I was thinking about picking up a large screen, higher resolution but cheaper laptop (maybe black friday).

17" Windows laptops seem to be in a price null as they are less portable, but the higher resolution (be careful, some larger screens don;t have higher resolution) larger screen are really appealing for looking at squiggly lines.

For instance:

http://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/produ...top/dndou2443h

 

Hahaha! BTDT.

True dat. Last weekend at the HSR/TA weekend at Daytona, I was working with four cars (two with VBOX HD, two with VBOX Video HD2, plus a few redundant SmartyCam HD's and I came away with 155 GB after Thursday test day, Friday and Saturday... Sheesh.

Typically though, the single user will not exceed 24-32 GB for the weekend.

Best thing I ever did (and I'm still in the middle of it, three months in) is to delete ALL of the less than quickest runs from previous weekends.

No need to save what you DON'T want to do!

 

But...Peter has me convinced to stay with my 13" MBP.

 

Hahaha! When my "away" business blew up bigtime in 2011, I bought a unibody, BTO, top of the line 15" MBP for about $2800, at the time. That damn thing was very powerful and very rugged, but really heavy and bulky toting through airports and balancing on door sills...

I had been buying MacBook Air's since the beginning for light duty work, web site maintenance and email.

After getting tired of lugging the 15" around, I decided to spec a top of the line, BTO Core i7, 512 SSD MacBook Air and to try and use that as my primary computer.

After a few test weekends where I brought BOTH to the track (sheesh), I was pleasantly surprised that the MBA could handle just about everything I could throw at it, so I sold the MBP to my brother and began buying new (well, refurbished from Apple, same warranty as new) MacBook Airs about every nine months since then.

I didn't miss the screen real estate, the difference is very small and I just maximized the windows I wanted to see. Most clients or shops that I work under have a larger screen that they have with them and I just bring an HDMI cable to show it on that. For a more permanent installation in your own trailer, monitors are cheap and good for presbyopic eyes, but the portability of the 13" laptops is key.

For events closer to home, or when I have a shop transporting the equipment to a large race or DE weekend, I bring a 27' iMac late-model with me. Got to tell you, the damned video jumps right out at you, and replays of crashes cause people to lurch out of their seat, sometimes...

You pay your money and make your choice. The 13" MBP is a great machine. And the older version is cheaper now. Don't avoid Refurbished options directly from Apple. Deals can be had...

Me? I am waiting for my new BTO, Core i7, 16 GB RAM, 1 TB SSD, 13" Touchbar MacBook Pro! And I have three, fresh install, Windows 10 on Boot Camp 13" Core i7, 512 SSD MacBook Airs for sale... Cheap.

 

I've used a 13" MBA running VMware Fusion for AIM software for a couple years track side. Works fine for me and my buddies... I'm kinda pissed the new MB doesn't have an SD Card slot. Ugh. Another dongle to watch video...

 

MoTeC Joe Hullett always carries a spare laptop in case his main one goes down. I carried two for a bit until I was able to put one in the transporter and make sure other people had a backup. I've never needed them, but you never know....

Carrying two does get old quick.

 

I still always bring two. I'm too expensive to be hobbled by hardware failure... And I don't want to rely on anyone else, including the client(s).

My second computer rotates between another MBA, a Surface Book or my Surface Pro 3.

 

Peter can you still play AIM video using Quicktime under the latest rev of OS X? Mine stopped worked a month or two ago and Quicktime no longer reads the smart cam video files native. Easy to use something else like VLC or 5Kplayer but it was much much easier to keep things native with the mac.

 

I've always used VLC native to OS X, Richard, but I do know the last two versions of Mac OS have broken the SC .mov working natively in QT.

 

Thanks. Figured it wasn't just my mac.

 

AiM is investigating what happened to cause this problem. No answers yet, but they are working on it.

 

It's nice. Through the worldwide dealer and distributor email distribution list, this problem has been reported a few weeks ago.

 

If you are running parallels for Race studio 2 on a Mac and want to video edit GoPro footage (as opposed to smartycam) with race render... is it best to download the windows version of race render and edit in windows or the Mac version of race render and do it there? I guess what I'm asking is if the Mac version of race render will pull data files from the parallels window/memory. I hope I'm asking this right!

 

I think I understand your question.

I think it would be best to do it all on Windows under Parallels. The reason for this is you will be asked to export in .csv form, the file from Race Studio 2, then import that same file into Race Render 3 for combining with the video. I would try and keep it simple, for sure.

 

Addresses exactly what I was asking, no interpreter required! Thanks.