Need Help With Laptop Computer Reqts.

[mikes616]

Hi Guys,

 

I want to buy a new pc laptop, which would be in addition to my current desktop so I will have flexibility to use Chief out of the office.  I am currently using X6, soon to be X7.  I am looking at buying either a Dell or an HP laptop.  I would get at least a 1TB hard drive and at least 8GB ram.  I would also get an i7 Intel processor.  I would also get a 15.6 or a 17.3 display.  I have been told that I should NOT use an integrated video display but rather get a Nividia video card with 2GB on it.  Also, I have been told that I should make sure that the processor is a Quad core rather than a Dual core as it is much much faster.  I have found that the i7 processors can be either dual or quad core depending on exactly which processor you get- although I see that the quad core processors are much more expensive.  It seems that there are many laptops with an i7 dual core and they are not too pricey- usually $1,000 or less- but I'm not sure that the speed would be adequate to run chief acceptably.  Do you think the 8GB of ram would be ok or would I need 12 or 16?  It looks like everything has Windows 8.1 OS. 

 

Any comments or help would be greatly appreciated.  I feel that my brain is fried at the moment.

 

Mark

 

p.s. I think I had put this post in the wrong place rather than here....sorry.

[Doug_Park]

Dell has lots of good options as does HP. A lot of laptops today have both an NVIDIA and Intel graphics. This is a good option as it allows you to either go with the faster high power usage NVIDIA or the slower Intel that uses less power depending on your power needs. So either go with one that has just an NVIDIA or one that has both and you should be OK.

 

Quad core is best. Dual cores are OK, but will not do ray tracing nearly as fast or other operations. I would highly recommend going with a Quad core.

 

Displays can be a bit tricky. Some of the high end laptops are using 4K (high DPI) displays. Chief supports these well, but some other applications don't. You will pay more for one of these displays. The benefit is very crisp fine lines. The down side is some applications may not display things correctly.

 

8GB is probably a good minimum target memory today. 16GB is where I would likely want to be to ensure a 5-6 year lifespan of the laptop.

 

I would highly recommend getting an SSD disk. These are very expensive in 1TB sizes. But you can get a external USB drive if you wish.

 

Windows 8.1 is an excellent choice from a reliability standpoint. It also boots a lot faster.

[lbuttery]

I would opt for the 17" screen

especially if you are doing client presentations on it

 

but I also bought a hand sized LCD projector 

that does a great job so you could go with the 15" screen

 

http://www.aaxatech.com/products/p3_pico_projector.htm

 

Lew

[Doug_Park]

I used to want bigger screens on my laptops. But after lugging a heavy 17" laptop around for several years I opted for lighter smaller screens. My MacBook Air has an 11" screen and is very portable. I even took it with me on my cross country bicycle trip last fall. I also have a Dell m3800 with a 15" 3200 x 1800 screen which weighs a little less than twice as much as the Air. I don't miss the large screen and if I do really need more space I can easily plug in a large secondary monitor.

 

But your needs are different than mine so you will need to decide for yourself what you want.