Affordable portable editing?

Bennp2000

Bennp2000

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Name
Paul
Edit My Images
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Currently I've got a Phenom X6 powered machine sat at home on which I run LR and PS (plus a whole host of other rubbish), its great.

However, the possibility has arisen that I may be able to go travelling at some point next year for a decent length of time. Basically (as you'll see if you've clicked my signature link), I spend all my time climbing and that's what most of my images are from.

This means that 'travelling', usually means bumming it around places not showering often enough. For example the last trip we did was 6 months around Western Europe in the back of an EX AA van. We stayed on campsites for 6 days out of that period.

This one (if it is to go ahead) will likely be to the West Coast of the US. Unlike last time (where I pretty much discovered my interest in photography), I'm keen to have the ability to edit on the move, even going away for a 3 week period this year I've got enough images to require some serious editing time when I returned. Plus, my 5dII makes considerably bigger files than that of my 1000d with which I started!

The problem is, the budget isn't high. With the trip meaning that work will cease (for both of us) and the mortgage won't, plus the cost of such a trip (actually not 'all' that bad the way we live during) means there's little left over for luxuries such as a Macbook pro with retina display.

Does anyone have any suggestions for a notebook/ultrabook/laptop that would be suitable for this? Battery life would be a major interest and I'd also love to know if buying such a device in the US would likely be cheaper (I feel it may).

I forgot to say, I'm open to any ideas. Tablets were interesting but then storage becomes an issue and I'm not sure they'll really allow enough control!
Many thanks
Paul

oops - how on earth did this end up in Talk Video? Would some kind Mod mind moving it elsewhere? (please)
 
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I know you said not tablets.....but the newer Android tablets support some spooky kind of USB. Basically, with a 3 quid cable you can jack in practically any USB storage.

I'd look into whether the Nexus 7 (or 10 depending how much space you have) would have suitable apps and then look at something like a LaCie Rugged. Photoshop Express is free and may be enough. http://www.photoshop.com/products/mobile/express/android

£230 ish would get you a 16GB tablet and half terrabyte rugged drive.

Charge off 12 volt if you're in a vehicle or toss a portable power device like this http://www.maplin.co.uk/9000mah-portable-power-bank-for-mobile-devices-636068 in your bag to run all day. That device will also charge some cameras and GoPros.
 
I'm not 'against' a tablet, (in fact I'd LOVE a nexus 7 to replace my cheapo android tablet) I'm just not sure they're quite enough?

I'd likely be running a hard drive as a duplicate backup anyhow (alongside an online solution).

The tablet route however, only leaves one copy, and then an online copy (sync'd when I get near some Wifi).

Thanks though, I'll look at PS Express!
 
Bennp2000 said:
The tablet route however, only leaves one copy, and then an online copy (sync'd when I get near some Wifi).
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I see what you mean. It's possible that you could plug in a hub and then dupe to 2 hard drives....

Depending how much you are shooting you might want to get some cheap high capacity thumb drives as a second backup. Slower and pricier than HDs but very robust.
 
it just starts getting a bit clunky... I've looked at PS Express, looks great for a phone etc. but there's no way there'd be enough control to keep me happy for ~6 months!

Thumb drives aren't going to be large enough either.
 
what about something like an I3 laptop ?
reasonable cpu speed for about 300 quid at the moment, add a portable hard drive ( 500gig - 1tb ) and something like a 150w 12v inverter to charge the thing and you should be good to go
with it being a pc existing software could be used
 
Bennp2000 said:
The tablet route however, only leaves one copy, and then an online copy (sync'd when I get near some Wifi).
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I've got a 32gb Micro SD in my tablet, great for intermediate storage, the cost is minimal now days and you could have more than one and swap them out, tiny too...
 
It is, but as an intermediate between camera and online storage/other storage it has it's uses, i dump camera cards to it throughout events as an instant backup.

Flash storage is definitely something to look at as it will take knocks and conditions far exceeding those of a normal harddrive.
 
Ok, I'm resurrecting this one with a little more focus!

I've decided that my 5d will be coming with me on my next trip, thus no handy lightweight JPGs from a Micro 4/3rd camera, instead hulking RAW files that need dealing with...

I've kind of established that tablets aren't going to cut the mustard with the volume of images I'll firstly need to backup/move from CF cards, and secondly to edit on the move.

I guess my question now is, what's the cheapest laptop that will run LR (3/4) and/or PS comfortably? I'd love it if it could also remain fairly small (a big ask I'm sure). The minimum specs on adobes site makes me dubious as to what the user experience might be like on such a lowly machine.

Another line I'm willing to investigate is running Ubuntu (or another flavour of 'nix) and Darktable / Gimpshop, thoughts?
 
Bennp2000 said:
I've decided that my 5d will be coming with me on my next trip, thus no handy lightweight JPGs from a Micro 4/3rd camera, instead hulking RAW files that need dealing with...
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Having toured the US for 3 1/2 weeks in 2011 with a 5D2 and L lenses, I sold up and went totally micro 4/3 simply because it would be easier to travel with!

Bennp2000 said:
I guess my question now is, what's the cheapest laptop that will run LR (3/4) and/or PS comfortably? I'd love it if it could also remain fairly small (a big ask I'm sure). The minimum specs on adobes site makes me dubious as to what the user experience might be like on such a lowly machine.
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You need to get away from processor power and look at what you want to achieve here. If you're used to a desktop with a decent monitor, a 1366 x 768 laptop may feel restrictive. A 1920x1080 may be too expensive though. As to processor, I'd prefer an i7-xxxQM, as they are quad core, but failing that an i5-3xxxM over an i3 (the i3s don't have turbo boost) - again if you can afford it - 5D2 RAW files take a bit of processing! Depending on how much you se PS for processing, I'd be looking at 8G memory (if you only use LR, you can probably get away with 4G and careful management of running apps as I have never seen LR use more than around 2-2.5G of memory at any one time). If you can stretch to it, replace the HDD with an SSD of 128GB+ (we have a 256G drive in our laptop). That is a BIG speed boost. Backup with external 2.5" USB drives (we bought an enclosure for our replaced 2.5" drive when we swapped it for the SSD and now have that as the backup drive). Backup religiously and keep the drive separate from the machine - if the machine gets stolen, you still have your images. Possibly take a second drive too.

Bennp2000 said:
Another line I'm willing to investigate is running Ubuntu (or another flavour of 'nix) and Darktable / Gimpshop, thoughts?
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Personally, I wouldn't do this. Not only are the programs likely to be the same time, but when you get back, you can't directly import your changes back to lightroom, so you're not going to save anything (the images are still 30MBytes in size) but you will also have to redo edits back at base.
 
arad85 said:
Having toured the US for 3 1/2 weeks in 2011 with a 5D2 and L so you're not going to save anything.
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...apart from some cash, i.e. the cost of an OS and then Software.

There's not a hope in hell the budget will be stretching anywhere NEAR an i7, 5 would still be pushing it. Really, I'm looking at the minimum spend.

I don't really want to go replacing the HDD instantly too as that'll void my warranty.

N.B. we won't be in hotels, it'll be a van (not necessarily of the camping variety) or car camping.
 
Not related to your editing problem but you would save an awful lot of time and space if you didn't need RAW?
 
Mikesphotaes said:
Not related to your editing problem but you would save an awful lot of time and space if you didn't need RAW?
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...yup, sticking with RAW though (stubborn, yes).

If worst comes to the worse I'll show RAW+JPEG and use photo mechanic or something to quickly get rid of any images that don't make the cut (to save storage). Then I'll still have the RAW to work with when I'm home.
 
Bennp2000 said:
There's not a hope in hell the budget will be stretching anywhere NEAR an i7, 5 would still be pushing it. Really, I'm looking at the minimum spend.
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Well... then choose based on your available cash with 4+GB of memory and the best processor you can afford. Budget for a portable backup drive (i.e. USB powered). There is NO WAY I'd do a trip without one. Too many things to go wrong!

You could do worse than: http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/hp-pavilion-g6-2292sa-15-6-laptop-purple-18093446-pdt.html There's a couple of the HP G6s on Currys website - just different colours of the same machine, but i5 processor.
 
arad85 said:
Well... then choose based on your available cash with 4+GB of memory and the best processor you can afford. Budget for a portable backup drive (i.e. USB powered). There is NO WAY I'd do a trip without one. Too many things to go wrong!

You could do worse than: http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/hp-pavilion-g6-2292sa-15-6-laptop-purple-18093446-pdt.html There's a couple of the HP G6s on Currys website - just different colours of the same machine, but i5 processor.
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Backup drives aren't a problem, I have those knocking around.

My budget is as little as I can feasibly get away with (hence the nod towards opensource OS and software) and is all inclusive for the trip (what I save here can go on other amenities and visa versa). What I'd like to ascertain is can things like this:

http://www.ebuyer.com/398944-zoostorm-laptop-7873-9040

run PS and LR in a usable manner? It doesn't have to be lightening quick but I'd rather it didn't make me tear my hair out and try and snap it over my knee at every opportunity.
 
Bennp2000 said:
It doesn't have to be lightening quick but I'd rather it didn't make me tear my hair out and try and snap it over my knee at every opportunity.
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Well.. unfortunately, I can't tell you that as your threshold to do that is different to mine!

I'm not sure which Phenom X6 (and whether you have it overclocked) you have but have a look at: http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_list.php and see where the two CPUs sit. You'll get a similar ratio of performance to the Passmark CPU Mark column (this tends to go out of the window when you start talking about hyperthreading which is on the i7s as that benchmarks much better than attainable real performance - but we're not talking hyperthreading here!).

Looks to be about 35-40% the speed of your Phenom (give or take). The i5 I suggested is closer to 75% of your Phenom (again depending on variety you have).

Don't forget the PC you have linked to is without OS and I'd much rather be processing using the same package away from home as used at home....
 
You will see an effect with RAM the more things you have running. 4GB will "do" if you spend 95% of your time in Lightroom only and have a couple of browser tabs open.

If you drop into PS a reasonable amount and have multiple images, you'll want 8GB.

The only machines I have less than 8GB in here are embedded machines that run things like xbmc.

EDIT: the effect of running out of RAM is to use HDD as a backing store for RAM. It is thousands of times slower to get data from the disk compared to direct from RAM. You always want to be running directly from RAM with no swap for example.
 
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ha, see that's where we differ as my XBMC box is a RasPi with a whopping 512mb!

I tend to do RAW development and cataloguing in LR and then move to PS for layers/cloning, dodge/burn and then export back to LR.
 
RasPi doesn't do some of the HD codecs very well (DTS 5.1 anyone), so I've avoided that, plus it's nice to have a PC you can drop some tuner cards in....

So... the thing to do is open up the resource meter next time your developing and see what the memory usage is. Would give you an idea if 4 or 8 is where you need to be.
 
I have an old Samsung NC10 netbook with a 640GB HDD that I use for backpacking (standard drive is 160GB). Can pick them up for about 100USD these days, battery is good for ~6 hours and it'll run lightroom (just!). That's a real bare minimum to backup and post a few snaps while you're away, along with usual web browsing etc.

Spend a few hundred quid more and you can get a much more capable machine, but I like small and cheap when roughing it in hostels!
 
I'm currently typing from an Acer D150 which is on its last legs (and served us well during previous travels). I think I put LR on it briefly but it was not only very slow but the screen seemed tiny once all of the menus were open!

With regards to the RasPi, mine is breathing life into an old SD tv, I'm seeing a pattern here lol!
 
Bennp2000 said:
I'm seeing a pattern here lol!
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Yes... you're off for a reasonably long period of time travelling to the west coast of the USA (you should do Utah/Arizona too if you are that way - my favourite place in the World - seriously) and I have a significant amount of reasonably high end PC gear..... :shrug::geek:
 
I think you have the better deal ;)
 
Ok arad85, what do you think to this:
http://www.johnlewis.com/231740069/Product.aspx

we've been looking at laptops and it suddenly hit me that ~15.5" screens means laptops are fairly large (relative to the netbook we took last time). Obviously sacrificing screen real estate isn't ideal BUT this would be easier to keep tucked away in the vehicle, and a lot easy to carry about etc.
 
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Bennp2000 said:
how can it have a zero value in the lower chart, that just doesn't make sense!
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Normally because there isn't a known reatil price for it - i.e. it's an OEM part...


Bennp2000 said:
they both score 600-700 but interestingly reviews have them running Lightroom "fine".
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In exactly the same way someone will swear blind their 8 year old computer runs as quickly as it did the day they bought it and it works "fine". I just have completely different expectations of what "fine" is...
 
Just bought myself a new notebook, an 11.8" ASUS.
3x USB (2x2, 1x3),4GB RAM, 500GB HDD, Win8, Touchscreen. Pentium 1.5GHz CPU 987.
£400 (or just shy of).

Much slimmer than my netbook and far better battery life. Getting used to the Win8 interface and touchscreen - I even find this touchpad OK (bigger than those I've used before). Model # S200E, came from PCW.
 
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