I need a new laptop for music production, what kind of specs should I look for? I'm guessing 8GB or up and an SSD...

>msi

Attached: msi_thermal_paste.webm (1280x720, 2.98M)

Don't get a gaymen laptop

At minimum you should be looking for a quad core, either a Ryzen 5/7 or an Intel 8th gen Core processor.

SSD is definitely a must, and 8GB RAM should also be a minimum, although you may want to get 8GB single DIMM and add another 8GB.

You should be looking for a business line laptop unless this is literally going to be sitting on a desk all day, in which case you should consider a desktop anyway.

MSI only makes gaymen shit. Their motherboards are good, but their laptops are shitty desktop replacements.

Jow Forums loves everything that is unappealing to normies
also lurk moar

what the fuck is this
why did he do this

>soundcard
This is someone who doesn't know jack shit

Get a laptop with a gtx 1080 in so the fan is loud as fuck.

what's "gaymen"? I'm sorry, I'm not a Jow Forums regular if you haven't guessed by now. What do you mean by "business laptop"? I figured I should be looking for gaming laptops.

a high end CPU and lots of usb ports

>gaymen
gamer
>business laptop
glorious thinkpad

sweetwater.com

find something nice and see if it's available in your area.

why would I get a "business" laptop for music production and video editing?

hey, thank you for this

>Is MSI really worth it?
Only the GT75 Titan-056. Everything else is rubbish, but most other laptops are also rubbish. Take that for what you will. Don't think you're gonna get a laptop that's under 17" that's gonna get good thermals.

bc it's thinkpad™

>the only laptops they have are Macbooks
huh, really makes you think

OP im going to make you mad now because you're acting retarded, but you need to answer some questions or everybody here is going to start trolling the fuck out of you, its already starting to happen.

>What is your Budget?
>Do you plan on recording people?
>Do you just want to make music on the computer in some fancy software?
>Do you want to do anything else on the computer, ie multimedia editing, such as video editing or gaming?

These are all fundemental questions that affect the outcome of your original question.

Because they contain workstation graphics.
If it doesn’t have “Quadro” “FirePro” or “Vega 64” in the name, you are buying gamer trash (see GTX, Radeon, Vega56).

You need compute performance, so an i7/Xeon/Ryzen 5 minimum alongside a workstation card. Not some i9/GTX 1060M gayymurr housefire.

"gaymen" is what Jow Forums calls gaming

Business laptops like Dell's Latitude or HP's Probook/Elitebook line are usually better constructed and come with longer warranties. Compare a current Inspiron vs a current Latitude, the Inspiron flexes and is obviously made completely of plastic, while the Latitude uses better materials like magnesium alloys.

You could build a PC capable of what you're doing and get a "cheap" $500-$1000 laptop for about the same price as a high end "production" laptop would cost.

user will probably be forced to use pro tools anyway. i remember fl studio working with razer a while back so there is that if user wants to go the windows route.

At minimum you need a shit tier computer with probably a shit tier midi keyboard and some free daw software.

Potentially you might need a computer with good thermals, low noise, high performance and good IO, as you will need supplimental hardware in the form of an external audio/midi interface.

This is a very open ended questions and your opening statements, suggest you want a laptop, which makes us think, oh so you need to be portable, which causes issues for noise, because powerful and portable with good IO dont generally mix.

To me you sound like somebody new, which isnt a bad thing but i may want to suggest you just start by buying a cheap mid tier laptop and midi keyboard and buy some software like reason or fruity loops and start there.

I'm not going to recomend you build some crazy i9 4k setup or buy a nuc hades canyon with nvme 970pros and 1000 dollars worth of rackmount usb/firewire audio/midi/adat interfaces

>a Ryzen 5/7 or an Intel 8th gen Core processor.
so none of these would make sense, right?
>ebay.com/itm/Lenovo-Yoga-720-15-6-Touch-256GB-SSD-Core-i7-7700HQ-2-8GHz-8GB-Silver/332833758427?epid=237246994&hash=item4d7e701cdb:g:H5oAAOSw4WFbrVu8
>ebay.com/itm/Dell-Latitude-E7450-Core-i5-5300U-2-3Ghz-8GB-RAM-1TB-SSD-14-WIN10-Pro/183475708744?hash=item2ab8012348:g:bT4AAOSwwdpbcLP8
>ebay.com/itm/Acer-Aspire-E-15-15-6-Inch-Intel-Core-i5-NVIDIA-940MX-8GB-RAM-512GB-SSD/192680373724?epid=1569600227&hash=item2cdca52ddc:g:ZFYAAOSwJK9bgADs
>ebay.com/itm/New-Acer-Nitro-15-6-FHD-i5-7300HQ-8GB-RAM-256GB-SSD-GTX-1050-Ti-4G-HDMI-WIn10/283199324254?epid=26020357779&hash=item41effec05e:g:QucAAOSwfhxbmpW6
>ebay.com/itm/Acer-Nitro-5-15-6-Gaming-Laptop-Ryzen-5-2500U-8GB-256GB-SSD-RX-560X-Win-10/153168556620?epid=12021099683&hash=item23a98eb24c:g:wfwAAOSw-cFbkGY7:sc:USPSPriority!12603!US!-1
>ebay.com/itm/Dell-Inspiron-7373-13-3-256-GB-Intel-Core-i5-8th-Gen-8-GB-RAM/232955489428?epid=240283503&hash=item363d3aac94:g:9WAAAOSwcjdbbwVW

You're not making me mad, I'm already aware how retarded I look and sound
>What is your Budget?
under $750
>Do you plan on recording people?
yes, myself
>Do you just want to make music on the computer in some fancy software?
I use FL Studio
>Do you want to do anything else on the computer, ie multimedia editing, such as video editing or gaming?
video editing

No. This is gaming shite.

store.hp.com/UKStore/Merch/Product.aspx?id=T7W01ET&opt=ABU&sel=NTB

>under $750
Give up and build a mini itx desktop
>b-but
No. If you’re in anyway serious about production, you’d save up longer and either buy a decent business laptop/workstation, or get it on credit.

The Inspiron looks good if you take care of your laptops. If you're someone who abuses their equipment you may want something more durable.

>intel integrated
Get out.

okay, thank you.

What would be an appropriate mid-tier laptop though? I had an ASUS UX360CA that I was producing on but it was built like shit and then it broke. Honestly I would prefer not to get a flippy 2-in-1 bullshit laptop, they all seem flimsily built.

>$1900
yikes
thank you for the response though

which is it, boys?

OP is not buying a gaymen laptop.

Intel integrated GPU is more than good enough for FL studios.

>video editing
Are we talking about producing music videos or rendering, adding effects, creating new videos etc.?

If it's the latter, you really should be building a desktop anyway, you'll spend way more money on inferior hardware for that kind of work if you buy a laptop.

From experience, I can give you some tips on music production.

You can get a decent tier i5 laptop with 8GB of memory. Get a M-Audio or whatever is hot now audio interface and a cheap midi keyboard. Pirate FL Studio and all the Native Instruments plug-ins.

Can’t tell you about recording or video editing.

I’m surprised people still use FL studio. Ableton Live was taking over like cancer when I gave up the hobby.

I have my old M-Audio interface if you want it. Don’t know if it’s still supported driver/firmware wise though.

If you're not having to do any actual rendering of the videos you're creating (e.g. you're just clipping videos and adding music to them) Intel integrated is fine.

8gb of ram is trash for serious production plus the integrated graphics will use some of it for memory. So you’re down to maybe 7.5. That and a low power dual core, Jesus. I told you, he needs a dedicated workstation card or a desktop

buy a used roland mv-8800

>tfw eBay doesn't have a business laptop section

>Are we talking about producing music videos or rendering, adding effects, creating new videos etc.?
As of right now, the former. I do understand that as I get more into more filmmaking stuff I'll need a more intensive computer but as of right now I'm just focused on making music.

that might work then

Attached: 1537974936370.png (354x328, 174K)

Alienware 15 or 17. They are going to have the CPU horse power you need for working with many VSTs at once. They fluctuate in price based on market value so you can score a good deal on one. You are able to upgrade a lot of the components inside and they laptop itself features a lot of ports (many of which are on the back which help with wire management for a desk/studio space). Doesn't have the longest battery life in the world, but it's a great laptop if you want almost like a desktop replacement that you can still move around.

8th generation i5s are all quad cores except the 8200Y which isn't available with this laptop, and by default the integrated GPU is typically set to use 128MB. Even so, I recommended earlier adding another 8GB if he went with 8GB to start with.

I really appreciate the offer, but I don't even know what an M-Audio interface is

fat neets cant afford anything else

>Music production
Congrats, you found the one area in which a Mac might be the best choice. Proper, low latency audio drivers (unlike Windows) and native VST support, unlike GNU/Linux. Get at least 16GB RAM and a big SSD, all those instrument libraries eat a lot of space.

>1.8ghz
Lmao and music production will use all cores so bye bye turbo

amazon.com/HP-840-G1-Professional-Refurbished/dp/B07C1HV2V1

amazon.com/Acer-Aspire-A315-41-R001-Ryzen-Windows/dp/B07BJTF8QC

what about these two?

and you're one of them

>you need a "top of the line" soundcard for music production
dumbass

.

Install Gentoo

.

Currently using a MPB Mid 2014 Retina 13" i5/8GB/128GB config, runs FL 12.5 in bootcamp fine as far as I'm aware, no latency as far as I've found.

On the flipside, got a HP Elitebook 2570p i7/8GB
and runs exactly the same.

honestly, I would recommend looking at design/weight/dimensions if you're looking to use your laptop portable; i.e not as a desktop replacement - and REALLY IMPORTANT - GET YOURSELF SOMETHING a 1080p+ RESOLUTION DISPLAY

that's the only crutch of using the HP over the Macbook, got barely any real estate to use FL properly.

Up to you if you want an SSD, but depending on your type of genre; like, if you're producing rap and need loads of samples, storage size might be better over speed, but then there's always external drives and such.

Sorry for the bloated post.
And apologies for picking something random, but remember having a dedicated GPU will help extend the life of your laptop too, in terms of performance.

amazon.com/8th-Gen-i5-8300H-GeForce-FireCuda-Windows/dp/B07BP9QG2J/ref=sr_1_27?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1539059369&sr=1-27&keywords=laptop

holy fuck, user, thank you so much.
I really appreciate this.

Acer laptops with Dolby have good sound quality (even on linux)

>Acer laptops with Dolby
Is there any one specifically you'd recommend?

I have an Aspire 7 A715-72G-73QB. It has very good sound quality. I had a Aspire V3-571G before. It also had way better sound quality compared to my mom's Asus, but this new one is even better

avoid ryzen, it's shit

don't fucking pirate you're giving yourself malware

>I need a new laptop for music production, what kind of specs should I look for? I'm guessing 8GB or up and an SSD, but what else?
8 GB minimum memory. 16 GB optimal. 32 GB overkill. As much storage space as possible (trust me, if you can get 4 TB as an option, do so).
Honestly? Just get a MacBook. There's a reason you see so many fucking musicians using it. I know Jow Forums hates it with a passion but sometimes you just need to ignore their memes.
Holy fuck I remember trying to install the necessary drivers for an audio interface in Windows some time ago. Took 4 hours; 3 reboots just for a single little piece of equipment. And I learned the hard way that that little piece of equipment could be completely destroyed if plugged in before installing the appropriate driver.
macOS has a lot of built-in plug-n-play functionality, so there's a lot less setting up to do.

You don't want to lug a desktop around and moving files back and forth from a desktop to a laptop is just totally fucking unnecessary, especially if you already have a laptop powerful enough to handle live shows anyway.
>why do you need to be mobile?
What is touring?
>no laptop will have top-of-the-line sound card
Audiophile snake oil.
If it's good enough for Tame Impala, Grimes and Nine Inch Nails (all musical acts lauded for amazing production and audio quality), it's good enough for some random 'tist on the internet just looking to get started.

>runs FL 12.5 in bootcamp fine as far as I'm aware
You realize FL Studio is now compatible with macOS, right? Generally it seems like hell is freezing over with DAWs recently, what with FL Studio becoming available for Mac and with Reason allowing external VSTs n shit.

laptops are terrible for music production their tiney PSUs and battery shit fuck up the Dacs inputs and outputs. they are only really suitable for working with pre recorded digital samples and not even rendering the final song on it but taking it to a better computer with less digital distortion.

and no a external dac doesn't fix this I used to get crackel and popping on my laptop with the latest GPU driver because of power management fucking up the digital signals even with a USB sound device it still happened don't know how it works but it does. AVOID

Lmao this thread reminds me of a professor in my uni who got an MSI gaming laptop for 2k quid because he wanted a strong laptop and the place he went to just ripped him off and gave him an helicopter instead.

>Proper, low latency audio drivers (unlike Windows)
If you're a retard who sticks to the native drivers, sure.
Everyone else just uses ASIO drivers, which are as low-latency as Mac's.

>native VST support
Windows supports many times more VSTs. Especially if you pirate (which OP will have to do, since he seems poor), on Mac you're gonna have a much limited choice.

What the fuck are you doing on Jow Forums?

How does rendering the song on a shitty laptop differ from rendering on a good computer?
Unless you're recording on tape or something from your 3.5 jack, it will be all digital and there will be zero difference.

uh...what?

used thinkpad

I use a 11" tablet PC i bought for $160. I also have more talent in my pinky toe than most "musicians" out there.

wtf

thank you, I was interested in Acer. My last laptop was an ASUS and it was shit.

yeah, I prefer Windows OS but I'm starting to understand that perhaps I should just try to get a Macbook. There's a store somewhat close to me that does Apple certified refurbishes.

what tablet PC and link your work

OP, if you're still here, I'm a producer from the /prod/ thread.

Don't listen to people here. They don't know anything about music production and will suggest you the dumbest things that have nothing to do with your needs.

Since you have a limited budget, you're gonna have to compromise on one thing or another.
You obviously can't have the best processor, GPU, screen, SSD, etc. so you need to prioritize.

The most important thing is the CPU. It's what's gonna bottleneck your system as soon as you use too many synth voices or plugins.

Depending on the type of music you make, RAM could also be very important.
For example, if you use sampled libraries like Kontakt or have ALOT of samples playing at once, you want all of those to fit on your RAM, so 8GB should be minimum. 16 is nice but you can probably get by with 8 unless you want everything "live" (meaning not consolidated to just one audio file) all the time.
On the other end of the spectrum, if you just make simple synth music (think chiptune or synthwave), even 4GB won't be a problem, but I still suggest having 8 because you'll probably also have other things open (like a web browser, some messaging app, etc).

Another important thing is the storage.
Having an SSD is nice because it loads everything quickly and if you have many samples playing off of it at the same time it will be able to keep up with the bandwidth (while a slow HDD will cut out once inna while), but honestly you can't afford an SSD without compromising on other more important things, so get a spinning hard drive (possibly a 7200rpm one) and simply load your samples into the RAM when you're working with them.

1/2

You need at least 250GB of storage (and if you only have that much, an external drive will be necessary), which will be expensive if you get it as an SSD.
I suggest getting a computer that has at least a 1TB HDD, and after some time replace it with a smaller SSD (I suggest 512GB at least) when you can afford both a new SSD and an external spinning drive (as big as you can).
Also I'd get an equally big secondary drive to backup your files in case your computer breaks (perhaps get it before the SSD+external combo).

A good resolution on the screen is also gonna be pretty nice.
1080p will fit enough stuff comfortably (especially with FL's floating windows everywhere), but if you're used to producing with a lower resolution, consider keeping on it if upgrading to a higher one is too expensive.
At the end of the day a low res screen is only a problem if you're used to a high res one. If you're not, you'll be fine staying on a low resolution.

The GPU isn't important at all for music production. At all.
For basic video editing an integrated one will be more than enough.
If you can find a laptop with a good CPU but no dedicated GPU, get it.
If every good laptop you find also has a dedicated GPU, then enjoy it I guess. It will probably be lacking somewhere else, but what can you do...

The sound quality will probably be garbage on any laptop of your budget.
If you want good quality recordings and low noise when you're listening, get a USB interface.
You plug your headphones, monitoring speakers, microphones, instruments, etc in that instead of the computer.
If you want to record someone, plugging the mic in your computer jack will give you super shitty results.

The rest isn't really important for music production (but will affect your experience with the laptop, which you can't afford to care about).

Use this information to choose a laptop that gives you the most bang for the buck while compromising the least on things that are important to your situation.

2/2

>FL Studio is now compatible with macOS
It's not even a year old, and I wouldn't trust such a complex program to be reliable or bug free for at least a couple years.
Not to mention the fact that virtually the entire FL Studio community is on Windows, so support for eventual problems will be very lacking.
If he's switching to Mac, I suggest switching to Ableton Live as well (while perhaps keeping the MacOS version of FL installed for some small things), like every producer is apparently doing.

>Generally it seems like hell is freezing over with DAWs recently, what with FL Studio becoming available for Mac and with Reason allowing external VSTs n shit.
They have to find new ways of attracting customers after the scene started leaving all these other DAWS to consolidate into Ableton.

yes, refurbished apple is the way to go. however, it's really like 10-20% off if that

No worries, if you still need any help feel free to re-make this thread on something like reddit with a throwaway account, post the thread url here and I can get incontact with you more directly if needed.

Take care and have a lovely day, good luck user.

I got it because it's what my other artist friends use, so it makes collabing easier with sending project files and stuff - plus, I thought for plugin/vst's there would be more compatibility within Windows

>but what else?
probably an audio interface, external hard drive, and software.