Searching for a Digital Art and a bit of Gaming Laptop Worth Investing in

pbandjelly

Estimable
Oct 2, 2014
1
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4,510
Skip to the questions below for quick specifics and to skip all my background blabber.

I'm an art student studying animation and currently thinking about going into either storyboarding or animal design. For all of my life, I've basically been using laptops my parents either hand down to me or end up getting at the beginning of Black Friday and I have just dealt with the terrible speed, memory and horribleness of cheap, commercial brand laptops that aren't useful for anything but searching something on google. My current laptop does just that: barely runs enough to browse the web and hates photoshop, sai and other art programs I currently use for my classes.

Sooooo... I've saved up money and decided that it was time I find a laptop specific to my major and its needs ( I would build a pc, but I'll be moving around soon and want something I could easily pack up and take with me. Plus, I take trips to different places and I'm rarely home anyway. )

Therefore, I need a bit of advice on what time of laptop I should get or what should be in the laptop I look for. My family and I aren't tech savvy at all, so anyone and anything will be a big help!

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1. What is your budget?
$1000-$3000

2. What is the size of the notebook that you are considering?
12 inch or more, though this is flexible.

3. What screen resolution do you want?
As high as possible though mainly something that will display colors accurately.

4. Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop?
I need a new laptop I could possibly carry around school.

5. How much battery life do you need?
I usually keep my laptop plugged in anyway so an hour at the least, though I prefer as much battery life as I could get.

6. Do you want to play games with your laptop? If so then please list the games that you want to with the settings that you want for these games. (Low,Medium or High)?
Mainly Minecraft and Sims, though a few cheesy games like ZooTycoon. I'd love to play them at a medium to high settings.

7. What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo/Video editing, Etc.)
I'll be using my laptop mainly with Photoshop and Paint Tool Sai for my digital art, but I'd also like to be able to listen to music, watch youtube videos, movies and possibly install other art programs such as Illustrator and ToonBoom if I get the chance.

8. How much storage (Hard Drive capacity) do you need?
Whatever I need for many, large digital art files.

9. If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post their links.
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10. How long do you want to keep your laptop?
As long as possible. Preferably more than two years because I've never had a good, sturdy laptop that lasted longer than that.

11. What kind of Optical drive do you need? DVD ROM/Writer,Bluray ROM/Writer,Etc ?
I don't really plan on playing dvds or anything on my laptop.

12. Please tell us about the brands that you prefer to buy from them and the brands that you don't like and explain the reasons.
I do not like macs so please no macs. I was thinking about getting a Lenovo or Origin or MSI, though I'm not specific on the brand as long as it's not an apple.

13. What country do you live in?
United States.

14. Please tell us any additional information if needed.
I just need the best or at least nearly the best laptop for digital art out there. I don't really care about the weight of it, though I want a laptop that doesn't overheat since I've had so many problems with laptops overheating. Preferably, I'd like the cooling vents on the side as oppose to on the bottom of the laptop. It needs to be pretty sturdy because I'm willing to invest a lot of money into it. Also, backlighted keyboards that could change colors is super cool, but definitely not needed at all ( though I am a night owl so I do typically work in the dark so it'd be a plus. )

So yeah! Hopefully I was specific enough and not too rambly, though I probably was... but I really need to get this laptop soon because my school is starting up again and I need to be ready to continue developing my portfolio. Thank you for any help!