Another what laptop thread - sorry

gibson123

I want to buy my daughter a new laptop / tablet but I am not sure what I need. She is 14, loves art and music and does both, uses skype to talk to friends.

her current tablet is ancient but it swivels so that the screen is outward facing which is really handy for when she is following guitar tabs on line. It really is falling to bits now

She saves a lot of music and uploads video blogs and music recordings to youtube. She is not a great game player.

So I basically need a laptop that she can use for her music, preferably with an easy to read screen and easy scrolling. It should also be quite light for when she goes gigging as she stores her music on it and carrying laptop, guitar etc. can be heavy going. If she can also avoid carrying her mini speakers that would be a bonus.

Finally she likes to do 3d modelling and japanese cartoon and the pictures she often downloads can be very detailed, so good colour and sharpness also helps.

Oh yes and of course school work and prezzi presentations.

Can you clever people give me an idea of what is the best laptop I can get for the money, brand is unimportant.

Thanks in advance

neilwoods

Define how much money as laptops in the 1500 could be recommended,

gibson123

Thank you.... Not that much, £400 is the very top limit for all Christmas presents and as she also wants a hard-case or gig bag I would prefer a bit cheaper, I don't mind second hand or re-furbed either as long as it does the job.

neilwoods

Another question, when you say 3d modelling, is that creating them and the rendering them or just viewing, if creating, what program will be used. Just as 3d programs like 3ds max, bryce, and various others do take a fair bit of processing power, so that will determing price as well

gibson123

Oh dear into the difficult questions already, I have no idea what she uses, she started with google sketch up and then downloaded some software that lets her see shapes from different angles and also draw in 3d, I may have got the terminology wrong. i think she uses it mainly for creating then viewing and then copies into her sketch book, it appears to be more about getting her cartoons to look more 3 dimensional so it could be a way of turning things on screen just so she can get more movement into her cartoons, if that makes sense.

bluesnake

be careful with the modelling apps. My friends missus bought a top of the range mac for her masters degree, then after found the app she wanted only works on windows - an my friend go the blame as he used his card to by it

What is the current spec, then go a level or so up.

macman

Then I suggest you find out exactly what modelling software she is using, and look at the minimum processsor/RAM/graphics specs required for it, otherwise you may end up with something entirely underpowered for her (fairly specific) purposes.
Any modern laptop (i3 upwards) will otherwise do all the tasks you mentioned.