Which is the better laptop: Dell 16 (DC16251) or Lenovo Ideapad Slim 3 Gen 10 (14" AMD)?

I'm looking to help an elderly neighbour (I'm elderly myself) who has little knowledge of computers to choose a laptop on a tight budget. I've whittled the field down to these two:

Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 3 Gen 10 (14" AMD) or Dell 16 Model: DC16251

Does anyone here have any of these laptops and could comment on whether it was a good buy or not?

General comments would be helpful too. I have no previous experience of dealing with Dell so I kind of wonder what they might be like to deal with. One of the things I find impressive about Lenovo is the Lenovo Vantage app that does a good job of informing on updates and installing them. Does Dell have a similar app?

BuddhaNature said:

Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 3 Gen 10 (14" AMD) or Dell 16 Model: DC16251

General comments would be helpful too. I have no previous experience of dealing with Dell so I kind of wonder what they might be like to deal with.

Click to expand...

I have / had several Dell desktops, and I've found Dell very helpful in helping choose my hardware & with after sales support.

BuddhaNature said:

One of the things I find impressive about Lenovo is the Lenovo Vantage app that does a good job of informing on updates and installing them. Does Dell have a similar app?

Click to expand...

Dell has 2 utilities to help you with update - Dell SupportAssist & Dell Command Update. However, I prefer to check for updates manually because the utilities are often way behind in downloading (some) updates.

I've always been a fan of Dell & HP desktops and laptops and have had a bunch of each over the years. Among my current computers are two Dell laptops and one Dell desktop and am very happy with them. I have no personal experience with Lenovo systems, though they certainly make fine laptops. Just pick whatever seems to best fit your needs and go with it - don't overthink it. Just pick a solid company and a configuration that suits your needs.

You won't regret buying a Ryzen processor - it's the fastest laptops I have worked with.
The last one was a IdeaPad 3 with a Ryzen 5 5500U and it's amazing fast in boot and workload.
I upgraded from Win 10 to 11 25H2, but still about 15 sec. to boot - and yes, no modern standby

The Ryzen 5 8440HS in the Lenovo should be a better CPU.

You do have to have other fast hardware as well. The above had this drive :

In CPU performance, the differences don't seem major (to me).

Their displays run the same resolution (1920X1200), so the Dell would be easier to read (16" vs. 14").

I'd guess that the Dell is worth the extra £29.

Between this 2x Lenovo has a better CPU (+iGPU) - but for an elderly (facebook, youtube, whatsapp, web browsing and such) - i'd go for the Dell cause of the "16 Display (seems more relevant than a system with higher performance - for an elderly).

With the options selected, the Dell also has 16GB of ram where the Lenovo only has 8. I have a Dell 16 Plus (with different hardware) but I'm quite happy with it.