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A musician's laptop...?


Chaz
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Currently I'm at college doing a music course, and I'm looking into applying for a composition course at a university next year. So my gear is quite important.

Unfortunatly, I still have a crummy 6 year old Dell PC. So I'm looking into getting a laptop that's ideal for my needs but I'm not incredibly tech-savvy and nor do I know much about finding decent deals. So could anyone please recommend some laptops to me?

My price range is about £400-500 which is about $650-800 I'd say.

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A composition program (Finale, Sibelius, whatever) will run fine on any modern laptop. There is a nice Asus at BestBuy for $650 that looks really nice, I almost bought it myself, but instead went for an ultra-portable netbook. Even this laptop, even being underpowered from really expensive laptops, runs Finale without a hitch (as well as some recording programs).

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A composition program (Finale, Sibelius, whatever) will run fine on any modern laptop. There is a nice Asus at BestBuy for $650 that looks really nice, I almost bought it myself, but instead went for an ultra-portable netbook. Even this laptop, even being underpowered from really expensive laptops, runs Finale without a hitch (as well as some recording programs).

Out of curiosity, which version of Finale are you running? I installed the 2010 demo (on my three-year-old laptop) because I was thinking about upgrading from 2006, but the screen redraw was so slow that I decided to stick with 2006.

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ugh. don't get a laptop. buy a desktop. you can upgrade it down the line, you can add ram and HD space as you get cash, and you can add multiple monitors so that you've got more room easily.

you should also make sure it's a pc. macs are nice for certain things, but there's so much more variety of usable software and hardware on pcs. it's a bit of a no-brainer for a musician on a budget.

if you buy a laptop, you'll be back in a year saying you need a better one.

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But depending on what his situation is a desktop PC might be impractical, for example if he moves a lot or his house sucks or he's never at home. If you do decide to get a laptop, make sure you look at getting a lot of RAM. It's about the only thing you can upgrade in most laptops, so you may as well get as much of it as you can. 4GB nowadays is a decent amount but depending on your budget you may want to bump it up even more.

Macs are good, I like them, but if you are looking purely for budget options then a PC allows you to get into those low price ranges.

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ugh. don't get a laptop. buy a desktop. you can upgrade it down the line, you can add ram and HD space as you get cash, and you can add multiple monitors so that you've got more room easily.

you should also make sure it's a pc. macs are nice for certain things, but there's so much more variety of usable software and hardware on pcs. it's a bit of a no-brainer for a musician on a budget.

if you buy a laptop, you'll be back in a year saying you need a better one.

The only problem with that is some of us get inspired or want to work on music without being stuck to the same cramped workspace for hours and days on end. :P

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Out of curiosity, which version of Finale are you running? I installed the 2010 demo (on my three-year-old laptop) because I was thinking about upgrading from 2006, but the screen redraw was so slow that I decided to stick with 2006.

2006. I haven't tried 2010, but I hate all the newer ones so...

I knew there was going to be some Mac suggestions. Please don't fall into the trap that musicians "must have Macs" that is such a load of crap.

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I knew there was going to be some Mac suggestions. Please don't fall into the trap that musicians "must have Macs" that is such a load of crap.

QFT.

While I moved on from Finale a while ago, I know for a fact that a few of my friends still use 2006 in favour of the other, newer versions.

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But depending on what his situation is a desktop PC might be impractical, for example if he moves a lot or his house sucks or he's never at home.

Bingo. I need to be able to take it to and from college and right now I have no idea where I'll be staying in the future.

Also, I'm really not a fan of macs. Not going to go into why...

Thanks you very much for the advice, everyone.

EDIT: I think I've made my choice:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/SONY-VAIO-NS20ZS-15-4IN-LAPTOP-CORE-2-DUO-WIDESCREEN_W0QQitemZ360151566038QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_Computing_Laptops_EH?hash=item53dab4c6d6&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

Shall I go for it? Is there any reason I shouldn't?

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Bingo. I need to be able to take it to and from college and right now I have no idea where I'll be staying in the future.

Also, I'm really not a fan of macs. Not going to go into why...

Thanks you very much for the advice, everyone.

EDIT: I think I've made my choice:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/SONY-VAIO-NS20ZS-15-4IN-LAPTOP-CORE-2-DUO-WIDESCREEN_W0QQitemZ360151566038QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_Computing_Laptops_EH?hash=item53dab4c6d6&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

Shall I go for it? Is there any reason I shouldn't?

You can find a lot better.

Go to retail stores and look at their weekly deals.

Or go to places like newegg or cyberpowerpc.com for high end laptops.

If you're really on a tight budget, the one you just posted should be fine.

I mean there's nothing wrong with it... it's great I mean 4 GB Ram dual core 2.00 GHz but as said earlier by Prophet down there (or up there depending on your forum viewing layout) a laptop is a poor investment, it's fresh for a little while but then it gets stale and you can't really do much to freshen it up. (The only parts on a laptop you can upgrade is the RAM... the only laptops that are good investments are maybe extreme high end alienware type laptops that'll last a few years because you won't be jealous that every one of your friends and their little sisters have equally good computers for like 300$ in a years time, but other than that laptops should just be used for school)

EDIT: But seriously... it's from eBay, you should try to find somewhere it else...

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I don't know how prices go in the UK but if that's about $700... that's not too bad. The Intel Core 2 Duo T6400-T6xxx processor might be the most you can get for your price range but a T8xxx might be nicer? Faster frontside bus and more L2 cache. I hate laptop shopping. Can't upgrade most anything... and then if they're power hogs... and you wanted something for more mobility... yeah, all-or-nothin affair, really.

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