A couple of months ago I was watching a Linus Tech Tips video about the Motile 14″ Laptop that was only $250 on Walmart.com. After watching the video a few times I thought to myself I have to give this a shot.
I spoke with my wife about it and due to all the technical issues we ran into with COVID-19 and “remote learning” we decided we needed to upgrade our kid’s laptops. By this point my son and youngest daughter were using 15 year old laptops that I had laying around and were still working. You got to love the old Dell Latitude D630 and Inspiron M500 models. I went to Walmart.com and placed and order for a silver one for my wife and I to play with. By the time we placed our order the laptop was about $329, which is still a really good deal and I will explain why below. It comes in 3 color which are Black, Silver, and Rose Gold (which is next to impossible to get).
I ordered the laptop on a Sunday and the laptop was on my doorstep by Tuesday. I was impressed with the speed in which this laptop was delivered.
Now for the moment you have been waiting for, details about the Motile laptop. The computer is a metal clam shell design (which is very uncommon for a budget laptop) the keyboard deck is very sturdy and there is very little flex. Powering on the laptop you have the option for the Microsoft Hello Face Unlock which is a surprise considering I have a few flagship laptops that are only a year old that don’t have this ability. It is super lightweight and my wife has commented that it is lighter than her Surface Go. It also comes with a full version of Windows 10, which is contrary to other budget laptops which are usually running Windows S (which has limited functionality). This is thanks to the fact that the the Motile 14″ has an AMD Ryzen 3 processor. With the average Chromebook costing between $250 – $400, why not save your money and get a full blown computer that will out perform a Chromebook.
If you are brave enough to open the laptop up, you will find that the memory (RAM) is up-gradable from 4 GB (which is great for most users) to 16 GB (theoretically….. WOAH) and the M.2 SSD is not only replaceable, but there is a second M.2 slot so you can add a higher capacity drive! This is not normal for a budget laptop like this one is supposed to be. Heck, almost every laptop these days <cough> Apple <cough> integrate (solder onto the board) Memory and Storage, and they don’t allow you to add additional storage at all.
Like I mentioned earlier, this laptop is a great choice for remote learning in a COVID world, but it could easily be upgraded to become a pretty capable daily driver for even the most discerning power user.
