Black Friday Budget Laptop Deals: $120 Lenovo Ideapad 1, $220 HP 14-Inch Laptop And More For Virtual Learners

by Brandon Hill — Tuesday, November 24, 2020, 09:44 AM EDT

Black Friday is a great time to splurge on hot tech items for ourselves -- a la new smartphones; perhaps a new PlayStation 5 if you can find one -- but it's also a great time to score deals for our loved ones that are in need. During this somewhat insufferable COVID-19 lull that has blanketed the country, many school age children in particular are in need of a computer to take part in virtual learning.

If your school district doesn't provide a laptop for your virtual homeschooler, or if you just need a cheap replacement for a device that they might have broken, we've got a few deals for you that won't break the bank.

First up is the Lenovo IdeaPad 1, which is about as cheap a deal as you'll find these days for a brand-new Windows 10 laptop. As you can tell by its price, the IdeaPad 1 won't win any specs races, but it does include a 14-inch (1366x768) display, 4GB of RAM, and 64GB eMMC for storage. Powering the device is a relatively ancient 1.6GHz AMD A6-9220e processor, and Windows 10 Home in S Mode is running the show.

Lenovo says that the IdeaPad 1 is good for 8 hours of battery life, and there's a webcam up front to handle all of your kids’ Zoom calls or Google Meet sessions. The IdeaPad 1 is a dirt-cheap solution that should handle the most basic web browsing, productivity, and video conferencing needs for your virtual learners.

Lenovo IdeaPad 1 4GB/64GB eMMC $119.99 @ Best Buy

If you tack on $100 to your budget, you can get a 14-inch HP laptop with a 1366x768 resolution and a Celeron N4020 processor. 4GB of RAM comes paired with the CPU, and you'll get 64GB of eMMC storage. HP says that the laptop can last up to 9 hours on a charge, and it has Windows 10 Home in S Mode installed.

HP 14-dq0002dx 14" Laptop (Celeron/4GB Memory/64GB) $219.99 @ Best Buy

Now we come to the ASUS Laptop L410 Ultra, which steps into the fray with similar specs to the IdeaPad 1. You will get 4GB of RAM, a 64GB eMMC, and a 14-inch display. However, the display sees its resolution bumped to Full HD (1920x1080) and you'll find a less pokey Intel Celeron N4020 processor under the hood.

You'll also get USB 3.2 Type-C and Type-A connectivity, an HDMI port, microSD slot, and Wi-Fi 5. Like the IdeaPad 1, it comes running Windows 10 Home in S Mode. The L410 Ultra is available direct from ASUS for $249.99.

ASUS Laptop L410 Ultra Thin Laptop $249.99 @ ASUS Store

Stepping back into the Lenovo fray, we have the IdeaPad 3, which is a 15-inch laptop featuring a 10^thgeneration Intel Core i3-1005G1 processor, 8GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD. The display features a Full HD resolution (1920x1080), and again, you're getting Windows 10 Home in S Mode. Lenovo is quoting battery life of up to 7.5 hours, which should be plenty to get kids through their day of online activities.

Lenovo IdeaPad 3 15-inch Laptop (Core i3/8GB/256GB) $299.99 @ Best Buy

Tags: black friday, deals, Lenovo, Asus, Best Buy, ideapad 3, ideapad 1

Brandon Hill

Brandon received his first PC, an IBM Aptiva 310, in 1994 and hasn’t looked back since. He cut his teeth on computer building/repair working at a mom and pop computer shop as a plucky teen in the mid 90s and went on to join AnandTech as the Senior News Editor in 1999. Brandon would later help to form DailyTech where he served as Editor-in-Chief from 2008 until 2014. Brandon is a tech geek at heart, and family members always know where to turn when they need free tech support. When he isn’t writing about the tech hardware or studying up on the latest in mobile gadgets, you’ll find him browsing forums that cater to his long-running passion: automobiles.

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