In 15.3" AE86 2025 Review

The In AE86 Laptop is a weird one. It's got a ton of RAM for the price, but it's paired with a CPU that's basically from a different era. The one thing you need to know is this: it's a budget Frankenstein's monster. It takes a super old, slow processor and tries to make up for it with a massive 24GB of RAM, which is a solution to a problem this laptop's core can't even create.

Let's be real, that Intel i5 2-core CPU is ancient. It's in the 10th percentile, which means 90% of laptops are faster. The 24GB of RAM is a funny attempt to compensate, but for everyday tasks, you'll feel that sluggish CPU long before you ever need that much memory. The Intel UHD Graphics confirm this isn't for anything beyond basic web browsing and video streaming. It scored a 12.3/100 for gaming, which is basically 'don't even try.'

At $340, it's cheap. But it's not a good value. You're paying for RAM you can't fully use because the processor and graphics are massive bottlenecks. It feels like they found a warehouse of old CPUs and tried to clear them out.

Don't even look at the MacBook Pro or gaming laptops like the MSI Vector here. They're in a different universe. For a similar 'budget workhorse' idea, a used or refurbished business laptop from Lenovo or Dell with a more modern quad-core CPU would run circles around this for the same money. The ASUS Zenbook Duo is also in a different league for productivity. This AE86 is competing with laptops that are 5+ years old, and it often loses.

I can't recommend it. The terrible CPU and reliability score are deal-breakers. That much RAM is a trap, making the spec sheet look better than the real-world experience. Save your $340, add a bit more to your budget, and buy a used laptop with a more balanced, modern setup. You'll be much happier.