Best laptop and why? I have mid2015 15" MBP but looking every direction

[royks]

Hi

I have a mid-2015 MBP (15", 16gb RAM, AMD Radeon R9 M370X, 2gb VRAM), but am considering new.

Why? I'm not a gamer, I'm a filmmaker using FCPX, but what got me started thinking was using the Topaz Video Enhancer to upscale some SD footage. Takes a good while.

When talking minimum requirements they always talk Nvidia graphics cards. Maybe most of their biz is with PCs.

Not having been interested in buying I haven't looked around much, but now I see there are laptops considerably cheaper that many consider superior to MBP (Dell XPS 15 (9500) maybe).

Now on another thread here re 2021, I see guys talking about Ice Lake and Tiger Lake CPUs.

Can someone please please please tell me a little about the world of laptops these days, maybe what they think best and why.

I've been a Mac guy since my first computer (2000), and I'd rather not change, so how does MPB 16" 2019 and into the future look regarding AMD vs Nvidia and CPUs present and future.

Can new Apple MBPs do a quicker and better job than my mid-2015er using Topaz to upscale footage? I'd love to know that.

regards

royks

 

[bill-p]

If you're getting a 16", and you know you will need more than 2 monitors with it, consider the 5600M model.

Dell XPS 15 9500 has its fair share of issues: bothced battery life, inadequate thermals under high load, trackpad wobbly, screen color profile messing up when you wake the computer from sleep, etc... but overall, it's not a bad computer if you want something smaller and slightly lighter than the 16" MacBook.

Anyways, the 16" should be better than your 15" in every way except the Touch Bar. I have a mid 2015 15" still, and it's not a close fight. The Core i9 is more than twice as fast as the Core i7 in the 2015.

 

[royks]

Thank you, thank you! Your input much appreciated.

And how would you compare their GPUs, AMD v Nvidia, I presume. (Yes, Nvidia may own top end, but at this pretty decent level, I want something to run multi-layers of 4K on FCPX and render out Topaz's Video Enhance upscaling software.)

Thanks again, you got me thinking and planning (and dreaming)!

royks

 

[Macral]

Thank you, thank you! Your input much appreciated.

And how would you compare their GPUs, AMD v Nvidia, I presume. (Yes, Nvidia may own top end, but at this pretty decent level, I want something to run multi-layers of 4K on FCPX and render out Topaz's Video Enhance upscaling software.)

Thanks again, you got me thinking and planning (and dreaming)!

royks

You might find good insight from watching this review about the 5600M GPU:

 

[pshufd]

Hi

I have a mid-2015 MBP (15", 16gb RAM, AMD Radeon R9 M370X, 2gb VRAM), but am considering new.

Why? I'm not a gamer, I'm a filmmaker using FCPX, but what got me started thinking was using the Topaz Video Enhancer to upscale some SD footage. Takes a good while.

When talking minimum requirements they always talk Nvidia graphics cards. Maybe most of their biz is with PCs.

Not having been interested in buying I haven't looked around much, but now I see there are laptops considerably cheaper that many consider superior to MBP (Dell XPS 15 (9500) maybe).

Now on another thread here re 2021, I see guys talking about Ice Lake and Tiger Lake CPUs.

Can someone please please please tell me a little about the world of laptops these days, maybe what they think best and why.

I've been a Mac guy since my first computer (2000), and I'd rather not change, so how does MPB 16" 2019 and into the future look regarding AMD vs Nvidia and CPUs present and future.

Can new Apple MBPs do a quicker and better job than my mid-2015er using Topaz to upscale footage? I'd love to know that.

regards

royks

Do you have to have a laptop? I've migrated most of my stuff to a Windows desktop and hardware is so much less expensive. I have two 15 inch MacBook Pros (2014 and 2015) but they are used much less these days. If you want a workhorse and size and weight are an issue, you might look at the Dell Precision 7740. The nice thing about the 7700 series is the flexibility and ability to expand after purchase.

 

[phoneme]

everyone has different needs. but i have been a long time lenovo fan just recently retired my T430s which is an 8yr old laptop. and just decided it was time to get something newer. so i went with the lenovo yoga 4th gen. battery life is great at about 10-12hrs, it has a touch screen, battery can replaced if needed years down the road, and it has a pen. which i use all the time because i'm always needing to sign documents sent to me via email.