Need laptop opinions, please

[Brique]

Hey everyone!

I'm going to be picking up a laptop in the next month or so to edit on while I'm away from my desktop.  I'm wondering what your opinions are on:

15.6" screen vs 17.3"

1920x1080 vs 4k screen resolution.

Here's my use case, if you need any further insight.  I use PP for editing and AE for motion graphics. I edit in 1080p and I do a lot of dynamic linking.  I'm mostly on my desktop, but while I'm away I'd like to be able to access and work on my active projects.  When i have a strong internet connection, I'll be using a remote desktop service like gotomypc so my desktop can continue to do the heavy lifting. I've tested this with my wife's laptop and it works well.  I'll also be using a cloud service to sync my desktop work drive with my laptop work drive so i can edit offline when needed.

Which brings me back to my original question: i can't decide between 15" and 17",  and between 1080 and 4k.

I'd prefer a 15" 1920x1080 laptop like the gigabyte Aero 15 for portability and battery life, but I'm worried that the screen would be too cramped in terms of having enough space on-screen to work comfortably.  Alternately i could go with a 17" like the msi gs73vr in either 1080 or 4k, but that would be less portable.  The 4k screen would hog more battery and might be overkill.

What do you think?

[Bill_Gehrke]

15-inch versus 17-inch both at 1920 x1080 I guess it would be dependent on your eyes.

I have not experienced a 4k screen on a laptop but I would guess it would be an expensive difference that might not be worthwhile in my opinion.  You probably have to run applications at 1920 x1080 to be able to read menus

I might suggest a very useful alternative workflow that I love.  Get a Samsung T3 (or equivalent) portable USB 3.1 SSD and take any current active projects with you and avoid the hassle of a remote connection.  I use one of mine to have all the current projects so I can comfortably and smoothly work in my easy chair in the family room.  No connection required to my work station where I just take the portable USB drive for final export or disk burning.

[Brique]

Thanks for the reply, bill.  Anyone else have thoughts?

[Mizzou95]

Working in TV news I face a similar setup every day. If I am in the field I am on my laptop, if I get lucky and edit at our studios I can enjoy our dual monitors in the edit bays. We have 15 inch monitor laptops. If you don't edit 4k footage I think the 4k option is overkill and the money can be spent elsewhere. It takes a little getting used to the smaller screen but it is pretty easy, and the battery life on the smaller laptop is a bigger bonus to me than the 17 inch screen. (Plus it is a little lighter to lug around)

[Brique]

Just a quick reply in case anyone googles this down the road:  I went with the Gigabyte Aero 15 and I'm quite satisfied with it.  I dropped an Nvme 500GB ssd in the second (yes this one has two 😃 ) ssd slot, so I now have an i7 quad core (8 virtual) with 32GB of memory (upgraded), a 500GB system SSD and a 500GB nvme SSD for my media, and a Nvidia GTX 1060, all coming in at right around 5 lbs.  With the tiny bezel, it's the size of a normal 14" but with the 15.6" screen.  This is a very nice machine that runs relatively cool and is very portable.

I did go with the 1080p display (at the time of this writing 4k isnt available yet, and I decided against it anyway).  The screen is advertised as pantone certified with amazing color, and aside from a few imperfections, I'd say they weren't lying.  It's a beautiful screen.

My one disagreement with the machine is that the battery life (96whr) is nowhere near the battery life stated by the manufacturer or by the reviewers.  It's still respectable, but with the 96whr battery, which gives it a big chunk of that 5lbs weight, I had expected a lot longer.  I don't expect super endurance when editing, but when doing spreadsheets, streaming, or browsing, I thought it would run a lot longer.

Still, for what it is, it's an amazing laptop, and imo at the time of this writing it's the best laptop available for mobile editing.  And it came in at $1000 less ($2500)  than a maxed-out macbook pro ($3500).

[Bill_Gehrke]

Great Feedback Thank you.  When editing as oppose to most other applications it really sucks up the power, and generally we advise to run laptops off AC power when available.

[Brique]

Yes, when editing there's no expectation of long battery life.  My complaint was in reference to doing work that is not intensive on the hardware.

I'll add that I was pleasantly surprised that it charges very quickly, so that's a plus.