Laptop Recommendation For Work

[Private Browser]

Hello LTT users,

 

I was wondering if I could get some input from you when considering a laptop purchase.

 

Currently my employer gives us field technicians a $1,250.00 laptop allowance to use towards the purchase of a laptop we will be using in the field for A/V work. This laptop is considered to be a mix between personal and professional because if we stay with the company for 365 days after the purchase of said laptop, the laptop becomes 100% our personal property (so I am willing to add a little bit more of my own funds to get the configuration I want).

 

This being said, I have been an Apple user for the last 10 years and currently have an iMac at home and a 13" 2016 Touch Bar MacBook Pro which I have been using for personal and some work stuff with the assistance of Boot Camp running Windows 10.

 

I have been toying around with the idea of switching to Windows entirely over the last few years after I built my own gaming PC, but the investment into macOS software and familiarity with the terminology has always kept me in Apple's "walled garden." Specifically I have very little knowledge when it comes to troubleshooting and restoring Windows (What is the Windows version of Time Machine, and Carbon Copy Cloner?).

 

Living in Apple's dongle-hell they call the future has been an expensive journey thus far and I am starting to wonder if their hardware is really as special as they think it is.

 

Regardless, I have mainly been drawn to the Razer, Dell XPS, Microsoft Surface/Surface Book and the new Gigabyte Aero 15 laptop, although I'd much prefer a 13" form factor for traveling a lot.

 

The physical connections that I use most often is traditional USB-A for connecting external video scalers, audio devices for recording, HDMI for testing video signal, and ethernet for configuring web based equipment. The reason for Boot Camp on my MacBook Pro currently is to run the offline version of Watchout by Dataton, and for configuration of Datapath products using their Wall Designer software.

 

Other than that we use Dropbox heavily at my company (disk space is a must, or at least the ability to upgrade later), along with using <insert video editing software of your choice> for re-exporting or tweaking content for clients on the fly. iMovie works in most cases for low-level stuff, but I've moved towards Final Cut Pro X for a bit more control, however I am very interested in the newest version of Resolve and will test that program lightly moving forward on my current Mac machines. I am also a light Logic Pro user, mainly for recording guitar at home and I am leaning towards switching to Bitwig for cross platform compatibility, and thankfully my RME audio interface seems to support every OS nicely. Lastly I have had great success with Pixelmator on macOS for making basic pixel maps and still image content if needed for clients on the fly since it is basically the poor man's Photoshop. I have heard of and lightly used GIMP, but I am unaware of any other 'affordable' image editing applications that are compatible with Windows.

 

We all have Microsoft Office365 under our corporate license with Microsoft so that works on either Mac or Windows platforms.

 

Losing the ability to use AirDrop, iMessage and other "fun but functional" Apple technologies would be disappointing, but the trade off is that I would no longer have to enter a terminal command to see my data transfer rate during a file transfer and other pieces of detailed information which I find Macs lacking from time to time.

 

Obviously the "virus" scare in today's day and age applies to basically both Mac and Windows platforms equally since Mac malware and etc is skyrocketing, so I have been using MalwareBytes for the last couple months, is there anything else you can recommend?

 

Thank you very much for reading and I am very interested in seeing recommendations!

 

-Benjamin

[openthatchest]

• The Razer Blade is one of the most powerful laptops if you are able to afford it. a 1060!

[The Sloth]

Just now, openthatchest said:

• The Razer Blade is one of the most powerful laptops if you are able to afford it. a 1060!

with overheating issue, not recommended. 

[The Sloth]

OP get a Thinkpad, xps 15, msi vr stealth those are good laptops, if you want reliability xps 15 or thinkpad takes the cake. 

[Private Browser]

Just now, nerdslayer1 said:

with overheating issue, not recommended. 

Good to know, I'd rather an export take 5-10 minutes longer than blue screen a laptop in the middle of working on a project for someone.

[Taswell]

if i was you I would start looking into a bussiness grade laptop with thunderbolt support and go for an external gpu enclosure. So you wont feel out of place at work and you can still play some games at home. killing two birds with one stone. and if you turn out hating windows you have only blown the money you spend on the enclosure and gpu which you could sell later.

 

If you want a recommendation I have been using a thinkpad x1 carbon (2014) for a few years as my out in the field laptop, it has an proprietary Ethernet adapter so that kinda sucks sometimes, but it hasn't been to bad

[Private Browser]

2 minutes ago, nerdslayer1 said:

OP get a Thinkpad, xps 15, msi vr stealth those are good laptops, if you want reliability xps 15 or thinkpad takes the cake. 

 

Thanks for bringing up the Lenovo ThinkPad stuff, I haven't looked at them in a while because I heard that they have been having issues lately? Dell definitely looks promising.

 

Just now, ITheSpazI said:

if i was you I would start looking into a bussiness grade laptop with thunderbolt support and go for an external gpu enclosure. So you wont feel out of place at work and you can still play some games at home. killing two birds with one stone. and if you turn out hating windows you have only blown the money you spend on the enclosure and gpu which you could sell later.

I like the idea of Thunderbolt 3 support as I am completely on-board with the connection type moving forward, however having it be your ONLY connection type is annoying on my MacBook Pro. 

 

Do you have any brands in mind for recommendation since it seems that Razer has been having some issues? I was really looking forward to the Razer Blade Stealth. 

[Taswell]

5 minutes ago, Private Browser said:

 

Thanks for bringing up the Lenovo ThinkPad stuff, I haven't looked at them in a while because I heard that they have been having issues lately? Dell definitely looks promising.

 

I like the idea of Thunderbolt 3 support as I am completely on-board with the connection type moving forward, however having it be your ONLY connection type is annoying on my MacBook Pro. 

 

Do you have any brands in mind for recommendation since it seems that Razer has been having some issues? I was really looking forward to the Razer Blade Stealth. 

Lenovo X or T series are pretty good, Dell XPS series, Asus Laptops are good (usually expensive)   Ive never seen a razer laptop in person so I have no idea what they are like