Editing laptop?
Hi,

Can anyone recommend a high end laptop used for editing HDV and DV?
(hidef)

Thanks!

When I did the spec vs price comparison last year, I ended up with an HP 2.something ghz machine.

I think you'll need as much muscle as you can afford, you could probably order one stick of ram in it and then add another on your own and come out cheaper.

Beyond that, there's a ton of threads here that can give you more info.

MacBook Pro?

A few months ago I ordered from CyberPower PC a laptop for my editing and capturing on. While I only do DV (SD) now it has really been a treat compared to my older desktop with only a P4 2.4 gig it in. Here are the specs;

Asus Z96Js
Core 2 Duo 2.0 gig CPU
1 gig PC5300 ram (will be getting another gig soon)
FSB is 800mhz
120 gig 5400rpm HD
15.4" 1650x1050 LCD display
DVD burner +_ dual layer
4 2.0 USB
1394 firewire port

Does me great! I've been capturing directly into my NLE from my camcorder and skipping recording to tape altogether (at least in some circumstances).

Nice that I can take it with me to edit or show customers what I got for them.

Jeff

Jeff...

Do you edit raw .m2t (hdv) files with that laptop?

Thanks

I second Macbook Pro with Final Cut Pro. Lots of power and lots of options.

I second Macbook Pro with Final Cut Pro. Lots of power and lots of options.

Macbook Pro + Final Cut Pro = Two pc laptops + two licenses of Vegas. Hehe.

I highly recommend Sager Notebooks. Sager has their own website, but I bought mine from a reseller called PCTorque. I put in a good 6 months of research, and after comparing Apple, HP, Dell, and a few other brands, Sager gave me the most bang for the buck.

My system is the Sager 5760. I have the original Core Duo @ 2gHz, but they're now shipping with the Core2 chips. You get a 17 inch screen at 1920X1200, and I got mine with the optional Nvidia QuadroFX 2500- which comes with 512MB dedicated memory. Since I do a bit of 3D work and motion graphics, the beefy graphics card comes in VERY handy- especially with the OpenGL. I have 2GB of RAM in my machine, and its more than enough to handle several layers of SD footage.

One drawback in my machine is the lack of hard drice space, which is at 100gb. If I want, I can mount another 100gb drive and have a RAID0 array, but I have to remove my DVD-RW drive to do that. Another drawback is portability. With the high-res display, robust graphics card, and 7200rpm hard drive, my battery lasts for about an hour- doing relatively simple things. I tried doing some more intensive stuff in After Effects, and I went through most of the battery in a mere 30 minutes...

Anyway, it cost about $2500, which was a few hundred dollars less than any of the competitors... and none of the competitors offered any perks like the high end video card or RAID capabilities. Like I said before, I highly recommend it- or at least checking them out.

They also have a huge model that uses desktop processors and offers an additional internal slot for a second or third hard drive. Those will run you between $500 and $1000 more, but its super heavy, and the battery is nothing more than a glorified UPS that will give you a few extra minutes to work in case the power cuts off...

Good luck in your search!

Make sure it has a 7200rmp drive.

Get the longest battery life possible if you will be editing unplugged(no 6 cell crap) Get a second battery.

Get a external usb2 drive for quick off-loads to save your main drives space.

Get one gig ram min. 2 gig even better.