Advice on a decent Laotop

W

weezhum

Active member
Im looking to get a laptop , mostly for capturing and minimal editing. I will also be using it for the internet so it WILL NOT BE my primary editing computer. I want something fast enough to run the Adobe Suite, but i wont be doing anything intense on it. Im thinking Dell, can anyone give me any pointers? Id like to keep it around $1000.00. Thanks in advance
 
How much ram do you need to run adobe suite? There's a nice dell with 2 ghz ram at overstock.com but it's refurbished.
 
I vote for H-P. I have one I use for video capturing and it ihas been rock solid. My husband dropped his inside its case the other day and nothing broke. Not sure what you need for Adobe but I have 1 gig of ram with Vegas as my editing program. In my humble opinion, Dell is overpriced for what you get. Campare specs and then decide.

Grasshopper
 
I'll have to chime in and say that HP is not quality. They were bought out by E-machines long ago, and now their products are a joke.

For example my friends have some Athalon 64 with Radeon 9600Pros laptops (nothing to laugh at and not even 3 years old).

One: no driver downloads anywhere. The hardware is so propiortary that if you didn't have the original CD you are ****ed.

two: They say they dont support Windows XP Pro. So some of the drivers wont work on that. (unless you know how to hack them)

three: No drivers? that means, Absolutly no vista support (though it might not matter to you)

Four: Both have had power adaptor problems, as well as cracked hinges on them.

HP is consumer crap. Go for something quality like a Lenovo Thinkpad or a Dell XPS. At least they stand by their drivers. (I have a 5 year old Thinkpad that you can still get drivers for and the hinge works just like day one, so does the power adaptor)

For your field I would seriously concider a MacBook. They have them refurbished at Apples store for about $800-$1000 Buy the ram upgrade yourself. and then Run Mac+windows.
 
@demistate

What the heck are you talking about?!


Demistate said:
I'll have to chime in and say that HP is not quality. They were bought out by E-machines long ago, and now their products are a joke.
Click to expand...

HP bought Compaq. Where are you getting Emachines?? Avid specifies certain HP models as qualified systems. I doubt Avid will be choosing crappy computers to run their products.


Demistate said:
For example my friends have some Athalon 64 with Radeon 9600Pros laptops (nothing to laugh at and not even 3 years old).
One: no driver downloads anywhere. The hardware is so propiortary that if you didn't have the original CD you are poo pooed.
Click to expand...
Just go to the HP website. There are plenty of drivers that are updated on a regular basis and are downloadable.


Demistate said:
two: They say they dont support Windows XP Pro. So some of the drivers wont work on that. (unless you know how to hack them)
Click to expand...
My HP nx9600 supports Windows XP Pro with zero issues.


Demistate said:
three: No drivers? that means, Absolutly no vista support (though it might not matter to you)
Click to expand...
HP is supporting Vista.



Demistate said:
Four: Both have had power adaptor problems, as well as cracked hinges on them.
Click to expand...
No power adaptor problems here. No cracked hinges.


Demistate said:
HP is consumer crap. Go for something quality like a Lenovo Thinkpad or a Dell XPS. At least they stand by their drivers. (I have a 5 year old Thinkpad that you can still get drivers for and the hinge works just like day one, so does the power adaptor)
Click to expand...
HP is crap? And you think Lenevo or Dell is the golden child?


----

@weezhum

I don't agree with demistate's assessment of HP in the least. Do the research and you decide what is best for you.
 
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DC said:
@demistate

What the heck are you talking about?!

HP is crap? And you think Lenevo or Dell is the golden child?
Click to expand...

I'm talking about their laptops.

Their desktop machines are screaming, but The lenovo is good. I have a T43 personally and I've had a t60, both awesome machines, both still supported by Lenovo. (Both with Vista support _right now_)

Hp couldn't make a 64 bit driver for their printers if their business depended on it. In fact our HP 7550 isn't supported by XP x64 (which we run on all of our editors for stability reasons)

I really think the Macbook will be your best choice.
 
My two cents is that HP higher end laptops are pretty decent. Same with Compaq. For consumer purposes. HP is not owned by e-machines.

Toshiba, Sony and Lenovo make rock solid laptops. In the tech industry, Dell laptops are viewed as pretty low quality relative to these manufacturers. Their desktops however are good. Dell is about making product; HP / Compaq is about engineering so you see the difference in better quality.

As I wrote in another thread, if you are considering Vista, you should buy Vista Premium (it has the HD codecs), go with at least 2 GBs RAM and a laptop hard drive that is 5400 RPS speed or higher. The advantage of Vista is that no other software is needed to capture HD. Moviemaker is installed and then convert to whatever file format you need.

Keep in mind that 1080i 24p is 1 Gig per minute so go for a big harddrive (100+).

About $1200 for this type of machine, brand new, running Vista at Toshiba with an extra battery (get about 6 hours shoot time with two 12 cell batteries). Much cheaper than a firestore..... but not as mobile...
 
At this point, I recommend a MacBook running Boot Camp with Windows - Price may be a bit more than you are looking to spend, but worth it. A one hour video rendered on my Windows machine takes 2.5 hours - on the MacBook, with less memory it rendered in 1.5 hours (both using Vegas 7).

As far as eMachines goes - someone above is very confused. eMachines was acquired by Gateway:

http://www.emachines.com/corporate/background.html

Phil
 
I just bought a Fujitsu. It's sweet! I paid about 2000 bucks, but that's because it came with 2 gigs of ram and a TV tuner built in. They have a 1 gig ram model sans tv tuner for about 1400 bucks.
 
Uh, So i guess that justifys you spending a ton of money on a mac, but i have had a toshiba laptop for 4 years now, and its still going strong.
 
I'd highly suggest the Lenovo/IBM Thinkpads. I've got an R60 and I've got a lot of use out of T60's in the past and they are rock solid laptops that'll last you a long while.
 
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