The right PC

[stgtech]

Hey everyone. Im looking for alot but heres basically what ive got in mind.

Needs to run lighting software fast, and as trouble free as possible.

Especially Magic Q

Pentium or higher processor

· 64MB RAM

· 1024 by 768 screen resolution, 16bit or 24bit colour

· Windows 95, 98, ME, XP, 2000

 

Has to be a laptop, planning on getting Elo Touch Screen to go with it.

Wouldn't hurt if it could run Adobe Premiere Pro and Photoshop as well.

Needs to be able to run Capture atleast slowly.

 

I was thinking the Intel Dual Core 2.0GHz, or is it worth the several hundred more for the 2.13 GHz?

2 Gigs of Ram

120 G hard drive

128MB NVIDIA® GeForce™ 8400M GS

Dell Vosotro Business laptop. ( I was gonna go with the Hp Tz-1000 because it has a built in touch screen but I think that the touchpads on the Hp laptops are kinda sticky.

Any Recommendations/Changes would be appreciated.

[themadhippy]

How about dual booting ,xp for the day to stuff and a cut down minilised install of linux for magic q, as a side note capture will run under wine on linux ,very slow on an athlon 2100 ,but still works

[mac.calder]

You could buy almost any computer on the market these days and it would cream your minimum reqs. In fact, any PC made in the last 10 years should meet those minimum specs for LX software. The only issue is $.

 

However visualisation etc is more a graphics card/ram issue than processor. 'Business laptops' usually contain rubbish Graphics cards.

[stgtech]

sounds great! how would I go about installing Linux and Windows on the same PC?

 

and I added in the specs for the graphics card too...sorry bout that.

[Bryson]

I think that question would be better suited to a computer forum.

[niclights]

Indeed.

 

As said any machine will meet the specs unless you want real time visualisation at which point you suddenly need fastest processor and GPU you can afford. Otherwise just go with minimum specs of Premiere & Photoshop which will be far more demanding than lighting control.

 

With laptops I would choose whatever had the nicest pad/keyboard and was strongest. Or get a Powerbook!

[Matt Riley]

We're certainly dancing on the edge of what is a pc question and what is a lampie question. If you really want a bulletproof one, then the panasonic toughbook is a good option, if you just want a well built, relatively reliable lappy which will cope with the road fairly well then I've had good luck with either a macbook or dell latitude - although I'm not sure about the graphics requirement.

 

It may well be that getting a tablet pc would work out cheaper than buying a seperate screen BTW.

[maeterlinck]

Hi stgtech,

You should be able to find a laptop that will meet your specification nicely. You may well hit some pitfalls when going down the laptop route though. For running the software you're talking about you need lots of memory (RAM) and a decent GPU (graphics card). I don't know the minimum specification for Capture but would guess it will only get quicker the more power you give it.

With this is mind I would suggest looking at either Gaming level laptops, or consider a small form factor PC. The latter would give you the ability to upgrade the machine in the future, whereas your abilities with a laptop are far more limited, usually only extra memory, HD replacement, additional expansion card.

These two companies both sell gaming laptops are I've had good experience with them:

http://www.ebuyer.co.uk/

http://www.novatech.co.uk/

There's also many other companies out there that sell machines aimed at the gaming environment. Of course if these machines are too expensive then a decent business level machine with lots of memory will work.

For a more computer focused forum try: http://forums.bit-tech.net/. They're a nice bunch and I'm sure they'll help you out.

 

Dual booting to Linux can always be a good idea and MagicQ can run natively. However, Wine can be hugely CPU intensive, sometimes making performance a distant dream. Another idea could be to have a dual boot Windows installation. Boot1 for day to day and Boot2 for show stuff. Remember Windows performance and stability issues are caused by the software you install on the machine (including Microsoft products) and generally not the OS itself.

 

I hope this helps, and that it actually makes sense! :)

[paulears]

Moderation: CONTENT CONTROL - as members have mentioned, we are very firmly in PC territory here - the only Blue Room link being that some of the software will run lights. The OPs questions seem to have been answered, so I'll close this now.