We are looking to purchase 2 Laptops to work with Vegas Pro. Just wanted some advise on the config for Laptops. Something that is not overboard on price. But good to use with editing and rendering.
Any suggestion would be greatfull.
Jeff
The starting point is to take into account the recommended specifications for Vegas Pro as per: https://www.vegascreativesoftware.com/us/specifications/#productMenu
Note that there are higher requirements for 4K and above than there is for HD; consequently, a laptop meeting 4K specs (something like a Dell Alienware or a Dell XPS laptop) is going to be more expensive than a laptop meeting the lower spec'd HD format.
It would therefore be useful if you could advise what video format (i.e. HD or 4K or higher) you intend using, what format your video media is likely to be and from what source (e.g. camera type), and what format/media to which you are intending to finalise (e.g. DVD, BD, memory card/stick, YouTube, etc)
Having met those specifications, get the largest, best quality screen you can afford.
That said, on a laptop, "Best Quality Screen" does not mean "Highest Resolution." Just try editing for two hours on a 15" 4k laptop; eye fatigue can set in rather quickly.
We are just using HD video which is recorded from our NewTek Tricasters. Due to the TCV being able to switch from multi cameras and NDI format imputs. Our cameras are all HD cannon versions. So we are not doing any 4k videos and most likely will not be for a while. Our rendering is set to 1920x1080 MP4 formats. And them same for our live streaming. I was looking for the 15.6 screens as that is what the minister wanted due to size and portable. But I think it would be better to a 16in or higher screen.
But I think it would be better to a 16in or higher screen.
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Look for one that has a dedicated GPU and can sustain high wattage to both CPU and GPU without thermal throttling. You should see some gaming laptops go on sale around Black Friday.
Personally I'd get Intel 12th gen CPU for Vegas
For some away-from-home editing I bought a new and very powerfull laptop - with i.e. a Nvidia 3060 mobile GPU etc - just to get negatively surprised how noisy it is when it blows all the heat out of that little laptop cabinet. Even simple previewing makes quite disturbing noise. Rendering makes you want to leave the room.
Laptops are all about heat management. Good point about the noise tradeoff which can make audio editing a challenge.
I have decided to purchase this laptop for video-editing- especially since here you have an HDR display with 550 nits integrated. But I have to start to test that with Vegas Pro 20 and other NLEs.
Let us know how it works! Looks like a great screen. An SD card reader and reasonable number of ports is great, too.
I wonder why they offer an i9 given these power limits: "140 watts total TDP (50 W CPU and 90 W GPU)" or up to 75W sustained for just the CPU. I think I'd look for the i7s.
Noise in the 40dB range is pretty good though so overall the tradeoffs seem reasonable.
I have decided to purchase this laptop for video-editing- especially since here you have an HDR display with 550 nits integrated. But I have to start to test that with Vegas Pro 20 and other NLEs.
If possible stay away from i9 CPUs (at Intel Gen 10, 11, 12 and remains to be seen Gen13 soon to be released). Thermal throttling will mean you could not use their capacity. Actually, it is even very difficult to utilize i7 capacities for more than 10-15 secs. From there on, CPU frequencies have to be lowered because of laptop's physical thermal dissipation limits.
For those who are interested in finding out the reasons for this, read on:
In recent years a few laptop manufacturers (notably Dell's Alienware line) have been trying their upmost to design units with improved t° handling. However the culprit of this t° race has been Intel, that was unable to optimize their manufacturing lines for most of the past decade and got stuck mostly at their 15 nms fabrication process, so when TSCM delivered 10nms (then 7 nms and now 5nm and even 3 nms), AMD got them with Ryzen being released on these fabrication efficient smaller nodes together with clever architecture designs.
That was when Intel decided to upend their frequency performance (so 90° and 100°C working temperatures had to be supported) straining their hardware and the rest of the industry to accommodate these insane high temps.
FFWD 2022 and we find that Intel asks Taiwan's TSMC to manufacture most of their 13th Gen CPUs plus keeps claiming their own manufacturing facilities will be on par soon. So their newest CPUs are expected to sustain the same high freqs (4+ MHz) than their past _overclocked_ versions, this time functioning at lower temperatures and THEREFORE good vented laptops will finally sustain high levels of performance at more reasonable t°s. A trend that timidly started started since gen 10-11...
@jkerry You might be interested in reading the good advice shared very recently at
https://www.vegascreativesoftware.info/us/forum/experiences-with-high-end-gaming-laptops-and-vegas--137651/
The Ryzen version was not available. Beside that, they state that they have implemented an innovative cooling system. I will use the machine for Vegas, Resolve and Edius - and will see if the constrains mentioned by you will take place.
https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/intel-laughs-at-thermal-throttling/?amp
Intel is fine but the price premium for high end processors and GPUs that are so power constrained doesn't make sense to me.
First tests show, that this problem does not take place during editing. I still have to see how the rendering works.
The problem is more, that BRAW 6K footage shows a limited playback performance in Vegas (but that was the external harddisc). So, depends more on the footage you wish to edit.
Could you do a Vegas render benchmark to see how it compares against other high-end laptops and desktops?
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1Exbi4K3hbxw6snJuisR1ble-0tCPVNcIcNnx0BAtSIM/
Not sure if I find the time. Still exploring the system. Today much faster external SSDs have arrived. BRAW runs much better using such SSDs. Now I see here a great performance.
Up to you. Is Braw making proxies automatically?
I will try to check the render benchmark in the evning.
The Pocket 6K Pro does not generate proxies automatically. So, that has to happen by Vegas. If you need them at all - because it takes long time.
Well, I mean in Vegas unless you change the defaults it's proxying the Braw files as they are over 4K, so if you're using preview it's not the Braw file. I've only tested Braw on SSDs and can see high data rates could be an issue for HDDs.
Great to hear on the benchmark, I look forward to your results. If you don't have much time just do a GPU-assisted MagixAVC render in UHD and then UHD Mainconcept. Keep an eye on CPU GHz speed and temperature through the renders to get an idea if the laptop needs to reduce performance under load.
Well, I mean in Vegas unless you change the defaults it's proxying the Braw files as they are over 4K, so if you're using preview it's not the Braw file.
I have changed the defaults that no proxys are generated in Vegas - for 2 reasons: it takes very long to render the proxys from the 6K BRAW footage; and they are useless, since grading changes are not reflected in the proxys. The raw workflow is still not finished in Vegas.
I've only tested Braw on SSDs and can see high data rates could be an issue for HDDs.
That is an issue, since the 6K BRAW files that I have here require something about 300 MB/s. The harddrive, that I have used in the first step, is capable of 125 MB/s only. Now I got one that can about 1000 MB/s - and that works much better.
Great to hear on the benchmark, I look forward to your results. If you don't have much time just do a GPU-assisted MagixAVC render in UHD and then UHD Mainconcept. Keep an eye on CPU GHz speed and temperature through the renders to get an idea if the laptop needs to reduce performance under load.
I have no experience with this test. Will see if I can work that out.
Have uploaded two tests.
Thanks for uploading- it looks like it's performing similarly to a Sager laptop with 12th generation i7 and similar GPU. The desktop equivalents do somewhat better but overall strong times and if it's not too hot or noisy looks like a well-enginered machine!
Understood on BRAW and agree the proxies are mostly useless as it's like looking at a different file. I decided to move working projects to an internal SSD (2TB ones have gone on sale of late) so disk speed won't be an issue going forward).
Overall, my impression is also that the machine is well designed. So I do not see the issue, that it becomes too hot.
The data rates are really an issue with BRAW. Especially, the fast external SSDs that I have purchased tend to go again and again to 100% data utiliziation. Even if the SSDs are specified for up to 1000 MB/s - but they wait from time to time. Still exploring this issue.
BRAW has the disadavantage that the files are still huge - so to use an internal SSD has clear limitations. Unfortunately, I have only 1TB in the system, since my assumption was always to work using thunderbold 4 and external drives.