Recommended Avid Xpress Pro HD Notebook/Laptops

O

Oz

Well-known member
I was looking at the specification requirements to run Avid Xpress Pro on a notebook and came across the following:

Note 5: Of the notebooks listed that support Xpress Pro HD, only the Dell Inspiron 5160 currently supports DVCPRO HD.

Now, why would that be? Just for fun - and maybe for a future purchase - I was configuring a notebook workstation over at Alienware and was thinking that the MJ-12M 7700 would do just fine.

What does a notebook running Avid Xpress Pro HD need in order to support DVCPRO HD? Of course there is Jared's excellent article on editing HD found here but what do you all think? Anyone editing on a laptop?
 
I don't edit full time on a laptop buit have edited on one when travelling and need to continue working on a project. I have used Alienware laptops for demos and they seem to work just fine. As long as the laptop meets requirements it should be good to go. The ones that Avid lists are the ones that go through Avid testing and are supported by customer support.

Michael
 
I edit on a Powerbook g4 w/ 1 gig ram, 200 gig ext. hard drive, and a mojo, and I love the way it works. i have been editing on avid when there was only avr (avid video res.) 1,2,or 3). Avid was originally on Apple, and I think this works well...
 
waykoolkh, how is the performance of your Avid Mojo while attached to the external drive? Any bus issues? I already work with and have invested in PC gear so unfortunately I'm not willing to move to the Mac platform anytime soon but I hope to edit on a laptop as my primary machine. Thanks for recounting your experiences, guys.
 
I really dont see why you would want to edit on a laptop fulltime.

To me, its just not comfortable. You can never get a big enough screen and you cant move your keyboard around to be comfortable while leaving the screen further away. Plus upgrading and adding is a pain and sometimes not possible with machines. You can never fit 4 hard drives inside of a laptop and externals just take up so much room after a while. Also not very many laptops out there can equal tower pc performance.
 
I agree, if I had the choice I would stick to a desktop but I will be traveling extensively in the future and so it isn't an option for me to lug around a complete desktop. For now, I am thinking of getting the most powerful laptop I can afford. Otherwise, you're absolutely right - I would rather purchase and build a dual-processor desktop for the money.
 
hey OZ,
I edit on a 17" power book, and I agree if you travel a lap top is the way to go. I can put my sys. in a backpack, ext. drive (200gb). deck sony gv-d1000, mojo, and laptop.
when not traveling I use a wireless keyboard, mouse, and a i-curve to raise the laptop to eye level. as for the ext drives I can add as many as I want.

and lastly the mojo will go both ways :), pc or mac. I would say it made my editing a lot faster. Basilly it made all my avid effect real time. Boris is still slow (render times). I very happy with the laptop performance.
 
you need 2 separate firewire bus.
Click to expand...

So I take it from your statement that Mac laptops do have sepereate busses? I've always wondered if they do. I'm constantly teetering on the edge of the Mac world. I wish I knew more about them....

Chris
 
krestofre,
the powerbook g4 has one built in, and I have a 3 "bus" card. so the mojo goes by itself in to the "build in firewire port" and the ext. drive goes into the firewire card. the mojo does not like to share ports.
so I have my deck goes into the mojo, and the mojo into the powerbook. ext drive goes into the firewire card, and all works will
 
Oh cool. That makes sense. Next time I'm shopping for a laptop I'll have to consider the Powerbook. :thumbsup:
 
I remember reading about the bus requirements on Avid's site, thanks for the reminder. It is something else I am keeping my eye out for.

krestofre, I checked out that computer you linked to, very nice system. The Alienware I was looking at is very similar in specs actually, and cost closer to $4,000 depending on what you add/remove of course. In either case, both come close to the price of an HVX200!

Going to be an expensive year...
 
Yeah, I know how you feel. For some reason the PC side is very protectice over multiple-bus archetecture. Unless it's a dual Xeon system, then you can basically kiss multiple buses goodbye. That 1 Beyond Laptop is the only laptop that I'm aware of that has multiple buses. It was specifically built with HD editing and Mojo in mind. I'm pretty sure the Alienware laptop is a single bus system, but unfortunatly you have to be a rocket scientist and have a diagram of the Mobo connectors to know for sure.

Mac on the other hand make the bus layout known and simple. G5s are obvious, and if I ever saw the inside of a Powerbook it would probably be obvious as well. I know you're PC based, but having waykoolkh's testiment that the Powerbook is working fine is a big incentive. And Powerbooks are only in the 2K range. :)

Either way, happy shopping. :thumbsup:
 
Sorry to dig up an old thread, but I thought I'd add that because of this discussion (and a few other things) I bought a 17 inch Powerbook G4 to use with Avid. It is absolutely solid and meets anything I've thrown at it so far. My media is on a 250 GB G-Drive Firewire 800 and is just as snappy as my desktop RAID 0 SATA drives (not as many streams, but just as snappy). OS X rocks too. I couldn't be happier. I highly recommend Mac laptops for editing!

Chris
 
I'm currently using an HP nx9600 for Xpress Pro HD 5.2 that supports DVCPro HD and HDV natively. I digitize to and edit from an external USB 2.0 drive, and use Mojo on the firewire bus. Simply put, fast and stable.
 
cre8tive, how much did your HP laptop cost you? krestofre, I'm heading over to Apple's site for prices, just in case I too join the dark side. I do like that OS X runs on a variant of BSD, which I am familiar with.
 
Yes, the UNIX base is fantastic. As a big fan of Linux and other *IX platforms, one of my biggest complains was installing software, and device drivers. They're just a pain. But OS X takes the UNIX base and solves those two problems, so in short it's the best OS I've ever used. Coming from Windows it took me about 5 minutes to become comfortable with it too. I'm not becoming a zelot, and I'm still keeping my Windows machines, but the Mac is a welcome addition.

Good luck with your choice.

Chris
 
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