Beer glass scene creation
This course contains a little bit of everything with modeling, UVing, texturing and dynamics in Maya, as well as compositing multilayered EXR's in Photoshop.
# 1 14-06-2003 , 05:33 PM
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Laptops

I'm looking to buy a new comp, and I think I'm going to go for a laptop, what with going away to university soon, It'll be much less hassle than a desktop. I was wondering if you guys could tell me any good places to buy one, or things I should look for in a laptop. It will primarily be used for Maya, so I'm assuming I'll need lots of ram and a decent video card.


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- Jacob
# 2 14-06-2003 , 06:28 PM
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I dont know much, but I do know that alais wavefront has a list of certified hardware on their site and it includes a couple of notebooks. one of them is a Dell, I am not sure of the model.

# 3 14-06-2003 , 09:03 PM
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If your still looking for a system here’s a good place to start, I have this one for my business trips and it works grate, never had any problems, you can also have them build it to your need’s it’s really grate. Area-51m

# 4 14-06-2003 , 09:19 PM
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thanks r-tillery
great site, great products, but too much for me
I'm setting my budget at 2000 canadian (1500 US)

question for you guys..
what would be better, ATI radeon 9000, or the GF4 4200 go?


________

- Jacob

Last edited by Blinn; 14-06-2003 at 09:34 PM.
# 5 14-06-2003 , 11:13 PM
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you don't have to get that system you can have them build it to what you want. what ever M-board with ATI radeon 9000, or the GF4 4200 go?nt
I have the ATI 9500 pro, and it works like a dream..and you can get it set up to $1200 or $3000. and shiping is free..user added image

# 6 15-06-2003 , 03:18 AM
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I have been looking at the dell's. Here's one i customized, please tell me what you think.

Inspiron 5150 Mobile Intel® Pentium® 4 processor at 3.06GHz w/ 15" SXGA+ Display

Memory 256MB,333MHz,2 DIMMs

Video Card 32MB ATi MOBILITY™ RADEON™ 9000

Hard Drive 30GB Ultra ATA Hard Drive

Operating System Microsoft® Windows® XP Home

Network Adapters (NICS) Integrated Network Card

8XDVD

Primary Battery 94 WHr Lithium-Ion Primary Battery


It came to $2180 CDN, taxes and shipping included.


________

- Jacob
# 7 15-06-2003 , 05:55 AM
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Originally posted by Blinn
I have been looking at the dell's. Here's one i customized, please tell me what you think.

Inspiron 5150 Mobile Intel® Pentium® 4 processor at 3.06GHz w/ 15" SXGA+ Display

Memory 256MB,333MHz,2 DIMMs

Video Card 32MB ATi MOBILITY™ RADEON™ 9000

Hard Drive 30GB Ultra ATA Hard Drive

Operating System Microsoft® Windows® XP Home

Network Adapters (NICS) Integrated Network Card

8XDVD

Primary Battery 94 WHr Lithium-Ion Primary Battery


It came to $2180 CDN, taxes and shipping included.

Yea thats a realy good system, If you can I would drop the processor speed and add the money to the Video card and go with 128 MB With the radeon, the more memory the better. But your choice brouser added image

# 8 15-06-2003 , 09:40 AM
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blinn, you wont be happy with only 2x128mb memory - that is just enough to run winxp w/o problems. for maya on a notebook you need at least 512 mb ram to archieve anything. notebook architecture is slow enough (compared to desktop) so dont slow it down with not enough ram.

# 9 15-06-2003 , 11:55 AM
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Originally posted by Blinn
I have been looking at the dell's. Here's one i customized, please tell me what you think.

Inspiron 5150 Mobile Intel® Pentium® 4 processor at 3.06GHz w/ 15" SXGA+ Display

Memory 256MB,333MHz,2 DIMMs

Video Card 32MB ATi MOBILITY™ RADEON™ 9000

Hard Drive 30GB Ultra ATA Hard Drive

Operating System Microsoft® Windows® XP Home

Network Adapters (NICS) Integrated Network Card

8XDVD

Primary Battery 94 WHr Lithium-Ion Primary Battery


It came to $2180 CDN, taxes and shipping included.

Actually, I wouldn't go for that. The video card will slow you down and after Windows XP + Maya, you'll definitily see some slow downs because of your RAM.
Even though you're going to college, I still suggest you get a desktop. My guess is you're not going to need to take the computer to classes and when you arent working in the dorm, you can work in the lab. Build a desktop, dude. user added image For $500, I built myself:
P4 1.7 gigz
512 DDR RAM
52x (or 56x, I forget, i'm not around it at the moment) Cd Drive
48x CD-RW
Geforce 4 MX 64 Meg (I plan upgrading it)
40GB Harddrive (more than enough for me. I have less than 8 gigs taken up)

# 10 15-06-2003 , 01:59 PM
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thanks for the replies guys.
yeah, id have to agree with you about the ram, and the vid card.
the main reason i want a laptop is because I am most likely going overseas for school, and a desktop would be a real pain to ship and cost lots of money.

I'll see what i can do about the ram, and the vid card.


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- Jacob
# 11 15-06-2003 , 09:04 PM
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I go to school overseas so I just built my desktop there, instead of at home.

# 12 21-06-2003 , 06:51 PM
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Blinn- I am now in the market too. what have you decided on?

our price range is about the same too... so whatever you get order me one too, maybe we can get a discount. user added image

# 13 21-06-2003 , 08:44 PM
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hah sounds good
I havent really decided yet, almost having second thoughts about whether to just save the money for tuition. But if you find some crazy deal, lemme know!

i did do alot of research though, and for our price range, I thought dell offered the best deal. so check em out.


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- Jacob
# 14 22-06-2003 , 05:00 PM
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I am looking for a laptop as well. I can share what I have concluded so far.

Toshiba Satellite S5200-902, Pentium-M 4 2.4GHz is a good one with a really nice screen. Nvidia Fx 5600 VGA.

Dell D800 with 64 mb Nvidia 4200

Dell M50 Nvidia 64 mb Quadr0 770 something....

Dell Inspirion 8500 Nvidia 64 mb4200

I am leaning towards the Dell lattitude D800. Although waiting to see what Dell M60 is alll about.

P.S- The only thing is with Toshiba i can buy from a shop. If something goes wrong I can take it back physically to the shop and kick up a fuss.
With Dell hmmmm....hanging on the phone is not my idea of fun...


grrrr
# 15 22-06-2003 , 05:16 PM
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If I had the budget I´d go for an Alienware one. Yet again .. If I had such a budget. user added image

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