Laptop Purchase Options

[YDG]

My friend is looking for a laptop and his budget is 600 dollars. The primary use of the laptop is for recording/mixing and for live sets when he performs. He uses a lot of heavy-weight music programs. Any help?

[Uronacid]

I used to do sound recording because I was in a band in high school. If he's going to be doing sound recording then he doesn't want a laptop. He wants a desktop. Here's why:

1. Sound Cards: Laptop sound cards aren't built to handle high quality sound. He's going to have to purchase an external sound card from M-Audio or yamaha if he wants high quality sound. With a desktop he can utilize a sound card that's dedicated for sound recording, they also work better than an external sound card because they have more bandwidth and can usually handle more devices at once.
   Internal Recording Card with 10in/10out: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16829121011
   Internal Recording Card with 4in/4out: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16829121120
   External Recording Card with 4in/4out: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16829121001
   On top of that, the one I mentioned is USB so there is going to be quite a bit of lag between when your sound is actually entering the microphone and hitting the computer. It's a really big pain in the ass. If you're going to go with an external solution you'll most likely want FireWire and that's significantly more expensive.
   
   
2. Hard Drives: HDDs are another issue with laptops. You'll need a fast HDD to reduce the lag between sound hitting the mic and being recorded on the drive. Cheap laptops have 5400RPM HDDs built into them. This is too slow for quality sound recording. Slow HDDs result in less time recording and more time syncing sound clips. Also, when you record/edit sound, you don't use MP3s. RAW sound data is quite large. With a laptop he will need to purchase at least a 500GB external drive, but even that won't be a good solution as sound data is very valuable to an artist. You will need to backup this data. Laptops/External drives are far more vulnerable to being bumped and damaged. I would recommend purchaseing two 500GB drives, one for recording and one for backup. If this was a desktop then both drives could sit in the chassis and mirror each other. Also, if this was a desktop the money wouldn't need to be spent out-right as the drives would be less likely to be damaged and it would be an easy upgrade down the road if he couldn't afford it immdiately. This brings me to another issue.
   
3. Upgrades: laptop solutions are more expensive outright. Desktops can be easily upgraded and it costs less to do so. You can't afford to mirror those drives and backup your data yet? That's fine throw an extra drive in later. You can't afford that 300+ dollar FireWire external sound card? That's fine, you have a desktop and that 300+ dollar problem just became a 100.00 solution.
   
4. Money: 600 dollars is just not enough for a laptop recording solution. If your friend is going to get a cheap laptop then hes in for a low quality recording soltuion that he will have to replace after only a few months of aggrevation.

If he doesn't then he's going to spend a lot of time syncronizing the sounds in some recording program because his laptop isn't designed for this sort of thing. The fact that he's on a budget just gives me one more reason to recommend he purchase a desktop.

A bare minimum desktop solution would cost him about 600 dollars provided he had the recording software. Seeing as how he wants to be on a budget I recommend purchasing a prebuilt computer from a manufacturer. I recommend ASUS or Lenovo because they have quality hardware. I realize the processor isn't crazy powerful, but it's dual core so it's good enough. Partition the hard drive on the first drive and mirror that partition to the second.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16883220032
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16822136073
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16829121120

He'd still have to upgrade a few things eventually. I would personally upgrade to at least a 400 watt powersupply. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16817371029

Eventually I would put in a video card that supported dual monitors so I could work off of two screens and increase preformance. Make sure you utilize passive colling though. Less sound = better: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16814127458

I'd probably purchase two of these since dell can make some really nice budget monitors: http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/product...jYAADHyNY4AAAFv

It's also important that he eventually purchases larger desktop speakers that can produce high quality sound... as an entry lv speaker I would suggest: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16836127010