Quad or Dual laptop for VS Pro X4?

[jhnholgate]

Hi guys, recently upgraded from VS Pro X2 to X4 and quite like the new program. I have a 2ghz Celeron Laptop zzzzzzzzz..... ! which will play the GoPro 1280x720 clips in the preview window pretty well, but as you can imagine, all goes to mush when I start editing. Things are much improved if I wait for the proxy files though. Rendering to .wmv 720 files is pretty slow - 2.5 hours for an 11 minute clip. So, it's time for a new laptop. I'm on solar power, so I can't run a Desktop PC for the length of time I want and budget is going to be under $1000. Am I better off with an i7 Quad 2 Ghz (with turbo boost to 2.9 ghz - I hope that works better than 'ready boost' on Vista!!) or a 2.4-2.6 ghz i5 Dual laptop ? And what sort of improvements can I realistically expect to see over my Celeron machine (3 gb ram)?

One other thing - when I get said laptop, can I re-install my downloaded VSX4_PRO-TBYB.exe file onto the new laptop and enter serial and activation numbers when prompted, or do I need another code for a different machine?

Many thanks

John

[skier-hughes]

I'd go for the i7.
Don't consider turbo boost etc in your equations.
SHould fly in comparison.
One licence number for running one programme on one computer, so as long you you don't use both computers you are legal.

[39_Steps]

I too am looking for a laptop, but do not have the solar power limitations. One parameter that I have noticed is that some 17 inch Intel Core i7 laptops have quite long battery life, presumably because they have room for a couple of extra cells. However, none of these long battery life i7s have decent graphics chipsets which is probably why the power draw is well regulated. Most of the advertised specials have the older cpus which do not even include the efficient gpu power of the Intel HD 3000 graphics.

Frankly, I have come to think that 4Q2011 is a not the best of times to buy such a marginal AVCHD editing laptop, whether with Core i5 or Core i7 mobile processors, due to the "Sandy Bridge" graphics muddle. However 2Q2012 does look more promising when both the existing motherboards and the Sandy Bridge processors may be superceded.

In the meantime, if I stumble across a laptop with specs similar to those that Abiel Corel has listed (with ATI "discreet class" low bidder graphics") for a good price in a local store, I will give it serious consideration. After all, I am not getting any younger and I need to get this $50 Corel AVCHD video editing fad/fancy over and done with so that I can go back to $400 computers.

[UncleBoo]

Depends on (1) how much editing you do vs. rendering, and (2) if/how well the turbo boost really works, especially for normal editing.

Why? Because VS editing is "single threaded" and will only use one CPU anyway, so clock speed is more important than having the i7 vs i5. Plus under your circumstances, power consumption is a consideration, and the dual i5 will consume less power.

So if you will be doing mostly editing, and if the turbo boost doesn't work for normal editing, then the less-power-hungry, higher-clock-speed dual i5 will be better. Otherwise, yes, go for the i7.

[aljimenez]

You can see my pc specs on the right and it's awesome for heavy duty work with editing photos and videos. I also have a laptop for when I travel. My laptop is an i5 but with the faster processor and 8GB of main memory in it. This laptop does not compare with my pc, but for the temporary video editing I do while on trips it works great. A laptop has other needs: keys are compact (mine is 15 inch 16:9 aspect display) and long battery life (I also bought a larger battery for it and it lasts over 5 hours with heavy use). So only you can answer what you want your laptop to do. If it is to be used heavily for video editing, get the fastest available, the most memory you can get, and the largest screen. If your laptop is for temp use while traveling, then long battery life and compactness are more important and thus why mine is the way it is... Al

[jhnholgate]

Thanks for your input guys. So from what you're saying, there wouldn't be any point in paying extra for a 2.2ghz i7 over a 2.4 ghz i5? Both have a 1gb nvidia card in them - is that of benefit for Video studio?

Cheers,

John

[teknisyan]

If you are referring to what UncleBoo has said then YES, since I have not used a core i7 computer, I can really cannot comment on how VS X4 behaves on that process. But on my laptop using core i5 it works great, able to do the work that I need to do.

But if you are looking for an i7 with great graphics, get one of those gaming laptops. which has one of the best specs for a laptop.

One other thing..

You can visit http://corel.force.com/index/articles/e ... d-My-Order on how to redownload your corel program to another computer.

[jhnholgate]

I managed to borrow my wife's Lenovo L420 laptop which is a 2.1ghz i3 machine. Editing was much, much smoother with just a bit of stuttering (1280x720 .mov files - no proxy) and what previously took over 2.5 hours to render on the 2ghz Celeron, the Lenovo did in 38 minutes (a 720p .wmv file of 11 minutes). That's a pretty fair improvement. I think a step up to an i5 2.4ghz machine should suffice for my needs - at least for a few years. Then again, with the new GoPro HD 2 coming out with 120fps......

Thanks all,

John

edit: ps: I see what you mean about the specs on the 'gaming' laptops but unfortunately, prices are a little out of my range on the ones I've seen so far.

[UncleBoo]

Thanks for your input guys. So from what you're saying, there wouldn't be any point in paying extra for a 2.2ghz i7 over a 2.4 ghz i5? Both have a 1gb nvidia card in them - is that of benefit for Video studio?

Cheers,

John

Just to expand on my "it depends" response: you need to consider where the time savings are most important to you: editing or rendering. VS is "multi-threaded" for rendering, which means it should render on that quad-cpu i7 almost 2X faster than on the dual-cpu i5. But VS editing is single-threaded, so only one cpu will be used anyway. If editing performance is more important to you, then the faster cpu is the way to go. If rendering performance is more important, get the i7. (FWIW, for my PC, being somewhat budget-limited, I compromised by getting a quad i5.)

As to the graphics card, VSX4 takes advantage of some nvidia and ATI cards to improve rendering performance. Check the X4 specs to see if the card you're considering is one of them. For playback, any video card you buy today is way, way more than adequate to do the job.

[jhnholgate]

Ended up with an Asus i5 2.4ghz machine with a 1gb nVidia card in it. My 720p .mp4 files edit and play smoothly without needing to make proxy files - yay!. I re-rendered the 11 minute .wmv file that took 2hrs and 38 minutes on the 2ghz Celeron and 38 minutes on the i3 and the i5 did it in 29 minutes. Much better and it didn't cost me an arm and a leg either!

Cheers,

John

[39_Steps]

Ended up with an Asus i5 2.4ghz machine with a 1gb nVidia card in it. My 720p .mp4 files edit and play smoothly without needing to make proxy files - yay!. I re-rendered the 11 minute .wmv file that took 2hrs and 38 minutes on the 2ghz Celeron and 38 minutes on the i3 and the i5 did it in 29 minutes. Much better and it didn't cost me an arm and a leg either!

Cheers,

John

You were fortunate to find an Asus laptop i5 machine with graphics support somewhat better than Intel's HD3000 without it costing you an arm AND a leg. I continue to read the holiday "Black Friday" sales ads (USA) for such a machine from semi-local chains with physical locations within 75 miles. I do see different laptop computers being advertised this week. In almost every case - and especially for the Asus models - the graphics support chipsets seem to be inferior to and older than the Intel HD3000 (formerly known as Sandy Bridge) in the newly advertised models.

It seems that the warehouse clearing process is in full swing. So be careful out there this weekend, but have a good Thanksgiving (not limited to USA).