One in three laptops fail over three years, with Asus, Toshiba and Apple outranking lowest scoring Hewlett-Packard, according to a study.

The Nov. 16 study by SquareTrade Warranties, prepared by SquareTrade Product Manager Austin Sands and Marketing Vice President Vince Tseng, analyzed the failure rates for more than 30,000 new laptop computers covered by its warranty plans for the study.

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The study looked at the first three years of ownership and found 31 percent of laptop owners reported a failure to SquareTrade. About 20.4 percent of the failure came from hardware malfunctions and 10.6 percent was reported as accidental damage.

In the report, a SquareTrade representative said the 31 percent laptop total failure rate is higher than most consumer electronics, including televisions and portable MP3 players.

‘This comes as no surprise, given that laptops contain far more sophisticated mechanical and delicate electronic components than most other electronic devices,’ according to the study.

The netbooks, light and inexpensive laptop computers, are more than 20 percent more likely to fail than entry-level laptops and nearly 40 percent more likely to fail than premium laptops, according to the study.’

The study found that the brands ASUS and Toshiba are the most reliable. They are nearly 40 percent more reliable than HP, the worst performer in the study. Sony and Apple also performed better than the average.

With an expected malfunction rate of over 23 percent, Gateway and Acer were almost as unreliable as HP, according to the study.

According to the study’s conclusion, reliability should be a factor in consumer’s buying decisions.

‘Given the high overall failure rates of laptops and sizeable difference in reliability by brand, reliability should be a concern for consumers shopping around for the best holiday deals,’ according to the study.

Some students said they were not surprised by the study.

‘I am not surprised because I can be very careless with my laptop sometimes,’ College of General Studies sophomore Kelly Molewski said. ‘The laptops should become more durable in the future and should be protected with more cushioning.’

College of Arts and Sciences sophomore Giulia Lais said she sometimes spills food and drinks on her laptop.

‘The makers should create plastic waterproof cases to protect the laptops and then they can’t be damaged as easily,’ she said.

Other students, however, said the results were unexpected.

‘I think it’s a little ridiculous,’ CAS sophomore Jordan Rossman said.

Rossman, who has a MacBook Pro, said he has had few problems with his laptop and expects to keep it for up to six years.

On the other hand, CAS junior Lauren Boyer, who has a MacBook, said she has had multiple problems with her computer.

‘I got a virus on my Mac, which isn’t supposed to happen,’ she said. ‘When I first got my laptop, the hard drive didn’t work, so I had to replace it right away.’

In addition, she said, her 2007 version is too old to use the new on-campus remote printing system, meaning she would have to buy and update.’

However, she does not plan on replacing her computer after three years.

‘That would be next summer,’ she said. ‘That’s not going to happen.”

Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences sophomore Hannah Letbetter said she has had an HP for almost three years without any issues.’

‘I’m hoping I won’t have to replace it until I graduate,’ she said. ‘People have to replace their laptops because they do things like spill a cup of coffee on them.”

Staff reporter Lilia Stantcheva contributed to the reporting of this article.