Laptop for PP?

[Greolt]

I want to upgrade my laptop and wish to get one well suited to PP work.

The one I presently have is not so good in the LCD department. I do PP on my desktop.

My question is about LCD screens and or graphics cards (specificaly on laptops), not ram or hard drive size etc. (I know what I want there)
Also I am not going to get a Mac (sorry Mac peolple) I have too much software for and familiarity with Win XP.

So do any of the knowledgable people on this forum have any words of wisdom for me?

Thanks in advance, Greolt

[MattC]

Greolt,

I use a Dell with an Ultrasharp Widescreen. This screen exhibits very little colour shifting with changing viewing angle. I have a couple of other laptops with low end and midrange screens. The difference is quite noticeable.
IMO, the graphics card is not of great importance for image editing. Get something decent if you plan to play games or want to drive a decent external monitor. I have a P-M with Intel Extreme (it is a Dell, but not the one mentioned above), and while I am happy with it, the graphics will not drive a 1920xanything external monitor and does use system memory. Any of the current ATI or nVidia cards would probably do it for you, if image editing is your thing.

I know you said that you know what you want in the area of HD and RAM, but I will say that 2GB of RAM is the go to avoid swapping (paging) - laptop hdds are too slow and generate lots of heat when worked hard.


Cheers

Matt

[Greolt]

Thanks Matt I will do some research on "Ultrasharp Widescreen" I guess that's a generic term and not a Dell brand name.

Your comments re graphics card is just the sort of thing I am interested in.
I am not a game player but hadn't thought about the need to consider running an external monitor.

Thanks, Greolt

Edit: Also your comments re laptop hard drives is pertinent, thanks.

[MattC]

No, "Ultrasharp" is a Dell brand trademark.

Cheers

Matt

[Oneputt]

I was just shown an LG notebook with a widescreen which had excellent definition and colour, but because it was a widescreen images look squashed. If you can understand what I mean.

[Greolt]

Oneputt I can imagine a movie say that was not widescreen being "stretched" to fit would look squashed
But I think image editing would not be affected.

Thanks, Greolt

[rokkstar]

I've got a Dell 8600 with Ultrasharp 15.4" wide screen monitor driving 1920 x 1200 res.

I use that for PP sometimes and over all it's pretty good. Colour replication isnt as good as my desktop though. Loads of screen real estate for all the palettes.

Not a bad price either. Definately get the RAM boost. At least 1gb if not 2.

[gstark]

Us ASUS users are a happy lot with our ASUS lappies.

I find my widescreen is very good for editing, DVDs, software development ...

[Onyx]

One time Gary took his Spyder monitor calibrator down to a mini meet. Several of us brought along our lappies. The before and after results of calibration on my then 3 month old Compaq Presario V1008 lappy was visibly indiscernible to the eye. The display came out of the factory pretty much spot on that colour calibration was essentially not required! It's made me more appreciative of the colour accuracy and quality of this display (it also had absolutely no bright pixels which I later found was an anomaly among LCD units). Compared to the famed IBM T42 my cousin has, it offers far more brightness and contrast at maximum, and more adjustments inbetween. I was very disappointed with the T42's display.

As much as I hate Compaq/HP the brand and the piss poor after sales service - this little unit has served me very well as a PP machine, probably just as much used as my desktop at home - due to my always away from home life.

WXGA, WUXGA, Ultrasharp etc. and other fancy terminology are probably the alphabet soup you should be looking for in a display these days.

[Greolt]

Thanks very much everyone.

Onyx, I will check out that compaq model.

Gstark, could you be more specific what model Asus you are happy with?
And do you use it at all for PP?

I think my next step will be to visit a shop with a good range and hope I can
talk with someone who knows what there talking about.

Greolt

[gstark]

I'm using an M6N, and yes, I use it for everything, including PP (see editing in my original post). While I have a desktop system at home, this is a worthey desktop replacement system when away from home.

[Greolt]

Thanks Gary

Edit: I missed the comma after editing.

[Neeper]

Onyx, tsk tsk.. how could you possibly recommend another human being a Compaq???

[gstark]

Onyx, tsk tsk.. how could you possibly recommend another human being a Compaq???

He's busy packing to return to SYD, and is thusly distracted.