Video editing on a Laptop?

[Anonymous]

I would like some advice on doing video editing on a laptop. I hear it’s not really a way to go. I saw a PC laptop with a gig of memory, 100 gig hard drive with firewire port, and DVD writer. the salesperson said I was better off to buy a Mac and video edit from there. but I am looking to go mobile and on location without carry my desktop. any suggestions?

[Anonymous]

Best I can sugest is get a Apple Powerbook G4 they are perfect for Video Editing on the GO.

[Anonymous]

I’m using a Gateway M520 Widescreen (it’s last year’s model); XP Home, 2.8Ghz P4 with 1.5Gb of RAM and Sony Vegas Movie Studio 4 with DVD Archtect (about $90). Just moved up from an old 8mm cam to a Canon GL-2.

Zero problems.

[Anonymous]

heycisco,

Two things to consider are: the scale of your project and the stability of your equipment.

While laptops are really powerfull now, an external hard drive is almost mandatory for an intensive project. Keeping your media on one drive and your editing application on the other will allieviate strain on your equipment.

Laptops are prone to wear and tear by their portable nature. This can lead to unstable editing environments. It’d be good to check into the "failure rates" of specific models.

Many people use laptops to edit, myself included. They are a wonderfull way to bring your project with you wherever you go.

-Andrew Burke, Videomaker

[tpainter]

One of the biggest problems with laptops are the slower hard drive speeds.

Now, there is one piece of software that I would recommend — DVRack by Serious Magic. It enables you to record directly to the hard drive and enables your laptop to serve as a field monitor. I would still recommend using a more substantial desktop system for editing though.

[Author]

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