check out this gnarly laptop, 8 core xeon with 8gb vram option!

[Brian Merlen]

http://www.mediaworkstations.net/i-xm.html


I had been waiting until the mac pro came to fruition to make a choice. I think i should buy a laptop and hackentosh it so i can dual boot. i cant afford to kit it out now, but i figure over time i will up it, but damn its already so far beyond the specs of what apple can give me for that form factor im in no rush to max it out... 8 cores is fine by me! how do u think it will handle resolve if i get barebones with an ssd and max it out later? maybe id up the ram a little now, but i cant afford much more then that and i wanna get a new machine to try and run resolve with good performance. ever since the redcine GPU update my old machine suddenly is wonderful for redcine...but i dont even use resolve cuz its like unusable on my current machine but id really like to learn it and not upgrading has been getting in the way of doing so, and screw it im gonna buy myself something nice for the holiday. which is why i am contemplating how best to get a mobile machine for under 4k or so that will run resolve really well, and am willing to avoid apple if it can get me better performance and doesn't lock me into their shotty choices.

i saw eurocom.com


which seems to have less expensive models then the first link, and some really cheap options as well but less powerful then above. i am checking if they will hackentosh for me and support it, the first link i posted previously told me they would. so staying osx while upping my performance and minimizing head aches is the name of my game here. hopefully i can get some decent solution for relatively cheap. i want to run resolve lite, redcine, cs5 and avid only, but i think all would benefit. my primary goal tho is good resolve performance. I wonder if a single gpu will even get that for me? or i should aim to find a laptop with 2 gpus...

 

[Jarek Zabczynski]

Ugly as sin…but that's pretty badass!

 

[Brian Merlen]

they got another model that can do dual gpus, im thinking that might be better for resolve, but i can only kit that one out to 6 cores and its non xeon... but i think the dual GPUs might out weigh the other points for my purposes.. i just wish either model had TB1 or 2 on it... even just one port so i could at least have it in place if i needed it ever. none the less its good to find a place that will help me get an incredible dual boot system going that is much higher specced then any apple offerings. i had kept pushing off getting a new machine cuz i was mostly working at a post house, but now that things are slow is why im considering getting a contemporary machine to try and boost my options as far as work goes... so i have been shopping around for dual boot hackentosh options, ideally the more mobile and powerful the better...


http://www.mediaworkstations.net/laptops/i7m.html

 

[paul schefz]

not sure what the point is: definitely not cheap, no TB and i would be amazed if this thing runs for more then 25 min on battery under full load....an imac on UPC would be a lot cheaper and might actually run longer as well....portable to me means at least 2 hours runtime on full load....

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Have to agree with Paul on this one. Don't see the point of these "mobile" workstations in an overly bulky laptop form. The screens are crap, the hardware options are a bit interesting if you look at the other stuff outside of CPU/ GPU. Not saving any money here. I'd rather buy or build a compact PC in SFF cube style or build it into a Pelican case. Or a new Mac Pro with its own carrying case that could house it, external storage and a monitor.

I also find it a bit curious that there are several excellent Xeon choices for smaller form factors and single CPU configurations, yet these guys are not offering them. Their 8-core offerings are just strange and most are clocked lower than we would like.

No Thunderbolt and otherwise relatively poor connectivity for such a monster system.

If you do want the beastly laptop, I would recommend one from Origin or Boxx. The Dell Precision M is pretty good too. But when it all comes down to it, the HP EliteBook is ultimately the way to go for a monster laptop. At least they put a nice DreamColor screen on it and you can actually get a warranty worth more than the paper it's printed on.

 

[Brian Merlen]

perhaps your right and i should rethink based on the lack of TB1 or 2. it did trouble me that it doesn't have it. i wish i could get a hackentosh with support that has tb1 or 2 and better options then a rMBP. perhaps a Mac Pro is the way to go but i need to expand my budget to a 6 core with d700s i think then...