whats your laptop?

FPshootsCanon · Jan 22, 2009

i'm considering purchasing a dell studio15 at the beginning of February. does anyone have an opinion about this model laptop? and what laptops do you guys find to work best for your studio or location work?

Holy Ghosted · Jan 22, 2009

Laptops are subjective and it boils down to what software and OS you want and need to use. Personally I will never own another Dell they just never did hold up to being worked and their Customer support was very poor. I now run a Mac Book Pro for a Laptop and it has given me the best life span and usability of any laptop I have ever owned. If Mac is a definite no then I would look to lenovo and / or Asus

ccssk8ter11 · Jan 22, 2009

I also use a mac book and i love it, the whole interface and organization of the mac's os is so much smoother and easier than my pc.

FPshootsCanon · Jan 22, 2009

i started working on macs in 2006 but i'm not ready to change everything i own over to apple plus i have a geek boyfriend that does all my computer management and hes better with windows.

anyone out there work with a hp? how well do those hold up?

Holy Ghosted · Jan 22, 2009

FPshootsCanon said:
i started working on macs in 2006 but i'm not ready to change everything i own over to apple plus i have a geek boyfriend that does all my computer management and hes better with windows.

anyone out there work with a hp? how well do those hold up?

Like I said if Mac is a No then Lenovo Or Asus are two of the best Windows running Laptops you can buy. If you are talking about editing on location you will need every thing you can get for it Lenovo and Asus understand this and Lenovo has even went as far as incorporating a wacom into one of their laptops.

stsinner · Jan 22, 2009

I swear by Dell.. I have the Inspiron 8600 running 1.25Gig RAM, and I love it.. I upgraded to a 120gig hard drive from a 40, and the RAM I upgraded from 512 meg..
I don't know if you are ever going to need it, but a lot of laptops now skimp on the ports.. I think it's important to have a parallel and serial port, which my laptop does, for when I need to program a PLC, which is usually serial...

Just don't fall for one of those crappy laptops that they sell very cheap.. Get a business model.. Celerons suck, as they have a reduced instruction set and are, therefore, much slower than a true Pentium.

jglovac · Jan 22, 2009

if it was an option, i would definately get a macbook.
I bought a macbook pro, and god has been smiling down upon me ever since

MikeBcos · Jan 22, 2009

I have Dell Vostros, Dell's pro line. My daughter has had one for over a year, it's had a tough life and never had a problem. I just bought myself a new one, a Vostro 1540, it runs the Adobe Creative Suite CS4, Office 2007 and Act simultaneously with no problems.

We are about to buy a third one for my wife.

I would highly recommend Dell.

Ls3D · Jan 22, 2009

XPS 1730 in SLI driving 24" display. 12 Lbs :lol:

If I were re-building I would be tempted to install Windows 7 beta from what I'm hearing... 64 bit dual boot.

-Shea

MikeBcos · Jan 22, 2009

Ls3D said:
XPS 1730 in SLI driving 24" display. 12 Lbs

If I were re-building I would be tempted to install Windows 7 beta from what I'm hearing... 64 bit dual boot.

-Shea

I'm running Windows 7 on one PC - it's nice!

frXnz kafka · Jan 23, 2009

Holy Ghosted said:
Personally I will never own another Dell they just never did hold up to being worked and their Customer support was very poor.

Dell's business CS is great, and their turn-around times are very fast. Home support may be different, I suppose.

I just recently upgraded from an old Dell Inspiron to a Macbook. The Dell served me very well for 4 years, but it just couldn't handle newer software. I don't think you'd be disappointed with a Dell Studio for photo editing and web browsing. If you plan on doing any gaming you'll want to look for something with a better GFX card.

KD5NRH · Jan 23, 2009

Right now, it's an old Toshiba Satellite 2775: 650MHz, 196MB memory and a 120G hard drive. With Debian or PuppyLinux I can actually get it to do a lot more than you might expect. With Win98 I can get it to crawl along, and whine for the install disc a lot.

OTOH, I just bought a used 1.6GHz eMachines on eBay for $170, so I think this one's destined to become a portable terminal for the house once I get that one running the way I want it.

usayit · Jan 23, 2009

I prefer to have both a laptop and desktop. Spend the money on a desktop and just figure in a mid-to-low end laptop for on location preview, file management, and light editing.. basic stuff. Place your funds on a well equipped desktop for your final edit, process, and archive. More options for performance, more bang for the buck, storage, expandability, and (VERY IMPORTANT) a better display (video card and monitor). Don't forget about backups.

As for what O/S, either windows or mac will work. Graphic applications are very memory bound. You will want to max out memory before spending money on faster processors.

As for Dell, I cannot make up my mind about them. I have friends and family that have had HORRIBLE experiences with them. My mother-in-law is up to the point of threatening lawsuit and discontinuing contracts with them form a business standpoint ( IT for the company she works for falls under her responsibility). On the other hand, I heard numerous people who swear by them.

Oh well.. I'm an Apple user so it doesn't really matter to me. I have a fully equipped PowerMac G5 at home and recently acquired an MSI netbook for portability. If you have the funds, you can't go wrong with a MacBook Pro. Just fill up on memory.

btw... I don't believe Celerons are RISC processors.

icassell · Jan 23, 2009

I use a 15.4" Dell Latitude D830 - 2GB Ram and a 120GB drive (with a couple of outboard WD 500GB USB drives as necessary). I use it for everything -- I don't have a desktop machine. The monitor is the WUXGA+ (1920 X 1200) and is beautiful for a laptop. I recently got a dock for it and am now shopping for an outboard monitor -- It was a pain to plug in my outboard keyboard/trackball/graphics tablet every time I want to do some editing.

Ian