New laptop from PC Specialist

[mushy]

Hi

I have read with interest all the talk of computers. My current laptop is 7 years old. It has 8 GB of RAM, a 128 SSD and an extra 500 GB HDD. It has no graphics card. It's perfectly functional and OK to date. But I have been thinking about an upgrade for some time and my rekindled interest in photography may serve as my excuse for a new toy.

I have always bought from PC specialist and want to do so again. They are a company whose sales service and after-sales support is superb and I like to support them. I need a laptop rather than a desktop as I have no study and it lives on the kitchen table. I need to be able to just shut it down and put on the shelf during mealtimes. I currently have it placed on a cooler/riser when in use.

I have been looking at the laptops from this range: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/17-gaming-laptops/

I want a 17" monitor and it is this range that has the graphics cards I see others talk about
My thoughts are to get one with:
- 32GB Ram
- 500GB SSD (for operating system and related programs. Could get away with 265GB but the difference in price isn't material)
- a 2nd 256/500 GB SSD for various chess related things (chess tablebases take up a lot of room...)
- a 3rd 500gb / 1 TB SSD for photography related things

The question I have outstanding is:
a) Will a four core 15 processor be sufficient (I imagine so!) and is a 6 core overkill?
b) on a laptop (even with the extra thermal paste and using a cooler/riser) won't a 6 core simply overheat?
c) Is there a material difference between a GeForce GTX 1650 graphics card and a RTX 2060 ?
d) Is there a material difference between a 120Hz FHD Panel (1920 x 1080), 45% NTSC display and a 144Hz FHD Panel (1920 x 1080), 72% NTSC ?
e) advice on size of 3rd SDD for photography. 500GB sounds quite big and I imagine I could just periodically delete stuff I don't want (which may in any case be best practice)? or do people find they like saving everything!?

Thanks in advance for help and advice

(PS. I realise that my willingness to pay for a new laptop but not an Adobe subscription may strike some as odd. Just the way my brain works)

 

[toohuge]

For photo editing ram, processor cores and processor speed are your friend. So a 6 core is preferable over a 4 core and iirc i5’s don’t hyper thread either.
The gpu options matter for intense gaming and possible video rendering depending on your software package. A few photography suites now use gpus for rendering but it’s very software specific.
The screen refresh rate is again - only for gaming - the larger colour garmut may or may not be of use to you. Some prefer it - others manage fine without.

3rd hdd size - that’s up to you and your workflow. I have 2 240 gb ssds in my desktop and delete stuff once I’m done working and long term storage is on OneDrive. I don’t keep raws. But there’s no right or wrong way and this is totally up to you. I prefer having my raws on ssd as transfer and loading into software is much faster.

 

[Major Eazy]

Hi


- 32GB Ram


The question I have outstanding is:
a) Will a four core 15 processor be sufficient (I imagine so!) and is a 6 core overkill?
b) on a laptop (even with the extra thermal paste and using a cooler/riser) won't a 6 core simply overheat?
c) Is there a material difference between a GeForce GTX 1650 graphics card and a RTX 2060 ?
d) Is there a material difference between a 120Hz FHD Panel (1920 x 1080), 45% NTSC display and a 144Hz FHD Panel (1920 x 1080), 72% NTSC ?
e) advice on size of 3rd SDD for photography. 500GB sounds quite big and I imagine I could just periodically delete stuff I don't want (which may in any case be best practice)? or do people find they like saving everything!?

In today's technology, any laptop will do fine, as long as it got a minimum of 8GB of RAM.

I see, you opt for 32GB RAM, and that is really GREAT! The more RAM the merrier.

What difference does it make if you want a 4 core or 6 core? if you want a GTX 1650 or a RTX 2060? And all that stuff? It is like comparing the difference between a 1.6 and 1.8 engine in a car. In my option, it is the humans that is the difference, in the same way as it boils down to the drivers that makes the difference.

My suggestion is...

Aim for a minium of 8GB RAM, but since you're aiming for 32GB, I would say "Go for it!"
If you want 17" monitor, then go for it.
500GB SSD is better than 265GB, after all, it's called future-proofing, sometimes updating the software leaves temporary junk files that could grow in size.
If needed, can't you try to add the 2nd and 3rd drives together? Instead of 256GB (2nd) SSD and 500GB (3rd) SSD, why not aim for a single unit of 1TB (or 2TB) SSD?

As for question e: It really depends on you. If you are the kind of person who prefer to delete unwanted and bad photos, then you've answered your question. Sometimes I keep bad photos to remind myself of my mistakes, after all, I got spare room on my hard drive for every photos. Sometimes I would still delete them anyway.

Even if you feel 500GB is too much for your needs, it would help to go for it anyway, after all, it's called future-proofing your machine. I have a 250GB SSD for Windows and application software only, with a 4TB HDD for my own files, and my 4TB is already more than half full just 5 years after I got it. But that's because I download iTunes movies. (Thankfully I have 3TB HDD what was for the kids, but the kids are older and moved out, so I'm going to be using that 3TB.)

You never know, in a few years time, you may decided to upgrade your camera to one of those models that have more MPs than before, so the file size of your photos had gone up, eating up more of the storage space. Or your rekindled interest in photography resulted in you taking a lot more photos than before, so you ended up needing more storage space.

If you can afford it, better future-proof it by going for the 500GB (or 1TB) instead of the 256 (or 500).

For most people, they would save money by buying a model with less storage space, only to find out later on, they end up spending more money upgrading, when they could have saved money, time, and effort by buying a model with more storage space in the first place.

Well, that's just my option.

 

[Snapsh0t]

I agree. Put in 2TB as the second SSD now to save messing about later. Partition it if you want to separate chess and images but it's easier just to have two top-level folders. It's also easier to add the third SSD at a later date than to have to move data around in order to replace a smaller one.

 

[stevewestern]

We've bought a few from them too, and I'd suggest that you ask their opinion to add to what you get here. Good honest advice that has saved me money on one occasion..

 

[ancient_mariner]

- a 2nd 256/500 GB SSD for various chess related things (chess tablebases take up a lot of room...)

I'd go for 1TB and....

- a 3rd 500gb / 1 TB SSD for photography related things

Make that a 2TB HDD for storage.

a) Will a four core 15 processor be sufficient (I imagine so!) and is a 6 core overkill?

More cores are better for faster processing. There's no such thing as overkill in this price range.

b) on a laptop (even with the extra thermal paste and using a cooler/riser) won't a 6 core simply overheat?

Depends on the thermal management, but when pushed hard for a while laptops can
throttle their processors, even with 2 cores.

d) Is there a material difference between a 120Hz FHD Panel (1920 x 1080), 45% NTSC display and a 144Hz FHD Panel (1920 x 1080), 72% NTSC ?

NTSC refers to colour gamut among other things, so it's likely to be better to select a monitor with a wider gamut - choose the 72% for editing images. https://www.lifewire.com/lcd-monitors-and-color-gamuts-833038

 

[mushy]

Thanks everyone.

Does having a graphics card make a big difference?

 

[andrewc]

Some photo editing packages make use of the graphics cards processing facilities to speed things up. Adobe does. Not sure about the others.

Personally I would prefer to have a really good 15" screen compared to a so-so 17" screen for photography.

You will build a collection of external hard drives for photo storage. I tend not to delete photos, largely because I consider storage cheaper than my time. Sometimes I revisit photos I didn't think worked at the time and process them in different ways.

 

[Major Eazy]

I agree. Put in 2TB as the second SSD now to save messing about later. Partition it if you want to separate chess and images but it's easier just to have two top-level folders. It's also easier to add the third SSD at a later date than to have to move data around in order to replace a smaller one.

Yeah, I agree with @Snapsh0t about two top level folders, one for chess-related and the other for the rest of the photos, which would be better than two separate hard drives for each subject.

Because depending on your settings in Windows. What most people don't realise is that when you move an image file from one hard drive to another hard drive, it copies to the other drive instead of move. If you have a file that is related to chess on the wrong drive, you move it to the right drive, you could be unaware that you copied, not move.

You would have to check your Windows setting, and remember to use either the Shift or the Ctrl key, or not at all, when drag and drop between drives.

But if you have bigger storage space like 2TB, and have two top level folders (as @Snapsh0t pointed out) then when moving files from folder to folder, if on the same hard drive, they will move, not copy.

Remember that if you chose to have one disk drive, but partition it into two, Windows treat it like two separate drives, so if you think you are moving the file, you are really copying the file.

Too many copies left behind on the original drive, does result in the hard drive's storage space being filled up, if you didn't realise they were still on there.