Need help with finding a laptop for after effects on a budget for ministry...

[Guest]

I need to know if this will work at all for using after effects. If not as is could I simply upgrade the ram and be ok until the ministry can afford to upgrade?

Amazon.com: ASUS VivoBook F510UA 15.6” Full HD Nanoedge Laptop, Intel Core i5-8250U Processor, 8GB D...

Thanks

[kirkeric]

Unfortunately, that's more of a maybe and to certain degree but you are going to want a pretty high end laptop.  I think the i5 processor is sufficient to a degree, the RAM and the graphics card are going to be very important.

I can tell you that I have a Surface Pro 3 that I've had for probably 4 years and is partially sufficient.  That means, yes AE will run (have not updated AE since back then though) but many plugins will not work because of the graphics support.  If they rely on GPU, you could have problems. All in all, I would expect it to run slow for sure.

I consider mine to be a very limited capability when on the road and I never use it for any complex projects.

So, in summary, I'd say go higher end, do some graphics card research to see what type support you may need and that sort of thing before springing for this.

I wouldn't feel too comfortable in this laptop.

Eric

[Szalam]

Do you absolutely have to have a notebook computer? A desktop computer or a workstation would get you a lot more bang for your ministry's buck.

[Guest]

Yes to start out with. That is the request from the guy leading it.

He had a MacBook that worked previously, which was donated.

The graphics card went out on it and he tried to see if he could get it fixed but the apple store wanted too much.

He is not very tech savy and did not get the specs on it before he got rid of it.

All he knows is that it worked to do what he needed... lol. So I am doing some research on windows based laptops.

I see the minimum requirements for Macs and windows based computers to run after effects but, I also assume that just gets you started and may not run smooth for a wider range of products.

[Kyle Hamrick · Accepted solution]

If you need it to be mobile, gaming laptops are generally what you'll want to be looking at to get something off-the-shelf. I'm not sure you're going to get much in this budget range that will be satisfying to work on.

You might take a look at refurb'd gaming setups - I have a feeling that'll get you the closest to what will work with the budget you have. Decent processor (tons of cores not necessary), decent RAM, decent GPU. You might be able to find a slightly older model that still has good specs.

[Guest]

Thanks that is what I figured.

[Guest]

Also, FYI, the ministry leader wanted me to check out a couple of specific laptops and this was one.

[kirkeric]

I would agree with the look at a gaming one.  That was a good comment in terms of a solution, as we mentioned, the RAM and graphics card are key.

Hate to drive it to a certain price but I think something in the range of about $1K will probably be closer to the mark on capability.  While, I'm not a fan myself of refurbs, there is nothing wrong with them at all and they can be an effective way to reduce that cost - I just prefer new myself.

Eric