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Computer spec guidence
I was wondering if anyone would be able to offer any advise on where I would be best to spend some money improving the performance of my computer. I do a lot of mographics and compositing in AE and have recently begun working with C4d and Zbrush so render times are my main problem.
Below is my current spec:
17″ MacBook Pro
Processor 2.4 GHz Intel Core i7
Memory 8 GB 1333 MHz DDR3
Graphics AMD Radeon HD 6770M 1024 MBI really have very limitied knowledge in terms of hardware but I’m doing my best to get up to speed. Any help anyone can offer would be very appreciated.
Thanks.
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7 Replies
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Since you have a laptop, you don’t have many upgrade options. There are a few aftermarket upgrades you can do, getting parts from a vendor like Other World Computing.
I’d consider upgrading your RAM to 16 GB of RAM to make better use of Ae’s multiprocessing feature.
If you have a regular mechanical hard drive, replacing that with an SSD might give a little speed boost working with the disk cache on Ae CS6 and higher.
There’s not much else you can do unless you buy a new computer.
Walter Soyka
Principal & Designer at Keen Live
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
RenderBreak Blog – What I’m thinking when my workstation’s thinking
Creative Cow Forum Host: Live & Stage Events -
I agree with Walter, the laptop limits upgrade possibilities.
In addition to the SSD, your laptop supports 16GB of RAM which would help with RAM previews and if you use the multiprocessing for After Effects renders, may allow you to use a 2 or 3 cores for rendering.
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Thanks for the advice, I kinda feared that would be the case.
If I do decide to invest in a new machine do you have any suggestions on what to go for? I realise that’s a BIG question (I’m sure even the Mac or PC debate is more than could be fit in to a single post!) but any general tips would be really great.Thanks again.
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[Stuart Samuels] “If I do decide to invest in a new machine do you have any suggestions on what to go for? I realise that’s a BIG question (I’m sure even the Mac or PC debate is more than could be fit in to a single post!) but any general tips would be really great. “
What’s your budget?
My general advice is to buy as much/fast CPU, RAM, GPU and storage as you can afford, and to make sure your system is balanced. There’s no point in having a zillion-core CPU if you only have 4 GB of RAM.
As for Macs and PCs, I use and like them both. Macs are all good machines and generally quite price-competitive, but you have a lot more performance options on the PC side.
Walter Soyka
Principal & Designer at Keen Live
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
RenderBreak Blog – What I’m thinking when my workstation’s thinking
Creative Cow Forum Host: Live & Stage Events -
See this page for information about hardware for After Effects: https://adobe.ly/pRYOuk
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Todd Kopriva, Adobe Systems Incorporated
After Effects quality engineering
After Effects team blog
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Thank you for your suggestions and help. I’ll definitely be looking into upgrading in the near future and this will be a big help.
Stuart
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I have to agree with the rest. If you really need more power, you can invest on a desktop PC so that you can upgrade to a 16GB, which I think would be a great investment considering that you are working on AE. Plus, rendering would really eat RAM.
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