i have a bytecc and a antec. i don't think they sell the one i have anymore. but the one that works the best is open air sold aluminum with an additional set of stand off pegs to push the laptop a little bit off of the aluminum grate. they look simple but they are the best imo. something like this

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834994787

Has everyone ever done any surgery on their laptops? I've never done it, but I know RAM is really easy to swap out, but what about putting in an SSD? http://www.newegg.com/Store/Category...y=119&name=SSD SSD prices are so low right now. What thickness SSD would you have to go for? Do any laptops come with empty expansion slots these days, or would it have to be choosing between keeping the big existing HDD or losing the disc drive?

the 17 Clevos sold by Sager, AVA and others are designed for 2 hdd and they have easy access covers to swap them out no problem at all. you can even swap out the video cards with out much fuss. the big brands like asus and alienware don't usually design that into there systems. you can take a look at the pics on there web sites.

http://www.sagernotebook.com/index.p...el_name=NP9170

if you look at the bottom pic you can see that everything has its own lid so you just pop it off and replace the parts.

That's exactly what I'm looking for, pity Asus don't do that. I'm pretty set on going with a 3D Asus for my next machine.

you might take a look at some of the 17 MSI laptops. there not as good as the Sager but there better then Asus. i really would not recommend an Asus for anything other the a cheap 12-14 for surfing the web etc.

Originally Posted by Andreas

Has everyone ever done any surgery on their laptops? I've never done it, but I know RAM is really easy to swap out, but what about putting in an SSD? http://www.newegg.com/Store/Category...y=119&name=SSD SSD prices are so low right now. What thickness SSD would you have to go for? Do any laptops come with empty expansion slots these days, or would it have to be choosing between keeping the big existing HDD or losing the disc drive?

It's easy if you can hold a screwdriver and don't get the screws mixed up ;)

Best expandable laptops are thinkpads - you can swap the DVD with a 2nd harddisk or even an additional battery. Hot swappable. No screws required.

Macbook Pros can be expanded easily with a 2nd harddisk because 3rd party manufacturers offer drive cages which replace the DVD. Some even offer slim external enclusures for the left over DVD drive.

Other laptops can be hacked to swap the DVD with a HDD. But you have to be lucky. i.e. you have to get a drive bay that fits (best bet, get a thinkpad one and see if it fits. If not, get a file and remove some plastic). Other issue: where is the SATA port internally. Some manufacturers also use custom connectors, so your mileage varies.

Big-ass gaming laptops often come with a 2nd drive bay by default. But it's easy when the entire machine rivals a desktop in size and weight ;)

I had a thinkpad before and only used the DVD for windows installs. Movies I ripped on my main PC. And later I installed windows from a USB stick. Now I have a Macbook - same thing. The DVD is just ballast.

How often do you plan to carry it around and how much of the time do you plan to use it in one regular spot (your main desk)?

Lots to think about.

It will be on my home desk 80% of the time. I need to downsize so that I can use it on a small desk, and then put it away to use the desk for other things. I'd also like to take it outdoors for occasional work. That's pretty much my intended use.

A 15.6" would be great, but I'm not sure if I'd regret not having that extra space for apps like Max. If I'll struggle at all with 15.6" then I'd rather get a 17" and sacrifice the weight, as long as it isn't a chore to carry a 17" around. I've no experience with the weight so I can't say.

Over what weight would you say it becomes too lumbersome?


Edit:

Earthquake: is it even possible to work well on a 12-13"? Like I say, I've no experience with laptops.

I should also mention that I'll be rendering on it, and the dialogue boxes take up a lot of screen space.

I'm working on an 11" Mac air and find it fine, you get used to it so fast, seems like a 15 incher to me to be honest. And I would say anything above 6kg is a bit much for a portable laptop. If you have a car it wouldnt be so bad.

you're doing 3D work on an air or something else? I have a 11'er air too and the nvidia card and core 2 duo care certainly good enough for last gen 3D work (my old Thinkpad T60p I got 2006 wasn't much better), but it still sounds rather cumbersome (with Maya's toolbars & ui taking up a lot of screen real estate). I do some coding on it and for that it's fine though.

For 3D work I love the hi-res display on my macbook pro - then at least the app's UIs still leave some space for the work area.

3d on an 11" air. It's an i5 so I only have Intel 3000 graphics, no nVidia. It's not really a dedicated card anyways, just an extra chip. I haven't used Maya, but for Blender, Illustrator, Flash... perfect device. Haven't booted up Unity on it yet though. Definitely looking to shell out on a decent Windows PC for Maya/Max work soon. And if and when this air dies, I'll pick up one of those sexy new Macbook Pro's.

i keep my MBP connected to a 24-inch display, wacom and external keyboard and do not use it for anything 3D. i can't even use it without a decent external pointing device, really. and 3D on a single (tiny but high-res) monitor? not to mention that anything remotely computing intensive makes the fans spin up like mad.

well i guess you have to have masochistic tendencies to prefer that over working on a desktop with a decent dual screen setup. ;)

not worth it when 80% of time is spent working at home imo. get a desktop and a small laptop/netbook/whatever fits the wallet for your on-the-road needs.

I've got an Alienware M11x, light and super portable. I've got a perforated Rocketfish stand for it and it stays very cool. I run UDK, 3Ds Max, Unity Sculptris, PS CS5 (not at the same time ;) ) and the battery life is 3hrs+

though with a resolution of 1366 x 768 it's not the greatest but when I'm on the go I can take my projects with me and keep working.

Originally Posted by Playdo

Earthquake: is it even possible to work well on a 12-13"? Like I say, I've no experience with laptops.

I should also mention that I'll be rendering on it, and the dialogue boxes take up a lot of screen space.

I have a 12.5" Lenovo X220 with the upgraded IPS screen, its the best laptop I've ever used. Its 3 pounds and the battery life is about 5-6 hours. I5 with basic Intel graphics(which isn't as bad as you would think). The screen is really, really fantastic for a laptop, and its very hard to find laptops with good screens, most cost over $2000. To me screen quality is more important for art than having a large laptop, because most laptops have downright awful screens and doing anything art/color related is a headache(also crappy laptop screens literally give me headaches, eyestrain etc).

The keyboard is actually fairly good for the size, and I use a Microsoft Arc Touch(not the new folding one though) wireless mouse that works really well on a lot of surfaces and collapses to about 1cm or so, perfect for throwing in a laptop bag. I like the IBM/Lenovo thinkpad style keyboards though.

Would I do heavy 3d work on it? No, I wouldn't, but there really isn't any situation where I would do heavy 3d work away from my desktop/workstation anyway. I wouldn't do heavy 3d work on a 17" laptop either. I use it for a lot of photo processing. For sketching or some light 3d work/sculpting it is totally acceptable as well. The biggest thing to look out for is screen resolution, this is 1366x768 and about the minimum you can reasonably use Photoshop at. Keep in mind that many ~15" laptops have the same resolution. If I need lots of screen resolution, I'm going to use my workstation with 24" + 20" inch monitors.

It sounds like your laptop will only be used for work occasionally, in which case I would say the smaller and more portable the better, because you'll be more likely to take it out with you. You don't think a 17" is all that heavy/large until you have it and have to make the choice of whether to take it with you on a day to day basis, with a truly portable laptop that choice is much, much easier.

Originally Posted by thomasp

i keep my MBP connected to a 24-inch display, wacom and external keyboard and do not use it for anything 3D. i can't even use it without a decent external pointing device, really. and 3D on a single (tiny but high-res) monitor? not to mention that anything remotely computing intensive makes the fans spin up like mad.

well i guess you have to have masochistic tendencies to prefer that over working on a desktop with a decent dual screen setup. ;)

not worth it when 80% of time is spent working at home imo. get a desktop and a small laptop/netbook/whatever fits the wallet for your on-the-road needs.

Right, even the best possible laptop is a poor workstation for 3d work, and once you hook up all the stuff to make it an ~okay workstation, you're back to workstation size so its pretty pointless.

17" notebook with i5 and no extra graphics card is pretty well suited for every task outside the house

I just got a $380 Asus laptop about 2 weeks ago with a 15.6" screen, an A6 AMD chip with a Radeon HD 6520G(integrated). It handles 4mil+ poly sculpts with ease, and the wacom has been very responsive (made sure to turn off all the tablet-pc options).

I was actually very surprised since I thought I had to settle on something inferior, but in practice that isn't the case. The one thing I do keep in mind is that I only have 3gigs of RAM, and although generally applications wouldn't use much more than that anyway, to be careful I try to stick to one app as much as possible and not have things in the background.

I use ZBrush, Sculptris, 3D-Coat, Blender, pretty much everything that I'd use on my desktop rig, and there isn't a huge difference in performance (although my desktop is 1080p dual screens). The laptop is just the right size for transportation imo, it's not too bulky, doesn't get too hot, is super quiet (haven't heard it get loud yet but then again it's integrated), and it has free accidental damage coverage for a year.

Originally Posted by arrangemonk

17" notebook with i5 and no extra graphics card is pretty well suited for every task outside the house

WHHAAAAAAA??? This is a complete waste. If you're lugging 17" around, have some decent specs so you can actually get something impressive up on the screen. At the VERY LEAST have dedicated graphics and some decent ram to push it all.

Worst. Bot. Ever.

Best deal I've seen for pure computing power in a laptop.

http://www.xoticpc.com/force-1762-ms...wconfigure=yes

Depends on the person. House sitting for a relative, pulling a few all nighters at workplace/friends house, going on long trip and have some spare time, etc.

I would love to say buy a 'Mini-Tower' PC and be done with it, get best of both worlds, but how many places do you know that even have a decent screen or keyboard?

A laptop is a sound investment, and when it gets old, nothing is stopping you form simply using it as an appendix to your other PC's.

Originally Posted by Ace-Angel

Depends on the person. House sitting for a relative, pulling a few all nighters at workplace/friends house, going on long trip and have some spare time, etc.

I would love to say buy a 'Mini-Tower' PC and be done with it, get best of both worlds, but how many places do you know that even have a decent screen or keyboard?

A laptop is a sound investment, and when it gets old, nothing is stopping you form simply using it as an appendix to your other PC's.

I don't think anyone here has suggested the OP shouldn't get a laptop. Me and a few others have suggested that he should get a laptop that does what laptops do best, which is be small, light, portable and have good battery life(so you can actually use it away from the desk).

Trying to replace a PC with a laptop is a losing proposition, you end up with a worst-of-both-worlds computer, too large to take places a smaller laptop would let you go, and too small/not powerful enough to actually replace your desktop.

So, get something that can compliment your PC, not replace it, that's how I feel about it. Buying a huge laptop as a secondary system is sort of like buying a CRT instead of an LCD. Sure it has some advantages, but the weight and bulk isn't worth it.

Now as a primary system that stays mostly at your desk, a large laptop is fine, if thats what you really want to work at.

I've been having a good think about it, and it's sounding like a better idea to keep my monitor and hook the laptop up to it at home. I don't want to struggle for screen space when using it out, so 15.6 might be best. I'll try and test a smaller screen out somewhere.

I'll be using it for rendering too, so it'll need to be a quad core. My current quad core tower is noisey. Am I being too optimistic thinking I can get a silent quad core laptop? Or are there certain specs I should be looking out for?

Don't be too afraid of having a smaller screen for 3d work, most applications have some type of 'expert mode' that you can go in and out of to hide what you don't need (sculptris and 3dsmax have them, I believe Maya's is ctrl + spacebar, and if you're using Blender its ui is incredibly flexible and hotkey friendly; you can hit 'tab' on ZBrush to get more room as well).

I also put my taskbar on the left of the screen rather than the bottom since the aspect ratio has plenty of width and I want all the height that I can get.

i'm going to assume that the OP or anyone else interested already has made the decision that they want/need a portable workstation class laptop. and they are going to use it to do the same work you would do on a normal workstation. so no arguing about 12-...-vs-...-17 etc.

one point tho, since about the geforce9 gtx mobile cards have in-class performance compared with the desktop models. they are not as fast as the equivalent desktop models but 'close', and certainly useable for the same level of work you would do with the desktop card. the notion that the high end mobile cards do not deliver in-class performance is false.

@Playdo
monitor,
if your going to get a 15 then hooking up a monitor is the best way to go imo. if your going to work all day for days then it matters. with a 17 it's debatable. it would still be nice to have a monitor but you can get by with a 17 for some time. if you put the monitor on a stand with space underneath then you can fold the screen back and slide it under the monitor. that way you can use the laptop keyboard and monitor. its 'very' compact and easy to break down.

15 vs 17 mobility.
if you have a nasty commute on the metro everyday and it gets really crowded and you have to walk lots etc, and you plan to do that every day then i would consider a 15. 15 fits in just about every normal bag/backpack. the weight is not to much even every day. if its not critical that you need to bring it everyday on a commute or you have a car then 17 is good. there not 'that' big, you can bring it on the metro etc but if you had to do it every day it might get annoying. they have more options for hardware, better screen, less heat etc.

rendering.
i think most of the i7m cpu's have 4 cores, so that's basically a quad-core.
again if your going to render over night then a 17 has better airflow and cooling. so it will not stress your components as much as a 15.

in addition to looking at Sager and gaming laptops take a look at the 'recommended hardware' by autodesk, lots of laptops.

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet...anuf=all&opt=1

its still the case that a geforce is just as good as a quadro for 3d work and there cheaper. so i tend to stick with gaming hardware. and the support from the gaming boutiques is usually good and you need that. trying to deal with dell/lenovo/asus etc to get a parts is going to be a pain and probably cost more. they are generally much more picky with there warranty void policy. if you need maintenance you have to mail it in and get it fixed or else you void your warranty.