Laptop for School/Editing

[IconxDestiny]

Hello LTT! I am in the market for a new laptop and am in a bit of a tossup. I am looking for something for college along with editing photos, videos and light coding (mainly a hobby). My budget is $1500 and under. Thank you for any help! 

[bellabichon]

Approximately how portable does it have to be? If it's more of a 'desk laptop,' then you can get a pretty decent gaming one for a reasonable price, with the trade-off being heavy weight and crappy battery life. If it needs to be light and portable, then you're gonna want to look for something else. 

[TH3R34P3R]

17 minutes ago, IconxDestiny said:

Hello LTT! I am in the market for a new laptop and am in a bit of a tossup. I am looking for something for college along with editing photos, videos and light coding (mainly a hobby). My budget is $1500 and under. Thank you for any help! 

do you want 2 in 1 style, ultralight, notebook, or heavy as a desktop style laptop?

[Acrain7]

what size are you looking for? (13", 15", or 17" - those are the main three sizes from my experience)

 

also as @bellabichon said, what do you value more- performance or portability?

[ZeroDayGG]

Linus has a few videos on "gaming" laptops check those out for some solid recommends. 

 

Looking at things like the Razer Blade/Blade Stealth, ROG Zephyrus, MSI's offerings (specifically the GS65 Stealth) These are all highly portable options that would be able to edit photos and more specifically video with no problems. Most of these laptops run in configurations above $1500 (not by much in certain configs), but certain configurations can certainly be had for under $1500 (razor blade stealth) Dell also has the XPS 15 which baselines at $1000. 

[IconxDestiny]

Just now, Genericplane said:

what size are you looking for? (13", 15", or 17" - those are the main three sizes from my experience)

 

also as @bellabichon said, what do you value more- performance or portability?

 

Just now, TH3R34P3R said:

do you want 2 in 1 style, ultralight, notebook, or heavy as a desktop style laptop?

I would prefer a 13 or even a 15 inch. As for style I am not too picky. The only thing I am not a fan of are the tablets (surface pro) and I already have a desktop that is my main rig so I don’t need something that is a brick

[Acrain7]

Just now, IconxDestiny said:

 

I would prefer a 13 or even a 15 inch. As for style I am not too picky. The only thing I am not a fan of are the tablets (surface pro) and I already have a desktop that is my main rig so I don’t need something that is a brick

awesome - so you want a max 15inch laptop, that has to have a built in keyboard instead of a weird tablet-with-a-keyboard-as-an-afterthought

 

so i ask once more, performance, or portability? (nowadays you can still get great performance on a thin laptop, but awful battery life on a beefy powerhouse-of-a-laptop)

[bellabichon]

1 minute ago, IconxDestiny said:

 

I would prefer a 13 or even a 15 inch. As for style I am not too picky. The only thing I am not a fan of are the tablets (surface pro) and I already have a desktop that is my main rig so I don’t need something that is a brick

Fair enough. I personally think the Dell XPS 15" is a good option for your situation. It has an i7-8750H CPU, a 1050Ti, 16GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD. If you want, you can also shill out for the 4K version, but it's quite a bit more expensive, and at 15 inches it doesn't really matter.

[IconxDestiny]

4 minutes ago, Genericplane said:

so i ask once more, performance, or portability? (nowadays you can still get great performance on a thin laptop, but awful battery life on a beefy powerhouse-of-a-laptop)

I’d be fine with either or to be honest. It’s going to be carried in my back pack so I guess it would depend on how big the ‘performance’ one would be

[IconxDestiny]

5 minutes ago, bellabichon said:

Fair enough. I personally think the Dell XPS 15" is a good option for your situation. It has an i7-8750H CPU, a 1050Ti, 16GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD. If you want, you can also shill out for the 4K version, but it's quite a bit more expensive, and at 15 inches it doesn't really matter.

I had looked at the XPS 15! I originally was set on 4K as I photo edit but from a lot of people I’ve talked too I’ve heard that it isn’t quite necessary at 13 inches or 15 inches for that matter.

[Acrain7]

6 minutes ago, IconxDestiny said:

I’d be fine with either or to be honest. It’s going to be carried in my back pack so I guess it would depend on how big the ‘performance’ one would be

Personally i'd recommend the Lenovo Yoga 730 15" Platinum - it has an 8th gen i7-8550U Processor with 4.0GHz with Turbo Boost, a GTX1050, a 4k IPS touchscreen, 16 gigabytes of ram, and a 1TB SSD - all for $1,999, but with instant savings it goes down to $1,399.

 

I've got a Lenovo Yoga 730 13" myself, with only a measly low-clock i5 and no dedicated graphics, but even it is blazing fast, with an incredibly long battery life to boot!

 

oh also they're both 2-in-1s

[bellabichon]

6 minutes ago, IconxDestiny said:

I had looked at the XPS 15! I originally was set on 4K as I photo edit but from a lot of people I’ve talked too I’ve heard that it isn’t quite necessary at 13 inches or 15 inches for that matter.

I'd agree. In my opinion, 1080p is fine at any size up to about 24". Also, because it's 1080p, everything will run faster.

[Acrain7]

1 minute ago, bellabichon said:

I'd agree. In my opinion, 1080p is fine at any size up to about 24". Also, because it's 1080p, everything will run faster.

if he doesn't want 4k the Yoga 730 also comes in the same config but with 1080p IPS for $1,579 / $1,049 with the current savings on their website.

[IconxDestiny]

7 minutes ago, Genericplane said:

Personally i'd recommend the Lenovo Yoga 730 15" Platinum - it has an 8th gen i7-8550U Processor with 4.0GHz with Turbo Boost, a GTX1050, a 4k IPS touchscreen, 16 gigabytes of ram, and a 1TB SSD - all for $1,999, but with instant savings it goes down to $1,399.

How long have you had your Yoga for? I hadn’t looked into those at all to be honest, but I plan to now.

4 minutes ago, bellabichon said:

I'd agree. In my opinion, 1080p is fine at any size up to about 24". Also, because it's 1080p, everything will run faster.

Would you go with the XPS 13 over the 15? I like the 15 because it does have dedicated graphics but everywhere I’ve looked the 13 is “the way to go” haha

[Acrain7]

4 minutes ago, IconxDestiny said:

How long have you had your Yoga for? I hadn’t looked into those at all to be honest, but I plan to now.

Would you go with the XPS 13 over the 15? I like the 15 because it does have dedicated graphics but everywhere I’ve looked the 13 is “the way to go” haha

for video editing dedicated graphics will be a HUGE help, especially when the footage being edited becomes higher-res and longer, especially when it comes to exportation (From my experiance)

 

i've had this bad boy for almost a year now and have zero problems to report! a full charge lasts about a full day, the screen is incredibly bright, the speakers are, well, nothing to write home about, but i assume on the bigger chassis of the 15" that issue subsides at least a wee bit, and the keyboard is simply stellar, and she's incredibly light to boot!

 

oh yeah the touchpad is great too.

[DailyProcrastinator]

17 minutes ago, IconxDestiny said:

Would you go with the XPS 13 over the 15? I like the 15 because it does have dedicated graphics but everywhere I’ve looked the 13 is “the way to go” haha

 

The XPS15 does not make a whole lot of sense, getting it just to have a discrete GPU when you don't game really or do heavy compute unit tasks makes no sense. If the purpose of the laptop is for "college along with editing photos, videos and light coding" then get something that is light, powerful, and has great battery life. I have last gens Dell XPS13 and it is perfect, I use it daily for work it has fantastic battery life, solid build quality, the new i7-8750 is an amazing processor and it is perfect for what your use is. Something with a GPU means it is bigger, heavier, worse battery life, and runs hotter. I would also look at the 13" Lenovo ThinkPad, HP Spectre, and the Razer Blade Stealth.

[IconxDestiny]

42 minutes ago, JM21 said:

The XPS15 does not make a whole lot of sense, getting it just to have a discrete GPU when you don't game really or do heavy compute unit tasks makes no sense. If the purpose of the laptop is for "college along with editing photos, videos and light coding" then get something that is light, powerful, and has great battery life. I have last gens Dell XPS13 and it is perfect, I use it daily for work it has fantastic battery life, solid build quality, the new i7-8750 is an amazing processor and it is perfect for what your use is. Something with a GPU means it is bigger, heavier, worse battery life, and runs hotter. I would also look at the 13" Lenovo ThinkPad, HP Spectre, and the Razer Blade Stealth.

After looking at it I was more so considering the XPS 13 over the XPS 15. I had considered the Razer Blade Stealth but am not much of a fan of it after using my buddies. Currently I am between the Lenovo Yoga, Spectre and XPS 13. 

[bellabichon]

2 hours ago, JM21 said:

The XPS15 does not make a whole lot of sense, getting it just to have a discrete GPU when you don't game really or do heavy compute unit tasks makes no sense.

I heavily disagree. Having a dedicated GPU greatly improves timeline scrubbing, and render times.

[genexis_x]

10 hours ago, IconxDestiny said:

Hello LTT! I am in the market for a new laptop and am in a bit of a tossup. I am looking for something for college along with editing photos, videos and light coding (mainly a hobby). My budget is $1500 and under. Thank you for any help! 

Any preference on weight and battery life? Any special requirements?

 

Saw many misinformation up there but I don't have time to correct

[IconxDestiny]

5 minutes ago, GeneXiS_X said:

Any preference on weight and battery life? Any special requirements?

 

Saw many misinformation up there but I don't have time to correct

Haha no not much preference on weight! I just do not want to carry around a brick. As for battery life I’d prefer it to last me at least a day of classes which is normally 5+ hours for me plus homework!

[genexis_x]

22 minutes ago, IconxDestiny said:

Haha no not much preference on weight! I just do not want to carry around a brick. As for battery life I’d prefer it to last me at least a day of classes which is normally 5+ hours for me plus homework!

Prefer performance/gaming laptop or Ultrabook/regular laptop?

[IconxDestiny]

12 minutes ago, GeneXiS_X said:

Prefer performance/gaming laptop or Ultrabook/regular laptop?

I won’t be doing any gaming on the laptop as I have a desktop. So an ultrabook would suit me fine! 

[DailyProcrastinator]

22 hours ago, bellabichon said:

I heavily disagree. Having a dedicated GPU greatly improves timeline scrubbing, and render times.

Yeah, I won't deny that for video editing it helps to have a discrete GPU but if video editing is a hobby it's better to get the XPS13 that has much better battery life.

 

On 12/7/2018 at 12:13 PM, IconxDestiny said:

After looking at it I was more so considering the XPS 13 over the XPS 15. I had considered the Razer Blade Stealth but am not much of a fan of it after using my buddies. Currently I am between the Lenovo Yoga, Spectre and XPS 13. 

 

Yeah the XPS13, Spectre, and Lenovo are you best bet for sure.  

 

15 hours ago, IconxDestiny said:

Haha no not much preference on weight! I just do not want to carry around a brick. As for battery life I’d prefer it to last me at least a day of classes which is normally 5+ hours for me plus homework!

 

You definitely just want a 13" ultrabook, I get 6-8 hours of battery life easily with my XPS13, this is a decently heavy workload as well.

[IconxDestiny]

1 hour ago, JM21 said:

Yeah, I won't deny that for video editing it helps to have a discrete GPU but if video editing is a hobby it's better to get the XPS13 that has much better battery life.

 

 

Yeah the XPS13, Spectre, and Lenovo are you best bet for sure.  

 

 

You definitely just want a 13" ultrabook, I get 6-8 hours of battery life easily with my XPS13, this is a decently heavy workload as well.

After going and testing out a few laptops yesterday I decided I definitely want a 13 inch ultrabook of some sort. My only dilemma now is 1080p enough or will I regret not spending a few hundred more for 16gb of ram and a 4K display down the road. I’m currently scouting the internet for deals haha.

[genexis_x]

7 hours ago, IconxDestiny said:

After going and testing out a few laptops yesterday I decided I definitely want a 13 inch ultrabook of some sort. My only dilemma now is 1080p enough or will I regret not spending a few hundred more for 16gb of ram and a 4K display down the road. I’m currently scouting the internet for deals haha.

4k display - useless in smaller display, scaling issue, cuts battery life

You need 16GB RAM?