OT: Specs for Dell M4600 Laptop

Kimberly wrote on 6/25/2012, 2:54 PM
Hello All:

I'm replacing my underpowered laptop with a Dell M4600 "mobile workstation." My current weekly deliverable is a DVD running 30-40 minutes. With a new computer I will also offer a 30-40 minute BD.

I want the 15" footprint over a 17" because I travel a lot and don't want to carry a 17" around. The Dell M4600 includes a firewire port for HDV capture. I need this to be able to capture from my old HDV cameras, which are now in back-up status. However mostly I'll be editing AVCHD footage.

Sure I could just pick the most expensive hardware options with the hope that it will make my Vegas Pro 11 editing experience better, but I wonder if that is really necessary. And if more horsepower is better, is it waaaaaaay better, or just a little better, i.e., cost versus benefit.

As a result, I'm looking for some Guru thoughts on the following hardware options:

============

Processor

Intel® Core™ i7-2860Q (Quad Core 2.50GHz,8M cache, Upgradable to Intel® vPro™ technology) [Included in Price]

vs

Intel® Core™ i7-2960XM (Extreme Quad Core 2.70GHz,8M cache, Upgradable to Intel® vPro™ technology) [add $700.00]


Memory

16.0GB, DDR3-1600MHz SDRAM, 4 DIMMS [Included in Price]

vs

16.0GB, DDR3-1333MHz SDRAM, 4 DIMMS [subtract $165.00]

or even

8.0GB, DDR3-1333MHz SDRAM, 2 DIMMS [subtract $465.00]


RAID Configuration

All Hard Drives, Non-RAID, 1 or 2 drive total configuration [Included in Price]
All Hard Drives, RAID 0, 2 drive total configuration add $0.00
All Hard Drives, RAID 1, 2 drive total configuration add $0.00

I'm clueless here. I back-up my data to an external drive. I must read up on RAID.

============

Thanks all for reading and for any suggestions.

Regards,

Kimberly

Comments

NickHope wrote on 6/26/2012, 4:27 AM
I'm not really current with PC specs, but as nobody else has replied, I'll have a go. Someone more up to date might have better info though.

My gut feel is that, if I was on a bit of a budget, I would go with:

- Non-Raid, which should free up internal disk space for storage. Apart from backing up your data externally, take occaisional images of your C drive so you don't have to reinstall everything from scratch if something goes wrong. I use Acronis Trueimage for this but I think you can do it in some versions of Windows now(?).

- 16GB RAM. More memory is more important than the speed of it. Probably the 1333 speed would do.

- i7-2860Q. The other one is a lot more money for what you get. IN GENERAL I have found that the "2nd best" spec CPU normally offers the sweetspot for performance v price.
Chienworks wrote on 6/26/2012, 6:28 AM
Pretty much agree with Nick.

As far as RAID is concerned:

- non-raid gives you more storage space but less security.

- RAID 1 gives half the space (data is duplicated on both drives) but high security since having a drive die doesn't result in data loss.

- RAID 0 is useless. It used to be used for increased speed but this is no longer necessary since even the cheapest scummiest drives today are ~hundreds of times faster than the drives were back when RAID 0 was concocted to fill the need for speed. It's also the most insecure because having one drive die means that all the data on all the drives is now lost. I haven't seen anyone with a reasonable understanding of RAID advocate RAID 0 for over a decade now.
Kimberly wrote on 6/26/2012, 9:51 AM
Thanks guys.

If I understand correctly, having 16 gig of RAM over 8 will improve editing and rendering performance with Vegas?

Also a question concerning the Blu Ray drive:

8X DVD+/-RW tray Load w/Roxio and Cyberlink PowerDVD™, no media [Included in Price]

Blu-ray Disc™ with Roxio and Cyberlink PDVD™, No Media [add $400.00]

Ouch on the BD drive price! Any suggestions on an external BD reader/burner? I'm having trouble finding the posts on the external LG burner people were talking about a few months ago, and I did not find it on NewEgg.

Thanks again for your help.

Kimberly
Opampman wrote on 6/26/2012, 1:39 PM
I bought a Blu-Ray bundle from Videoguys with the Pioneer 206 and the Vantec NexStar enclosure last year (I think there is a newer model now) and it has been flawless. My first DVD burner from Pioneer is still going strong, but with a slight limp, after 8 years so I stuck with a good thing. This is the 3rd Pioneer burner I've owned and the first Blu-Ray and never had a moment's problem with them or the discs they burned (but I always use Ty premium discs). I think the price was around $150 for the case and burner.

Kent
NickHope wrote on 6/26/2012, 2:33 PM
Still happy with my LG external Blu-ray here. Bought an internal LG DVD drive a while back and been very happy with that too.

RAM... hard to say if 16GB will improve editing/rendering performance over 8GB. It might not. CPU is the biggie with Vegas. 8GB has been fine in my desktop with 10.0e and 4GB has been fine in my Dell laptop with 8.0e. Extra RAM helps if you want to render from Vegas and also do, say, Photoshop and a few other things at the same time. RAM is one of those things where it's good to err on the side of safety and chuck in more if you can afford to, to eliminate a possible source of problems. But $300 seems quite a lot for the extra 8GB. What O/S will it have?
Kimberly wrote on 6/26/2012, 2:47 PM
Hey Kent:

Is your burner something like this:

http://www.videoguys.com/Search/Search.aspx?Query=portable+blu-ray+writer

Around $130.

Kimberly
TheRhino wrote on 6/26/2012, 2:52 PM
I prefer having the Blu-ray Burner onboard because it is both convenient for me and it also appears more professional to my clients vs. having to plug-in external devices just to demo a BR disc... For instance, my (4) year-old Dell M1530 ($1500) came with an internal BR Burner. It's the laptop I use for all email contacts & for demonstrating HD videos & BR discs to clients on the road. The KEY reason I have not needed to replace this laptop in (4) years is that it plays my Blu-ray demo disks just fine - plus it hasn't died yet running nearly 24/7...

Since we keep a copy of all client data on hot swap 3.5" SATA drives, I also bring a (2) drive SATA caddy along that connects to an eSATA adapter. For short videos, if the client wants small tweaks I can typically do them right on the laptop and even burn a new BR disk while we wrap-up the meeting or go out to lunch. These are generally just quick fixes like titles or Blu-ray Menu items, but I like having the capability available without having to return to the studio.

Having to connect external drives is a pain, so if I were purchasing a new laptop today it would have (2) non-raid HDDs & USB 3.0 so I could use small 2.5" USB powered drives vs. my bulky 3.5" HDD adapter...

Workstation C with $600 USD of upgrades in April, 2021
--$360 11700K @ 5.0ghz
--$200 ASRock W480 Creator (onboard 10G net, TB3, etc.)
Borrowed from my 9900K until prices drop:
--32GB of G.Skill DDR4 3200 ($100 on Black Friday...)
Reused from same Tower Case that housed the Xeon:
--Used VEGA 56 GPU ($200 on eBay before mining craze...)
--Noctua Cooler, 750W PSU, OS SSD, LSI RAID Controller, SATAs, etc.

Performs VERY close to my overclocked 9900K (below), but at stock settings with no tweaking...

Workstation D with $1,350 USD of upgrades in April, 2019
--$500 9900K @ 5.0ghz
--$140 Corsair H150i liquid cooling with 360mm radiator (3 fans)
--$200 open box Asus Z390 WS (PLX chip manages 4/5 PCIe slots)
--$160 32GB of G.Skill DDR4 3000 (added another 32GB later...)
--$350 refurbished, but like-new Radeon Vega 64 LQ (liquid cooled)

Renders Vegas11 "Red Car Test" (AMD VCE) in 13s when clocked at 4.9 ghz
(note: BOTH onboard Intel & Vega64 show utilization during QSV & VCE renders...)

Source Video1 = 4TB RAID0--(2) 2TB M.2 on motherboard in RAID0
Source Video2 = 4TB RAID0--(2) 2TB M.2 (1) via U.2 adapter & (1) on separate PCIe card
Target Video1 = 32TB RAID0--(4) 8TB SATA hot-swap drives on PCIe RAID card with backups elsewhere

10G Network using used $30 Mellanox2 Adapters & Qnap QSW-M408-2C 10G Switch
Copy of Work Files, Source & Output Video, OS Images on QNAP 653b NAS with (6) 14TB WD RED
Blackmagic Decklink PCie card for capturing from tape, etc.
(2) internal BR Burners connected via USB 3.0 to SATA adapters
Old Cooler Master CM Stacker ATX case with (13) 5.25" front drive-bays holds & cools everything.

Workstations A & B are the 2 remaining 6-core 4.0ghz Xeon 5660 or I7 980x on Asus P6T6 motherboards.

$999 Walmart Evoo 17 Laptop with I7-9750H 6-core CPU, RTX 2060, (2) M.2 bays & (1) SSD bay...

Opampman wrote on 6/26/2012, 5:58 PM
Kimberly - Actually this is the new version of the one I have (mine is model 206). I added external case from Videoguys.

http://www.videoguys.com/Item/Pioneer+BDR-207+Internal+Blu-ray+Disc-DVD-CD+Writer+without+any+software/B42444730323254424.aspx

Kent
Kimberly wrote on 6/27/2012, 3:24 PM
@Nick Hope:

RAM... hard to say if 16GB will improve editing/rendering performance over 8GB. It might not. CPU is the biggie with Vegas. 8GB has been fine in my desktop with 10.0e and 4GB has been fine in my Dell laptop with 8.0e. Extra RAM helps if you want to render from Vegas and also do, say, Photoshop and a few other things at the same time. RAM is one of those things where it's good to err on the side of safety and chuck in more if you can afford to, to eliminate a possible source of problems. But $300 seems quite a lot for the extra 8GB. What O/S will it have?

The OS will be Windows 7 64-bit.

That begs another question -- I can run the 32-bit Vegas in a 64-bit OS, yes? I gather the 64-bit Vegas Pro 11 isn't as ready for Prime Time as the 32-bit version (which is what I have on my current 32-bit laptop). Of course I do have some crashes in 32-bit Vegas Pro 11, but it is "generally" stable over what I perceive is happening in 64-bit Vegas Pro 11.
NickHope wrote on 6/27/2012, 11:41 PM
You can run 32-bit Vegas in a 64-bit OS. i can't comment on the stability as I have never used V11 or any 64-bit version of Vegas. I was really asking to make sure you're planning a 64-bit OS. The extra 8GB RAM would be less worth bothering with on a 32-bit OS.