Plant DNA/genetics is likely going to require specialized software and computing power he’s not going to find on a Dell laptop. Computer modeling on a single PC can be terribly slow depending on what you are doing. That being said, he probably won’t be doing anything that complicated until his junior or even senior year when he starts working in the lab with samples, etc. Usually the lab itself will have all the data collection and computational programs already setup by a paid lab assistant or grad student. The majority of his first two years is going to be general ed (term papers) and math/physics/bio classes that will have minimal computational requirements outside of something like Matlab or Mathematica. So stick with something cheap that you won’t mind if he spills on it or it gets stolen. Whatever it is it will be outdated in three years anyway. By then he’ll be ready for grad school and have a better idea of what he’ll actually need.
We’re waiting to hear on his testing. He’s taken so many AP classes in high school and with the Honors College, there was a bunch of classes he doesn’t have to take. We weren’t sure what the professorial assistantship was, if he might need to do lab work earlier than expected.