing up all files onto cloud storage and external hard drives. Students working with large media files (such as video or animation), should plan on purchasing one or more external hard drives for storage and transportation of files. External drives should use USB-C connections and have at least 1TB of space. Solid state drives (SSD) are faster and less fragile, but are more expensive than drives with a spinning disk (HDD).
4. Extended Warranties
We highly recommend purchasing an extended warranty for your computer. Technology can fail or fall victim to physical damage at the most inopportune times and students should prepare for this. WITS will provide assistance with usage of student owned devices, but will not provide hardware support or repairs. Students that need a repair (through a mail-in to the manufacturer or local repair shop) should expect to be without the computer for about a week. WITS does have loaner laptop computers available to cover that downtime as well as computers in labs on campus. An extended warranty will not speed up the repair, but it will significantly reduce the cost.