It's worth paying for reliability. If that also means more speed, fine -- but raw CPU benchmarks rarely matter outside of very specific workloads. What you'll notice day to day is whether the machine crashes, wipes out a project, or forces you into an unexpected week of downtime.

Computers are like lightbulbs, and laptops are the extra fragile kind. They burn out. I've never had one more than five years, and after year three I just assume it could fail at any moment -- whether it's an SSD crash, a swollen battery, or drivers breaking after the next OS update.

If you replace machines every three years, like I do, you're not necessarily paying for performance -- you're really just paying for peace of mind.