What Is the Best Computer for a Small Business?
As the owner or IT operations manager of a small business, you need technology that keeps pace with your business and the needs of your employees.
Computers purpose-built for business are designed to help your employees work smarter and faster while keeping your business more secure and running smoothly. With business PCs, you’ll gain integrated security features, professional-grade performance to support the applications you use the most, and tools to help you maintain and manage devices more easily. You can also select devices in a range of form factors to meet your team’s needs wherever work gets done.
But with so many options, how can you select the best option for your small business? Read on to learn what to look for in a device and the key capabilities to help you best support your employees and get the most out of your technology purchase.
Select a Form Factor
To find the best PCs for your small business, start by determining how and where devices will be used to inform your form factor selection.
Laptops
Laptops help your employees move business forward from anywhere, offering a powerful, flexible choice for everyday professionals—whether on-site with customers, collaborating in meeting rooms, or simply moving between office and home. Laptop options include thin-and-light, premium, and high-performance notebooks; 2-in-1s with a convertible screen that can be used in tablet mode; and mobile workstations.
Desktop PCs and AIOs
Desktops are a strong choice for employees with a dedicated workspace, like those serving customers in a retail or office location or technical creators working on dedicated workstations. Additionally, you can consider all-in-one (AIO) computers that streamline an entire desktop system into a single device.
Mini PCs
Mini PCs are great for small businesses needing a compact PC that fits into tight spaces without compromising performance or features. Mini PCs offer desktop performance in a compact, energy-efficient package that can be used in various ways, including hidden behind the screen in digital signage or as a hub in a conference room.
Mobile and Stationary Workstations
Workstations are the go-to choice for professionals such as architects, engineers, analysts, and video editors who need high-performance desktops or laptops purpose-built for demanding resource-intensive applications or computational workloads, including data analysis, 3D design, video and audio creation, animation, and rendering.
Understand Small Business Computer Needs
Selecting a form factor is just one step toward finding the right computer for your business. When evaluating potential devices, consider the following factors as you select devices with the capabilities and cybersecurity protections you need.
Security
Unfortunately, small businesses remain a highly targeted sector for cyberattacks. To help protect your business, look for business PCs with integrated hardware-enabled security capabilities that provide more-comprehensive device security than software solutions alone. Hardware-based capabilities extend protections across hardware, firmware, and software, all targets of evolving cyber threats.
When considering your device security options, it’s also important to understand how they can affect device performance. Modern, built-for-business PCs are often optimized to balance security and productivity. For example, AI PCs leverage special processor hardware to deliver advanced AI-enhanced security protections and superior device performance.
Performance
Your employees need tools that enable them to do their best work and meet your customers’ needs. Underpowered or older devices can cause lag, crashes, and freezes, significantly impacting employee productivity, collaboration, and customer interactions.
When selecting the right computer for your employees, consider the type of work they do today to understand what level of processor power, memory, and storage they need.
For example, employees who do complex tasks or use resource-intensive applications for their work—such as AI modeling, video editing, 3D modeling, or data analysis—need a PC with a more powerful processor and enhanced random access memory (RAM) for optimal system speed and responsiveness, while employees who work on less-data-intensive projects may not need the same level of processor power or RAM.
It’s also important to consider not only your current needs but what you may need in the future. To get the most out of your business PC purchase, choose a device designed and sized to grow with your business. Critical components that impact device performance include the processor (CPU), RAM, storage, and the graphics processing unit (GPU).
Processor
When a PC processor gets overloaded, everyday tasks take longer, resource-intensive software has slow response times, and employees can encounter substantial system lag, a fragmented experience, or an unexpected crash—all of which can limit or halt productivity.
The more powerful the processor, the faster the computer can complete the tasks needed for optimal device and application performance, the more concurrent applications your employees can run, and the smoother the user experience will be.
When considering a new computer, it’s important to know that modern PC processors are designed with specific purposes in mind—some optimized for high performance, others for energy efficiency, and increasingly, processors specifically engineered to handle specialized workloads like artificial intelligence (AI) applications.
To enable your employees with ultraefficient multitasking and a boost in productivity, look for a processor that offers performance tuned for the workloads and applications they use the most. Additionally, to give your employees and business a competitive edge, look for devices with processors that enable AI-enhanced productivity features and on-device AI processing.
RAM
When your small business computer runs an application— including the operating system (OS)—or opens files, the processor accesses data stored in RAM for quick retrieval. The higher a computer’s RAM capacity, the more simultaneous tasks the computer processor can perform, the faster it can do them, and the smoother the experience will be.
The amount of RAM a computer needs will depend on the complexity of the programs it runs. Video editing requires a lot of RAM, while basic web browsing does not. Look at your employees’ tasks to determine whether you have high or low RAM requirements, then equip your small business computer accordingly.
For more information, read about the performance and productivity impact of RAM and computer processors.
Storage
While RAM can be considered a PC’s short-term memory, storage—in the form of a solid-state drive (SSD) or hard disk drive (HDD)—provides the long-term memory, holding the computer’s operating system and program files. When selecting a new computer, look for a device with plenty of storage space to help avoid unexpected slowdowns, freezes, and crashes—all of which can impact productivity.
To extend the life of your PC, think about all the files, apps, and tools your employees will use and accumulate over their tenure—it can be a lot, especially for small business team members who often wear many hats. Accounting for these computer storage requirements will help prevent you from relying on external storage devices or upgrading device storage soon after your device purchase.
Graphics
A computer’s GPU directly impacts the visual quality that your employees experience when using their PCs. A computer with a more powerful GPU will deliver higher-quality and smoother visual experiences, which is especially important for employees doing visually intensive creative work, like 3D rendering, graphic design, and video editing.
The GPU and processor must work together efficiently, and a mismatch between their capabilities can result in reduced performance or stuttered or lagging visual experiences. Based on your employees’ work, consider what graphics capabilities are needed, including advanced features like ray tracing or upscaling for better performance at higher resolutions.
Many PC options offer a high-performing integrated GPU built into the processor. Integrated graphics hardware doesn’t have a separate memory bank to process graphics and video. Instead, it uses system memory shared with the processor, which uses less power, creates less heat, and helps to improve overall performance.
Collaboration
Poor video quality, device incompatibilities, and spotty connections greatly impact productivity, team collaboration, and remote calls with your clients.
To enable your employees with the best experiences, look for computers that:
- Offer AI-enhanced audio, video, and collaboration tools for improved online conferencing.
- Come equipped with best-in-class connectivity standards, like Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4, which provide improved responsiveness, resolution, and connection speeds even when using the most-resource-intensive applications.
- Provide fast, reliable connectivity to PC accessories, including multiple monitors and external drives. Many devices are available with Thunderbolt™ technology, which delivers a single port capable of connecting myriad peripherals, fast charging, and rapid data transfer speeds.
Remote Management
As more employees work from anywhere, maintaining devices and resolving computer issues can be challenging. For businesses with some IT support, look for PCs that offer hardware-based, remote device manageability capabilities. These tools make it easier to access, maintain, and resolve device issues from virtually anywhere, even when devices are asleep, powered off, or seemingly unresponsive.
Additionally, look for PCs built on a validated platform, which helps ensure device stability and reliability.
Sustainability
As a small business, you want your devices to last, and you want peace of mind about the impact of your purchases on the environment. Look for PCs that offer integrated sustainability benefits, such as processors built for energy efficiency, and for product labeling that indicates certification with sustainability standards.
Accelerate Your Business with Intel-Based Small Business PCs
No matter your business size, IT environment, or form factor choice, business PCs built on Intel vPro® and powered by Intel® Core™ Ultra processors provide the capabilities you need to pivot, scale, and respond to the unexpected as your business develops.
Intel® Core™ Ultra processors power enhanced AI experiences and local AI processing capabilities, with a balance of performance and efficiency, to help your team maximize productivity and stay competitive.1 2
Intel vPro® is built for the challenges facing today’s businesses. It offers hardware-level manageability and the most-comprehensive security for your business right out of the box3 to help keep distributed devices secure, up to date, and functioning properly.
Supported by Intel® technologies and Intel vPro®, you and your team can focus on what matters most—serving your customers and growing your business.