A laptop for the lad
You asked for something that does homework. Homework runs on anything. The question is whether the same machine can keep up when the Minecraft turns into building things, which, with this one, it will.
What I'm assuming about him
Three things you've mentioned, and what I think they add up to:
Put those together and the question changes. It isn't "will the laptop do his homework"; it's "what happens when he leans on it". The answer, in 2026 and after, is that he'll code with an AI beside him, because everyone who codes now does. Those tools reward a machine that responds quickly: the faster it answers, the better his results; the better his results, the more he does it; the more he does it, the better he gets. A laptop that makes him wait breaks that loop before it starts. Headroom isn't a luxury for this kid; it's the thing that decides whether the habit forms.
That's the lens for everything below. Every option here does homework. The scores are about how far past homework each one will carry him.
The one spec that matters
Any of the brands you named are fine. Acer, Lenovo, ASUS and HP all make good student laptops and all make bad ones; the badge tells you nothing, the numbers tell you everything. Buy at or above this line and he's set for five years:
The £300 laptops fail on memory and processor. The jump to about £500 to £650 is the whole difference between "does homework" and "builds things".
Three good choices
Prices are what the shops were showing in mid-October; check the link before buying, and look for the student discount on the maker's own store.
| Laptop | Price | What you get | Running small AI models | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ASUS Vivobook 15 / 16The everyday pick | £450 – £650 | Core i5 or Ryzen 5, 16 GB, 512 GB SSD, built-in graphics. Light, good keyboard, good screen. Looks like a normal laptop. | Fair. Runs the small models; slow on bigger ones. | 7.6 / 10 |
| HP Victus 15The quiet gaming laptop | £600 – £800 | Core i5 or Ryzen 5, 16 GB, a proper NVIDIA graphics chip. Doesn't look like a gaming machine, which matters at a new school. | Very good. The graphics chip does the heavy lifting. | 8.4 / 10 |
| ASUS TUF Gaming F15The most capable | £700 – £950 | Core i5/i7, 16 GB, NVIDIA RTX 4050. Built to military drop-test standards. Heavier, and the battery is shorter. | Excellent. Runs the 3B–7B models fast. | 8.8 / 10 |
The scores weigh specs per pound, how well it runs small AI models, and how long it will stay useful. They're a steer, not a verdict.
"Running small AI models", in plain words
Within a year or two he'll want to run a small AI model on his own laptop, the way kids now run their own Minecraft servers: it's the obvious next thing after modding. Those models live in memory. A laptop with a separate NVIDIA graphics chip has fast memory built for exactly that job, so the model answers in seconds. A laptop without one still works, but it thinks slowly and the fan runs. That's the whole reason the two "gaming" laptops score higher: not for games, for headroom.
If you'd rather the laptop itself were the project, there's one more option, and it sits in a category of its own.
Framework: the laptop he builds himself
Most laptops are glued shut. When something breaks or gets slow, you replace the whole thing. Framework makes the opposite: a laptop that arrives in pieces with a small screwdriver, and he puts it together. Memory, storage, keyboard, screen bezel: about twenty minutes with picture guides, no soldering, nothing he can get wrong. The ports are little blocks that slide in and out of the side, so he picks what he needs. Years later, when it's slow, you replace the one board inside rather than the laptop.
| Laptop | Price | What you get | Running small AI models | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Framework Laptop 12The smaller, tougher one | £500 – £650 | 12-inch, folds flat to a tablet, rubber bumpers for a school bag. Lighter processor. | Basic. | 7.1 / 10 |
| Framework Laptop 13The full one | £850 – £1,100 | 13.5-inch, aluminium, Ryzen 7. No separate graphics chip, but the memory can be upgraded to 32 or 64 GB later for about £100. | Good, and grows. Slower than a graphics chip, but it can hold bigger models. | 8.1 / 10 |
Why it might be a bit much: the DIY version needs Windows installed from a USB stick (half an hour, and a good first job), it costs more on day one than an equivalent ASUS, and it doesn't look like the laptop everyone else has. For some kids that's the point. For a kid walking into a new school, it might not be. You know him.
Order from frame.work; it isn't in the shops.
Where to go and feel them
- Currys, St Albans (Albany Park, Hatfield Road, AL1 0LH): ASUS, Lenovo, HP and MSI side by side. Try the keyboards; it's the thing he'll touch most.
- John Lewis, Welwyn Garden City: fifteen minutes up the A1(M); a two-year guarantee comes free.
- Online: ASUS UK, HP UK, Lenovo UK, Laptops Direct. Student discounts are on the makers' own stores.
Two cheap things that do more for "building tech" than the laptop
A Raspberry Pi 5 (about £60 with a case) and a BBC micro:bit (about £20). Both are what UK secondary computing lessons use, both plug into any of the laptops above, and the Pi runs a version of Minecraft you control from code. If he takes to either, you'll know where the next few birthdays are going.
Prices are indicative as of October 2026 and move weekly. The comparison and scores were worked up with Gemini and checked by James.