Is my laptop strong enough for video editing?

[Sna0605]

Hi there, 

I have issues with my laptop Lenovo:

System-SKU: LENOVO_MT_20S4_BU_Think_FM_ThinkPad P14s Gen 1

Everytime i want to edit some video's the playback or the preview monitor can't play this smoothly. It's always with framedrops, it's always with lags, i can't even make a mask because it's so much troubleshooting. 
I already tried; cache media, i tried working with proxies, i tried working on the lowest resolution. I tried everything that already exists on the help pages. Ofcourse IT is a little bit anti Adobe. So when they choose my computer they made their decision on photo-editing and not on video-editing. They say it's a laptop who are used for architects and ingeneers. But how is it possible that when i work in premiere pro or any other video editing program it just doesn't run smoothly. I can't work. 

the specs; 

SKU system: Systeem-SKU LENOVO_MT_20S4_BU_Think_FM_ThinkPad P14s Gen 1
processor: Processor Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-10610U CPU @ 1.80GHz, 2304 MHz, 4 core('s), 8 logische processor(s)

GPU 0: Intel (R) UHD Graphics

GPU 1: Nvidia Quadro P250

it's an SSD

GPU memory: 0,6/7,9GB

Shared GPU-memory: 0,6/7,9 GB

i work on windows 11: Version 10.0.22631 Build 22631

If it turns out that my pc isn't good enough, what are possibilities to make sure it is good enough? Can we add some hardware? or do you recommend to ask for another laptop? 

i  wanted to do a screen-shot video but even that doe'sn work because it just shuts down every time i record it so great!!! 

It decided to try da vinci resolve, but i can't work with that and i already use photoshop, indesign illustrator... i't just so easy that everything can be combined together, so i want to avoid this. Hopefully somebody can help meeeee

[Sna0605]

maybe also nice to know: i found out that my laptop doesn't support hdr. 

[Peru Bob · Accepted solution]

If it turns out that my pc isn't good enough, what are possibilities to make sure it is good enough?

By @Sna0605

I don't think upgrading that (if possible) would be cost effective.

[RjL190365 · Accepted solution]

I'm afraid that Peru Bob is correct in this case. That entire laptop is too weak by modern standards. And its Quadro P520 (there is no P250 at all) is so weak that it bottlenecks even the weakling CPU. Worse, the P520 has no hardware NVDEC decoder or NVENC encoder at all while the 10th-Gen Comet Lake U's integrated graphics is a gimped version of the integrated graphics that's inside most 10th-Gen desktop Comet Lake CPUs (with fewer render units and lower clock speeds to boot). Thus, all H.264 and HEVC decoding must go almost entirely to a CPU that is already struggling to keep up at all (plus, the integrated UHD Graphics 620 isn't of much help here).

Worst of all, practically none of the internal components (CPU and GPU) is user-upgradable at all.

As a result of these shortcomings, the only fix is a completely new system (desktop or laptop).

[Sna0605]

okay, that's very clear, thank you! 

I will tell this to the IT-department. 

[Conrad_C · Accepted solution]

As usual, the analysis by RjL190365 is excellent.

Another way to look at the differences between your laptop and what people use today is to compare what laptops running current software tend to have:

• At least twice as many CPU cores, today even many budget laptops have 8 CPU cores.
• At least twice as much RAM, today most would start with 16GB but many prefer 32GB.
• A much more powerful discrete GPU, often with at least 8GB memory of its own. This is because current software depends heavily on GPU acceleration to speed things up.
• Video encoding/decoding processors to accelerate video and take the load off the CPU, pretty much standard today.

It’s good that you have an SSD, what is critical for performance is keeping a lot of free space on it. A SSD with low free space will slow down the rest of the computer.

[Sna0605]

okey, thank you for this! it's very clear, what i have to do now. 

Change my hardware. 

[Sna0605]

Maybe we change to a desktop computer, wich is very good for me. But now they say i have to come up with good hardware. I know the basics but that's very much it. Can you guys do some recommendations? 

[Peru Bob]

See here:

https://www.pugetsystems.com/solutions/video-editing-workstations/adobe-premiere-pro/hardware-recomm...

and here:

https://www.pugetsystems.com/solutions/video-editing-workstations/adobe-premiere-pro/