Question Regarding Notetaking in UCL Lectures

First year econ student here - varied depending on the module. Economics (ECON1001) almost explicitly requires you take a laptop or tablet to lectures because there's interactive stuff which needs it. All core modules except maths have either lecturecast (so you can watch lectures online), lecture slides online or both, so I regard note taking as thoroughly pointless. Everything they write on the board will be in the course textbook somewhere, so save note taking for when they say something like 'this will be on the exam' or 'this is a neat little trick I use'.

Please don't be one of those students typing away on a laptop rewriting the course textbook instead of actually listening

Great to see the POV from an econ student!
When you say interactive stuff, would a 10 inch tablet suffice? Or will you be doing lots of typing as well?
I ask this because I'm debating whether or not to buy a new desktop or laptop. I personally am not a fan of laptops due to their poor performance-price ratio compared to desktops so I will only be buying a laptop if it is absolutely necessary.

Great to see another desktop user! I didn't buy a laptop myself and don't own one, for the same reasons as you, and I have a desktop I built which sits in my room and a kindle Fire X (7 inch tablet) which I use for portable reading, and it was absolutely fine for interactive lectures! Those lectures you could even get away with a phone tbh, but a tablet is easier (you just need it to vote on multiple choice questions and write 4 word sentences every now and again). I've not once this year thought 'man I wish I had a laptop'.