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Question: Best laptop memory size, space, gb, etc. for producing music, photography and editing, and making videos?

(Posted by: Starr on 2012-01-23 19:12:37)

I'm looking for a new laptop and have had some issues with my past laptops on space. I've heard that Intel cores are good, but I have no idea what I should be looking for. I am a photographer, so I save lots of pictures on my laptop. I also do videos and music. Just an FYI, the programs I have on my laptop now, are Photoshop, GIMP, Photoshop Topaz, Photoshop Lightroom, Adobe After Effects, Corel Video Studio Pro, FL Studio 10, and other things that are taking up a lot of space. According to my Hard Disk Drive, it states that I only have 13 GB out of 287 GB of space left. I plan on adding a lot more, but obviously can't because of space. My laptop also seems to run slow (this is when I first got it before installing anything to, so I know it's not a virus). It's a Toshiba and two Toshibas I had were crap. I don't know if it's because I spent less than 500 on them, or what. Please send me any suggestions and ask any questions that might assist you on helping me make my final decision. I'm looking to go to Best buy tomorrow, so I would prefer to see answers tonight if possible. Thanks in advance guys I'm trying to stay away from really expensive laptops though. I know MACs go for a lot, don't they? Plus, I heard that MACs really limit the software and programs you can download I don't know how to respond to answers, so I'm putting them here. Thanks for all the input. So in general, what laptop would you all suggest? I was looking at ones with Intel corei5 and i7 with in between 4- 6GB (or 400- 500GB) and maybe around 2.60 HGZ. Is this good enough for my needs?

Posted by: MP on 2012-01-23, 19:17:29

You'll have to get something custom built to REALLY handle that sort of work. But for a factory computer, you may want to turn to the dark side and get a MacBook pro. Great for user friendly, near professional level work. Get further into video editing, and you'll never feel like you have enough power.

Posted by: Praktize-dummie on 2012-01-23, 19:44:32

What you should be looking for is a decent CPU, GPU, and an SSD (of course you will need a regular hdd for media storage). Below I'll list what you need and why. Because you're using a lot of photo/ video editing programs, one would first consider getting a ssd- what an ssd does, is that it has faster read/ write speeds so when you're recording videos you are able to record them in a higher quality, also they have the advantage of able to boot up your OS faster and start up these photo/ video editing programs faster which in a sense = a faster computer. In addition to an ssd, you will obviously need an hdd for all you media storage. SSD's are fairly high priced and HDD are pretty cheap; here is an example: An 1 TB (*note 1 TB = 1,024 GB) hard drive (HDD) costs around $150 while and SSD of 120 GB costs about the same price so yes because of your demands, you will need extra money for them. Of course with that being said, to rendering videos faster- yes, you will need a decent CPU to render the videos faster and again, in better quality (b/ c you are able to render at a faster speed). Next would be a decent GPU, which you will be using for your video editing. Please note your CPU and your GPU will need to be balanced or else the lack of power to compensate the other will be called a bottleneck- for Example: You get a $400 CPU and a $50 GPU that's a completely bottleneck as your CPU can handle MUCH MORE than what you GPU is capable of, however vise versa- you get an $400 GPU and a $100 CPU that's also a bottleneck, because you CPU does NOT have the power to handle what your GPU can process. Therefore you will need a balanced priced GPU and CPU like a GTX 560m would pair up well with an intel core i7 2720m but thats only for example. For RAM 6-8GB is fine whether you are a extreme gamer or casual user (unless you multitask A LOT for which case you would need more RAM but I don't think you will). And thats pretty much what you should look for, you are NOT looking for a specific brand but for well rounded specs. To update to your question I'd prefer 6 gb of ram yes intel core i5 or i7 is fine and your hard drive seems ok too.

Posted by: B K on 2012-01-24, 06:49:14

Why not just get a removable hard drive to store your images on? These are fairly cheap now and have massive storage. In fact get a couple so you can back it up in case of disaster. amazon.com/ s/ ref= nb_sb_noss?url= search-alias%3Daps &field-keywords= mypassport &x= 0 &y= 0

Posted by: Nahum on 2012-01-25, 00:12:56

The only programs that take up a lot of hard drive space are video games. The rest of the space is likely taken up with your personal documents. Don't rule out malware until you've run a proper scan with trusty software: Microsoft Security Essentials windows.microsoft.com/ en-US/ windows/ products/ security-essentials Spybot safer-networking.org/ en/ home/ index.html A program called TreeSize can show you which folders are larger than others: TreeSize jam-software.com/ freeware/ index.shtml Slow computer? Unless you built it yourself, there are likely a lot of useless programs taking up RAM and storage. These programs can tell you what is configured to run at startup, and can help you disable uneeded software: HijackThis free.antivirus.com/ hijackthis/ SysInternals Autoruns technet.microsoft.com/ en-us/ sysinternals/ bb963902 Experts can tell you what programs you might not need based on HijackThis reports. Certain malware can also be identified from an HJT report. You can try posting it as another question here, or perhaps at the BleepingComputer.com forums: bleepingcomputer.com/ forums/ If you're still set on getting a new laptop, get one with as much RAM and storage as you can afford. You'll need at least 4GB RAM, and probably at least 500GB of storage judging from your current condition. The i5 or i7 processors will certainly do; the speed doesn't matter too much, but they will be much more capable than an Atom processor. You'll likely need a better graphics card than an integrated Intel—both Nvidia GeForce and AMD Radeon are decent options. The extra price of a Mac goes a long way towards tech support and service, and more reliable equipment. If you can't be bothered with troubleshooting Windows bluescreens, consider a Mac. Don't confuse RAM with hard drive storage. RAM is your countertop; storage is your fridge and cabinetry.