Photoshop CS on a Laptop

[KenW]

I am looking for a new laptop to run Photoshop CS and I am not sure what processors to avoid or get with about 512MB -1 Gig ram. I am looking for one less that $1500. Any one have any recommendations or cautions.

Thanks in advance.

Ken

[mdaddyrabbit]

I would stay away from the Celeron, Pentium M, go with a Pentium 4 Chipset, as far as Ram the more the better the speed with CS you will have. CS will suck the breath out of 512K RAM I would really want atleast 1GB. I would maybe call Dell or some name brand company and tell them what I wanted and how much money I have. I am a Assistant IT Administrator for my local county government and I have found that if you call these companys and tell them what you need they will come closer to the best deal than if you customize the laptop on the internet. I personally am running a HP ZD8080US 3.4Ghz Pentinum 4 H/T with 1GB RAM and a ATI X600 256k Ram 17" WSXUGA, the worst thing about it is I only get 90 minutes out of battery but I knew that before I bought it. As soon as money allows I am going to add another Gig of RAM. Hope this helps, maybe someone else has something to offer than will help you. Good luck on your purchase!

[chris.bailey]

1) Laptop screens are not the best for Photoshop unless you go very high end. I have a Sony Vaio and its not bad but I would not use it for colour sensitive work and its way over your budget.

2) With only 512 RAM and a single hard drive CS will run pretty slowly almost whatever processor you have.

3) PS is resource hungry and battry life will always be a problem.

[lancea]

I think you first need to decide whether you're buying the laptop to use away from the mains a lot, or are simply buying one instead of a fixed desktop. If you are using it as a portable then battery life becomes very important - so I'd definitely go for a Pentium M. Fast as you can afford, and as much RAM as you can afford. Ditto for size of hard disc. Make sure you choose one with a good graphics chipset - one that isn't specially cut-down for laptop use. The dedicated graphics memory should be 64MB or better.

If it's a desktop replacement then go for a standard Pentium 4 - but then it's not really a laptop anymore - it's a compact PC :)

[ByteTheBullet]

I run CS on a 2GHz(not celeron) 256meg ram 30gig hard drive laptop. It runs fine as I only open a few(3 to 6) pics at a time(5 and 7 meg camera jpgs). I certainly wouldn't expect the same performance of my desktop from a laptop, but it is not as bad you'd think. Would more ram be better? Sure. I mainly use the laptop on trips and I have used it to process a weekend of vaction pics, but I have my desktop for major post processing. Oh, I am not a pro.

ByteTheBullet (-:

[MCB]

I have a Dell Inspiron 9200 laptop and it has no trouble at all with Photoshop CS2. I see that Dell doesn't sell the 9200 now, but the 9300 looks like pretty much the same thing. 1.6 GHz Pentium M, 1 gig RAM, 60 Gig 7200 RPM hardrive (optional, and worth it) and a 17" monitor for $1500.

You can get the UXGA monitor (1920 x 1200) for a little extra. I like it, but it's not everyone's cup of tea. It's still 17", so fonts appear a bit small for some people, and switching to the larger fonts in windows can mess up the user interface in a lot of programs.

I also have an old Dell Precision 530 workstatikon with dual Xeon processors (1.7 GHz) and two gigs of RAM. Running benchmarks on both systems (PCMark 04) shows that the Pentium M at 1.6 Ghz laptop beats the dual processor workstation by a small, but significant margin.

Also, the Pentium M uses less power, so less heat and longer battery life compared to a P4 system.

Good luck with the new purchase. I hope you get something you enjoy.

[Streetshooter]

Get a Mac.....I have an iBook that I use for working and in the studio......about $1100.00 and I get great results......I'm running Creative Suite 2....no bogging down at all.....don

[elbirth]

I have an IBM T42 that has a Pentium M 1.7ghz, 512mb of ram and 64mb video, and CS runs great. I recently upgraded to CS2 and it's a little slower, but still completely usable.

Just stay away from Celerons or the AMD Sempron. AMD Athlons, Pentium M and Pentium 4 will all be your better bets. Pentium M processors are just made for mobility and have power saving modes to save battery life. In fact, the 1.7ghz Pentium M benchmarks at the same processing power as a Pentium 4 2.4ghz.

[MCB]

Get a Mac.....I have an iBook that I use for working and in the studio......about $1100.00 and I get great results......I'm running Creative Suite 2....no bogging down at all.....don

Even though I don't use a Mac right now, I'm still a big fan of Apple and their computers. But one of the big reasons Apple is switching to Intel chips is because there is really on comparison between the iBook and PowerBook lines and what's available from Intel/AMD. The G4 in those iBooks can't begin to hold a candle to a Pentium.

I don't mean to start a Mac/PC flame war, but an $1100 iBook gets you a 12" screen and a slow G4. There are lots of good reasons to get a Mac, OS X being one of them. But the laptops... wow. Not a highpoint in Apple's current lineup.

If you've used Macs a lot in the past and are comfortable with that working environment, then an iBook or PowerBook is a great choice from a workflow perspective. But if you already have Windows software and know your way around Windows, switching to a Mac laptop is probably not a great idea.

[CyberPet]

Well, my 2.5 year old PowerBook G4 (1GHz processor with 1 GB RAM) still is faster than my hubbys PC laptop (and his is a year "younger"). So I think the current PowerBook G4's can still hold their own against any PC laptop when it comes to running Photoshop CS (1 or 2) as long as you have some RAM to play with and a fast harddisk.

[MCB]

Well, my 2.5 year old PowerBook G4 (1GHz processor with 1 GB RAM) still is faster than my hubbys PC laptop (and his is a year "younger"). So I think the current PowerBook G4's can still hold their own against any PC laptop when it comes to running Photoshop CS (1 or 2) as long as you have some RAM to play with and a fast harddisk.

Maybe, maybe not. I think if you set up an action that runs through a wide range of operations, you'll start to see a difference. Something that takes 5 minutes to run on your Mac might take 3 minutes on a PC. (top of the line PowerBook vs top of the line Dell, for example)

But how often do you do that in real life? You're probably right that you computer is "fast" if it feels fast to you when you use it the way you use it on a daily basis. I spend most of my time sitting around trying to figure out what to do next. A faster computer isn't going to help me much. :o So at some point, faster doesn't really get you any more productivity. Which is why I would say stick with a Mac if you like Macs. And don't waste a bunch of money on the "fastest" computer money can buy. It probably won't really pay off in terms of your creative content productivity.

But I bet some benchmarks would prove you wrong about your old G4. ;)
(I know, I know: lies, damn lies, and benchmarks)

[KenW]

Thanks for all the great info. I am looking for a low cost unit to fill in on the weekends and process maybe 30-50 photos a day and print them. Power is not a problem so battery consumption is not an issue. I just don't want to fall asleep while waiting for a some actions to run. Now at least I know what processors not to look at and where to spend my time comparing features and prices.

Thanks again, I do really appreciate all the experience here.

Ken