Looking for new laptop

[alessiozampa]

Hello everyone,

 

I'm from Italy and i'm new in this forum. I read a lot of tutorials on cgarchitect and i found this site probably the best in web.

Now i'm looking for new laptop. I'm a yacht design student and i've to choose between these 2 models:

-Dell xps 15 (fhd, gtx 960m, i7 Quad core, 16gb ram, 512 ssd)

-Thinkpad p40 (wacom technogy good for my sketches, quadro m500m, i7 dual core, 8gb ram, 512 ssd).

I often use Autocad, Rhino, 3D Studio Max, Vray, and sometimes a CFD software.

Which laptop will you buy considering my needs?

 

Thank's in advance for your advices!

 

Ale

Edited April 13, 2016 by alessiozampa

[alessiozampa]

Any advice?

[Nikolaos M]

Does it have to be a laptop? Have you already got a desktop?

[KuzysiekNowotka]

It depends, if you need to use pen for your work and not spending a lot of time rendering images then go with p40, but when you are more serious about 3d then XPS would be a better choice since it has better cpu, gpu and more ram.

[alessiozampa]

Yes, it's necessary for me to work on a laptop and this will be my main support to model.

[joelmcwilliam]

Hi Allesio,

 

before giving advise I think you should give some more info about how you work. Like: do you sketch a lot or model a lot? Do you have a wacom tablet and stuff?

 

Hard to give advise if you don't provide more info.

 

If I don't know which hardware is better, which in the case of laptops can be diffucult, I usally go here: http://www.userbenchmark.com/

[joelmcwilliam]

O, and thumbs up for Nikolaos M. Dude, you have helped so many people and always have stay nice. Awesome! I think you have done a wonderfull job and all on your on free time. Respect.

[Dimitris Tolios]

Both of the 2 laptops mentioned are very nice "luxury" portable devices. The XPS15 is bigger, thus given the $/euro it can pack more punch than the low voltage parts the ultra-portable P40 does. The XPS is more of a MBP competitor, while the P40 is more of a Surface Pro one.

 

If you are to be rendering / doing multithreaded tasks on this, the XPS will be the better choice - again, given enough money for upgrades/customization.

 

As a student, I would prefer to go for a more value oriented & user upgradable solution. Usually those come in the form of "gaming" laptops. More RAM, more SSD, bigger body = room for higher TDP CPU & GPU.

Edited April 16, 2016 by dtolios

[KuzysiekNowotka]

Even from the box its a better choice for 3d.

[alessiozampa]

Thank's a lot for your advices guys!

[sydnk]

Hi

I'm also looking to buy a laptop from Germany. I have about 900 Euro. And, I work with 3Ds Max and Revit.

these are the things I have come up with until now;

 

The ASUS X751LB- T4240Tcharacterized by the following specific product characteristics:

43.94 cm (17.3 ") glare type

1920 x 1080 , Full HD16: 9 format

Intel® Core® i7-5500U (2x2,4 GHz, 4MB Cache)

with up to 3.0GHz Turbo Boost

NVIDIA GeForce 940M (2GB)

8 GB DDR3-1600 RAM

1000 GB HDD

DVD drive (DVD R / W, CD R / W)

WLAN 802.11 b / g / n, Gigabit LAN

VGA, HDMI, 3x USB 3.0

Windows 10 64 bit

 

 

 

The ASUS X756UB- T4089T is characterized by the following specific product characteristics:

 

43.94 cm (17.3 ") glare type with LED backlight

1600 x 900 (HD +), 16: 9 format

Intel® Core ™ i7-6500U Processor (2x 2.50 GHz, Turbo max 3.10 GHz, 4 MB cache)

NVIDIA GeForce 940M with 2GB VRAM

8GB DDR3L-1600 memory (2x 4GB)

1000 GB hard drive (5400 rev / min, SATA) + 128GB SSD

DVD-Super Multi D / L Double Layer

WLAN 802.11 b / g / n, Gigabit LAN, Bluetooth 4.0

VGA, HDMI, 2x USB 3.0 and 2x USB 2.0

Microsoft Windows 10 Home 64 Bit

 

 

Now, I think Dell is better than Asus, but, I can't afford it.

 

Question:

 

Cashe: Is a 4 Mb cashe good enough for me? or "Not at all!!!!"

Storage: which one is better? SSD + HDD Or SSHD

Ram: how much does it cost to upgrade a laptop with 8 Gb Ram to 16 Gb ? and is it necessary in my case?

 

 

thank you guys!

[joelmcwilliam]

Hi

 

Question:

 

Cashe: Is a 4 Mb cashe good enough for me? or "Not at all!!!!"

Storage: which one is better? SSD + HDD Or SSHD

Ram: how much does it cost to upgrade a laptop with 8 Gb Ram to 16 Gb ? and is it necessary in my case?

 

 

 

Don't worry about cache. The main thing is to get the i7.

 

Dont worry about SSD + HDD Or SSHD. You will just have to settle with what you laptop comes with at a certain price.

 

You can look up ram prices. Do your research to see what kind or ram is placed, like 2 x4 gb or just 1 x 8 gb. In the case of 1 x 8 gb you can ad another 1 x 8 gb into the laptop. With 2 x4 gb you will have to repace both sticks wit two 1 x 8 gb sticks in case you find it necessary.

 

Do a youtube search for best laptop below xxxx dollar.

 

Have a look at here: http://www.notebookcheck.net/Benchmarks-Tech.123.0.html

 

Some interesting stuff:

 

Toshiba P50-C-17F

Medion P6661

 

or

 

Medion Erazor X7841

 

http://www.revitforum.org/hardware-infrastructure/75-revit-hardware-general.html

 

Have a look at the site of medion and see what you can get for your money.