Reply To: Workstation laptop?

[ottawablenderguy]

Consider that laptops are fine for everything except rendering. That should be reserved for desktops because of the load it puts on the cooling system. Whereas a desktop has lots of airflow and can handle sustained CPU/GPU heating while rendering, overloading your laptop’s cooling system can drastically shorten the life of either the CPU, the GPU or the cooling system itself (fans,etc.)

That said, any mid-to-high powered laptop should do the job after 2.8 comes out, if you’re working with Eevee since it puts far less strain on all these things, although I think I’d still want something with a bit of beef for those times when I forget to turn down the Simplify setting.

Also, a smaller screen may not be a big thing to deal with if you have 20/20 vision. For me, they’re a waste of time.

Another thing to consider…

When I bought my laptop several years ago (MSI GE72 2QF Apache Pro) I wanted the largest screen I could afford (17″) for those times when I was wandering around. As it turned out, I’ve never used it anywhere except on my desk with keyboard, mouse and two 24″ monitors plugged into it. I’ve come away from this experience thinking I could have spent less on screen size and more on CPU/GPU/RAM. A 15″ or 13″ would have worked just as well with this desktop set up and I could have saved a ton of cash going that way. So you might wanna think about where you’ll be wandering to (if you wander at all) while working with Blender on a laptop.

For what it’s worth.