PC laptops

Slightlydelic · Post by **Slightlydelic** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 3:29 pm

looking to make a purchase of a PC laptop, budget upto £500 for the laptop, seperate budget for soundcard. anyone got any tips on what i should be looking for ive no experience with laptops in a music setting. or external sound cards.

im prety sure i read something on here regarding compatability of chip sets when it comes to making music but not sure what it was getting at and cant find the thread.

looking more for performance & compatability info than robustness, also ideas for portable soundcards.

curently running live 8.04 with APC & padKontrol.

thanks in advance.

Earwax69 · Post by **Earwax69** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 1:41 am

I would personnaly go for a Dell Studio 15, 2.4ghz, ati HD 4750, 4gb for 899$. It a really sweet looking aluminium laptop and the quality is great. You can upgrade the HDD from 5400rpm to 7200rpm for 50$.

http://www.dell.com/us/en/home/notebook ... redirect=1

Oh and for that price the screen is LED 1080p (1920x1080) which give you a lot more place to play in Ableton. Try to find a Dell coupon for get a discount on google.

outershpongolia · Post by **outershpongolia** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 2:45 am

Slightlydelic wrote:i read something on here regarding compatability of chip sets when it comes to making music

If you're going to use firewire you'll want a Texas Instruments chipset.. Other than that Idk.

evolwizard · Post by **evolwizard** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 3:37 am

(biting tongue)

outershpongolia · Post by **outershpongolia** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 5:28 am

evolwizard wrote:(biting tongue)

Do you have something to add or are you going to say "get a mac"?

3osc · Post by **3osc** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 5:53 am

What you may want to consider is a laptop with an ExpressCard 34 slot and then you can get one of these.

evolwizard · Post by **evolwizard** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 5:58 am

Do you have something to add or are you going to say "get a mac"?

What?!....

outershpongolia · Post by **outershpongolia** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 8:05 am

evolwizard wrote:
Do you have something to add or are you going to say "get a mac"?
What?!....

andy c · Post by **andy c** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 8:38 am

The Dell studio range did have a very bad DPC latency problem that made them unusable for audio work, i know i had a studio 17 and had to sell it on. They do look good on paper and with out this problem would really smoke i had a 7200 HD fitted as well. I think they have released a bios update to address the problem but do your research before parting with your cash i got stung big time. just google dell studio dpc latency to get a feel for what is going on with them. I ended up with a bog standard acer aspire and though not perfect gets the job done.

evolwizard · Post by **evolwizard** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 1:55 pm

OK!....

Slightlydelic · Post by **Slightlydelic** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 2:08 pm

thanks for the info guys, this is a tough chice for me as im just not keen on laptops at the best of times, i would be more than happy to give a MBP a try but i cant justify that kind of outlay.

considering how much portability i need, an iMAC might be a doable alternative, and it seems to have a better price performance ratio than the MBP.

Anubis · Post by **Anubis** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 7:17 pm

Awkwords wrote:What you may want to consider is a laptop with an ExpressCard 34 slot and then you can get one of these.

...or you can just pass GO and collect one of these

Earwax69 · Post by **Earwax69** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 11:23 pm

Jeeeeesus! I did not know about the latency problem!! Its only for laptop? (im on a dell desktop) Is it fixed or not because I was planning to get a studio... they are the best performance/price ratio here in japan. Most laptop are overpriced here and Apple are 400$ more than in the USA. Only Dell got their price right, even lower here than in America. Here the Studio 15 is like 700$.

EDIT: found this recent thread here on the forum;
http://forum.ableton.com/viewtopic.php? ... 34&start=0

Look like the newer Studio 15 work better than the older 1535... The guy say there is no latency at all and everything is fine. I guess the best is to go to a surface store and load dpc latency checker in the machine!

EDIT 2: If you use a usb audio interface, is all of this become a non issue??

outershpongolia · Post by **outershpongolia** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 11:41 pm

I use a dell Inspiron 1525, I will probably post my results with dcp later, I remember it being not too bad, but I remember a few spikes happening.

evolwizard · Post by **evolwizard** » Sun Sep 13, 2009 2:18 am

What?!....

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