should i buy a portable handheld recorder?

Portable recorders are great if what you do is on location stereo recordings, Like the Deadhead Sound board tapes, live bands, classical performances almost anything your 2 ears can listen to can easily be recorded. As a songwriter they are great for catching a tune before its gone from memory. Lots of song writers never leave home with out one. But you can do the same thing on a cell phone these days if quality is not an issue.
All of them are very limiting and cannot be expanded beyond what they do.  One trick pony.
A laptop will always be expandable and open ended with what you can do with it.
I use my laptop and a small interface to record 2 track live on location, have been for a long time.
I would only buy one of those recorders for song writing while driving in the car or something like that, I would only pay $50 for that convenience too.
Buy a smart phone.