Laptop recommendations for Vegas editing?

[Danny Hays]

That would be about the best laptop you could get for Sony Vegas. The quad core, dual thread, will show 8 processors. If it has an HDMI and VGA out like the F series, you can connect your HDTV and use it as an external monitor. You may even be able to connect another VGA monitor as well, not sure if it will let you use both HDMI and VGA as a secondary Windows monitor at the same time. I’ve had a Sony Vaio laptop for about ten years with a firewire input and have Used Vegas on it since it first started editing video, version 3 or 4. It was audio only at first. It’s only a 1.2 single core an can capture DV and HDV. It has never failed me so I would recommend the new Vaio i7 in a heartbeat. It’s actually getting difficult to even find a laptop with IEEE-1394 firewire ports anymore. You will be happy with it I’m sure. Best Buy should sell them and if for some reason you didn’t like it, you can return it within 14 days with just a re-stocking fee, although I don’t forsee you doing that.
Danny Hays

[Nigel O’neill]

I recently picked up an Asus i7-720qm laptop (Model N61JQ)with Windows 7×64. Although it did not have native firewire, I added a firewire ExpressCard. I also use Vegas Pro 9 x64, so I bumped the RAM up to 8GB. The laptop has e-SATA and a single USB 3.0 port, which will be handy in future. It offers VGA and HDMI outputs.

I did look at an i7 Sony Vaio, but it cost AUD$1,000 more for a very similar configuration. I think the Vaio includes a blu-ray/dvd burner, but the Asus is just is blu-ray reader/dvd burner.

Some specs to compare:

https://www.computeralliance.com.au/parts.aspx?qryPart=11860

https://www.computeralliance.com.au/parts.aspx?qryPart=11170

Asus offers a 2 year warranty versus Sony’s 1.

Whilst Sony has a reputable name, Asus has not let me down as a desktop system.

The last time I purchased a quality brand name laptop, I got burned big time by a faulty nvidia chipset that literally cooked the laptop inside out!

Intel i920, 12GB RAM, ASUS P6T, Vegas Pro 9 (X64), Vista x64 Ultimate, Vegas Production Assistant 1.0, VASST Ultimate S 4.1

[Bruce Quayle]

Hi Bob,

Have a look at the HP Pavilion DV8T series configuration I have just bought:
https://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/load_configuration.do?destination=review&email_id=1716388&jumpid=in_r329_emailconfig

Besides having a faster processor (i7-840 QM) than the suggestions above, it more importantly has dual 500GB HDDs both running at 7200 rpm. This will help greatly when editing HD.

It comes with a below-par graphics card, but as Vegas doesn’t use the GPU, this won’t affect your editing speed. However, this card is better than nothing when using photoshop or other graphics programs.

It’s not exactly light to carry around, but the 18.4″ screen gives you excellent HD quality.

The price point is not bad considering what you are getting.

Good luck,

Bruce

[Fred Robinson]

What Danny said.

I have the VAIO model VPCF11Z1E. I bought it specifically for the task. All I’ve had to add to it is an external, solid state HDD. It has a 1920×1080 screen, HDMI and VGA out, Firewire (which I need for my MOTU soundcard), eSATA port, and of course the i7 chip showing 8 processors.

Works like a dream, even though the internal HDD is only 5400rpm.

Fred

[Bob Mark]

Thanks for all that great info guys! I’m using a Sony EX1 for most of my shooting so the data rate is pretty low. But getting good quality previews is important to me. Thanks!

Bob

[Nigel O’neill]

Since Version 8, smooth previews in Sony Vegas has eluded me… even on my i7-920 desktop system * sigh *

I don’t need the 2nd drive in my laptop as my desktop has 5… . I did make sure the laptop supports USB 3 and e-SATA, though… .

Be aware that most low end (i.e. sub $1,000) laptops have a cut down or mobile friendly version processor. I did consider an i7 8* series laptop, but it was an extra AUD$1,000. I use the laptop for demos and roadshows, and the desktop for my main editing.

Intel i920, 12GB RAM, ASUS P6T, Vegas Pro 9 (X64), Vista x64 Ultimate, Vegas Production Assistant 1.0, VASST Ultimate S 4.1

[Nigel O’neill]

Sorry, I meant since Vegas version 9, smooth previews have eluded me. 8 was fine.

Intel i920, 12GB RAM, ASUS P6T, Vegas Pro 9 (X64), Vista x64 Ultimate, Vegas Production Assistant 1.0, VASST Ultimate S 4.1

[Dave Haynie]

A laptop isn’t the best platform for video editing, no matter what you get in it. You’re ultimately paying more for less, for the transportability. Of course, if that’s what you need, it’s what you need… I couldn’t give up the dual 1920×1200 monitors for editing.

But yeah, if you’re going to a laptop, get an i7 model. Quad Core is pretty much a given for decent rendering speeds these days… you’d have to benchmark Vegas to see if the hyperthreading helps or hurts your performance — it pretty much does one of those, application dependent.

I bought my son an i7-720M laptop from Lenovo last Spring, for about $750… pretty reasonable. That included a fairly decent nVidia GPU with its own RAM… you will be able to use this for video soon; Vegas 10 will do CUDA-based rendering, at the least (which means you need nVidia, not ATi… ATi’s native support is via Streams, and the generic GPU computing standard is OpenCL or MS’s DirectCompute).

The i7, at least in mobile configuration, is kind of a spec-hack when it comes to CPU speed/power consumption. All modern x86 chips scale the clock based on actual use. Most of them simply drop the clock down from their peak speed, but when they spec out power/heat numbers, it’s still based on the “normal” clock. i7’s spec their normal clock as one of the slower modes, and then they “overclock” when CPU demand increases. So the i7-720M can spec a 1.6GHz clock, rather than the 2.7GHz or so it’ll jump to as needed.

Anyway, this laptop would be unacceptable (IMHO) for video work for at least two reasons. Number one is the lack of a higher resolution screen… I’d pretty much want 1920×1080, maybe 1680×1050 would suffice. And either an IPS or MVA screen, fairly unusual on a laptop.

Second one is HDD… there’s only one. For serious rendering jobs, you’re going to get hard drive bound, not CPU bound, with a single drive… much less the likelihood that your laptop HDD is slower than the desktop alternative. Sure, you can add external drives, but you’re giving up portability.

I guess the real question is, just how much portability do you need. Is it critical for video editing to be able to move around, or are you specing out a multi-purpose machine? After all, a higher-spec desktop and a netbook-style laptop together would run less than a high-spec laptop, if the mobility isn’t driven by video work.

-Dave

[Fred Robinson]

This isn’t meant to be a knee-jerk, defensive response just because I use a laptop, because, if portability is not a requirement, you are of course correct in what you say. Two points I can pick on though ;-)…

The SONY VAIO I mentioned earlier does have a 1920×1080 screen. So that removes that issue from your ‘cons’ list for laptops generally.

And, I have to disagree that adding a single or even 2 SSD’s removes portability. These things are the size of a cigarette packet after all and plug in via the eSATA port. No big deal (pun intended).

So personally, I think the laptop option, IF you have the top spec, is pretty much as good. An if, like me, you want portability, it wins hands down.

Fred

[Al Bergstein]

I recommend not using a laptop, I have both a desktop and a laptop. I use a Samsung R580 with 4 GBs RAM and a i5 processor w/500 GB hard drive. It’s got an odd location for it’s trackpad, so I usually use a mouse, but to be truthful, I’ve NEVER found a windows laptop that stacks up to using a desktop, or a Mac laptop. sad but true.

The Samsung does have an esata port on it, so you can use an esata doc with it. It’s big, heavy, the screen is ok, not great, but it was only $800. If you wanted to spend upwards of $1800, then there are some great options. HP, Lenovo, etc.

Alf