Lightroom on an ultrabook?

lordrobs · 20 Jul 2013 at 20:55

People of OCUK, I have a dilema. At the moment I use my work laptop (Toshiba Satelite with 15" screen) to edit my photos in Lightroom. I finish work on Wednesday and it has to go back leaving me laptopless. My first thought was to get another 15.6" laptop running an i5 processor but an ultrabook has caught my eye with a 13.3" screen.

I' d love the portability of the ultrabook but my concern is that it will simply not have enough screen area to work in Lightroom?

Does anyone have any experience of this and be able to give me a pointer? I'm on a really tight budget of £400 max and need to buy from a specific supermarket as I have store credit with them meaning that I only need to dip into my pocket by £200. Thanks in advance

lordrobs · 20 Jul 2013 at 21:27

They are indeed both 1366x768 so really it is physical size that is the concern.

It probably seems like a daft question but I've never used anything other than a 15" laptop screen.

I do have a 17" monitor in the loft which I could use while at home.

lordrobs · 21 Jul 2013 at 10:47

They are similar. Ultrabook is an i3 while the other one is an i5 but not much else to seperate them.

Thanks for the advice

lordrobs · 21 Jul 2013 at 21:51

Thanks for the advice. In the end I couldn't go for the ultrabook as it was online only and I couldn't use my store refund card

Shame as it was a cracking deal.

I also decided that for its secondary purpose (work

) that a bigger screen would be better as I tend to have documents side by side.

Went for a relatively low spec Asus in the end (Pentium 2020M 2.4GHz, 1TB HD, 8GB Ram) but it is much better than my old one and, for what it cost me, I'm sure it'll do the job fine

lordrobs · 21 Jul 2013 at 22:07

Genoma said:
Top job, if you get chance and can do it, drop a SSD in it. Laptops and SSD's are a great match IMHO

I noticed that this is becoming a more common combo. Seems to make a lot of sense TBH! As far as I can see though I only have a singe HD bay

lordrobs · 23 Jul 2013 at 22:38

Amp34 said:
You're not going to get an ultrabook for £400... They are normally around £1k+, unless you're talking about a laptop they are advertising as an "ultrabook"?

As for Lightroom on one then yep it's fine IME. I have an Air and Lightroom will run fine on that, the benefit of ultrabooks is they have SSD's which speeds things up over a mechanical Laptop HDD. Make sure you get a 1600x900 or greater screen however or else you'll really run out of screen estate!

On the other hand I'm guessing for £400 it'll be a mechanical drive and a 1366x768 screen?

EDIT: seems you got a laptop already! Enjoy.

Yeah went for a laptop in the end, I'm already seeing the benefit I think for work with two side by side windows plus a side bar. Just about workable with 15.6", 13" would have been pushing it. I'll probably hook up a 17" monitor for photo work.

But you were right it was an Acer S3 with regular HDD and a 1366x768.