I’m thinking ahead because that’s how I roll…
Sending first child to college in the fall, physics/engineering major with a math focus (loves Calculus). Currently using a MacBook Pro for school but I’m thinking he might want a PC in case he takes a computer science course.
Is a Dell XPS 15 a good choice for a student like this? Any other suggestions from btdt parents or professors/TAs/advisors/deans?
Wait until you know where they are going and check with the department.
True, but I would just add, also talk to other students in the department. Since he already has a laptop to bring to school, he can wait until he is on campus to see what other students are actually using. At my son’s school, the department’s recommendations were vague and broad, and were not the same as the students’ recommendations. 
A MacBook will be perfectly fine - even if he majors in CS. My daughter uses one. There’s nothing that can’t be done on a MacBook.
I have heard in the past that there may be some software used in certain engineering classes that may not run on a Mac but I doubt that’s the case any more.
If in doubt, ask the school’s CS or IT department.
Solidworks, for example, for a student doing MechE at a school where they use solidworks, or if they need to use it for a club or team. It will run on parallels but depending on your macbook it might not work well.
My son went to school with a macbook. It didn’t work for solidworks. He almost bought a Dell. Eventually he bought a new, different macbook recommended by his classmates.
Anyway, there is no harm in waiting until school starts to think about whether a new computer is needed.
I have a CS/Engineering background as well as my spouse, and my kid recently graduated and launched to a first job in CS. I do think it is nice to have a PC at least at some point during college because a lot of employers will use them. We have apple and android/PCs in our house, but our college kids have had PC laptops on campus. You can also get more bang for the buck. It’s really ice to have something that is truly portable on campus. Big gaming laptops are heavy and can be hard to fit in a reasonably sized backpack. My CS kid eventually got to using a small screen cheapy PC laptop and built his own desktop machine. Researching and building your own machine is a great exercise for this type of student too if he gets to the point of wanting/needing something more powerful.
I do agree that if he has a computer now, wait until he gets on campus. Some campuses might have discount offers, etc. and you might be able to learn more about the program. He probably technically doesn’t need anything for a while.
ETA - as a side note, our family has had very good luck with the Dell laptops. I have been using the same Dell laptop for a number of years as my primary machine now.
DH is a CTO/Software Engineer at a well known company. I think almost his entire team uses Macs.
According to D22 everyone, especially the Engineering/STEM students who deal with a lot of problem sets, defaults to an iPad Pro with Apple Pen for everyday/class use.
Dell XPS 15 are great computers. I own an engineering company and have been providing Dell XPS laptops for years. We got a 15" XPS for my daughter when she started college two years ago to study chemical engineering. It met or exceeded all of her school’s requirements and her needs.
Two things to think about:
Check the computer requirements of the schools that he is interested in. You can typically find that on the school web site. Some have specific requirements, some only recommendations, and some require that you buy computers from them. You can get a feel if they only want PCs or if they provide Mac alternates as well.
He may be able to get but with a Mac but if he goes into engineering then he is likely going to need to become comfortable with PCs. Pretty much all engineering firms provide PCs to their engineers. I have never come across any company providing Mac options.
Hopefully this helps.
Do people use the pen for notetaking or type instead? I’ve been playing with the idea of a magic keyboard + ipad + pen, but I get hung up on the theory that taking notes is better (for retention) when they are written instead of typed.
Re: OP, my two older kids used macbooks with no trouble. And I believe VM Fusion is free for single users for non-commercial use.
CS courses may use the school’s computers running Linux or other Unix(-like) OS. Recent Apple MacOS has Unix-like stuff under the GUI, and recent Microsoft Windows can add Windows Services for Linux to run Linux without needing a heavier-weight VM, in case one wants to do software writing locally without logging into the school’s computers. Either can also host VMs to run Linux or other Unix-like OSes. Typical Microsoft Windows computers can also have Linux installed on them as the native OS.
However, any decision can be deferred until later if the student already has a computer. Computers get better and cheaper over time.
Do not forget to consider how the data on the computer will be backed up. Losing weeks or months worth of work on a term project or paper because of a computer failure would not be good. The computer itself is more easily replaceable than the data on it.
So my D is a humanities major and she likes old fashioned spiral notebooks but she often takes her laptop to lectures because she can type faster. And she only has papers, no problem sets. But uses the iPad for digital art and illustrations.
The iPad is particularly well suited for STEM notes because you are jotting down formulas, graphs, vectors etc. Thats hard on a keyboard. We use a product called Paperlike that is a screen protector with texture so it feels like paper when writing.
Everyone still has a laptop, they just don’t necessarily carry it around all day.
My daughter used a Dell and it got her through engineering undergrad and grad school. It’s been great. I do know some kids had Macs and they worked fine as far as I know. The company is she going to work for uses pc’s, though I don’t remember the brand.
My daughter started using an Ipad with pencil for notetaking her sophomore year and loves it. She likes that it’s easy to edit, she can copy images into her notes, etc. She also has the paperwhite screen protector that another poster mentioned.
Both my kids (S23, D26) use the largest size of ipad, and use the pen extensively for hand written note taking and hand written problem sets.
My kids swear by this, too!
Bottom line (IMO): it comes down to preference, because (barring specific situations which you can check with the department/IT desk), both Windows and Mac laptops will do just fine.
Like Tony’s DH, I too lead a technology organization and we have started transitioning teams to MacBook. They have lower amortized cost. But again, it really comes down to preference and I have not seen students who used MacBook in school face any difficulty using a Windows laptop when they start working.
I agree with what others said - keep the current laptop and figure out later if you need a different one.
I use a tablet computer when I am teaching in class and researched a ton of forums to see which one would be best- the physics forums b/c they have to write out equations etc. recommend a surface computer. It is a tablet but you can get it as a computer so it has a keyboard etc. you can also get a monitor to plug it into if you want a big screen when he gets back to his dorm room. But also definitely see if his school or department recommend anything.
DS is an ECE (electrical and computer engineering) major and uses a MacBook Pro and an IPad Pro. DH is a software engineer so made sure to fully load the MacBook pro so he has enough space to run all the needed software/programs. So, it was more than the base price/setup, but DS loves it. He says the iPad Pro is invaluable though. His professors post their lecture outlines and problems in advance. He downloads them before class and writes notes on them with his stylus during the lecture and when working on problem sets in his study group. He said most students in engineering have some sort of tablet with a stylus to do this. It’s the best way to take notes because you can fill in the professor’s pdf overview during the lecture. He says it would be difficult to keep up with the lecture if you’re starting from scratch in a traditional notebook, but it’s not impossible.
I don’t know your budget, but a lot of students in his engineering school have both a laptop and iPad.
Of course, if the engineering school has specific recommendations, you should follow their suggestions. His school just listed the minimums to run software and didn’t specify a laptop model.
ETA: I joined the Facebook group for engineering parents at his university a few months before he started. The advice was invaluable—including answers for questions around laptops for particular engineering majors.
This is what I was thinking also.
One daughter attended a university that specifically recommended either one of two particular laptop computers. One advantage is that the university’s IT / helpdesk people were very familiar with these two particular computers. Another advantage is that they had loaners in case something goes wrong with your computer and you need to borrow a spare.
I could see that this might be department / major specific at some schools. We did not run into this, but neither daughter had a particularly “computer heavy” major.
Agree. Nothing should be done before they know which school they’re attending.
I’ll also add that if the Mac is working use it as long as possible before updating. Son picked a minor (that most don’t add until Jr year) that required software that didn’t work on MAC and required certain specs. If we had upgraded earlier, we probably would have picked incorrectly. It’s a niche minor, and I don’t think anyone would have thought to give us those specs. BUT, in those cases, there is usually a lab with computers to run the software.
Yes, that’s what my son did for Solidworks at first. This gave him time to talk to students and figure out exactly what kind of laptop he actually needed.