Topic: Best LAPTOP suitable for Lumion?

[jordan230]

Hi Forum,
Does anyone know a good laptop suitable for Lumion? The ones I had seen on the internet, the videobenchmark is to low. Any suggestions? Thanks in advance for you help!!

[tug]

Hi Jordan

I use Dell M6500
CuadCore Xi940 (8cores)
32 Gb Ram
NVidia 5000M 2 Gb

Lumion runs quite well in this workstation, I hope this information will be suitable for you

[cpercer]

I run a Clevo x7200:

Core i7 970 (Hyperthreaded 6-core)
12 gigs triple channel RAM
Nvidia GTX 485M 2gig
17" glossy widescreen

This is a completely cusomizable desktop component laptop form factor beast!  The above configuration costs less than the Dell M6500 (now M6600.)  It is available with the latest Intel chips and Nvidia cards from a vendor of your choice.

I recently ordered two Malibal Satori (Clevo P170 HM) laptops from malibal.com.  Each is about half the weight of my x7200, which is about 14 lbs.  They are available with Intel mobile components including 2nd gen chips and the latest Nvidia cards.  They top out at around $4000 fully loaded, still less than the Dell.  I must compliment the folks at Malibal.  The service was fast and friendly with good tech support.  The computer was well assembled and works flawlessly.

The framerates for the mobile Nvidia cards are only slightly lower than the desktop versions for simple to moderate scenes.  For heavier scenes, use layers to raise framerates.  Movie generation is slightly slower or nearly the same as desktop movie generation (image sequence and mp4 output.)

I use Autodesk Building Design Suite 2012, Adobe Production Premium CS5.5, Sketchup, Vue 9, City Engine 2010 and Lumion, of course.  Although, I would much rather use Lumion 2!

[jordan230]

Thank you lofts and cpercer for your reply and help.. What i see so far,my options for a video card on  a laptop are:Considering only nvidia cards

 NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 560M 1.5GB GDDR5 

 NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 580M 2GB GDDR5 
    
I can not find better videocardbenchmark than these for laptops. In conclusion,for medium to small/ simple scenes  those laptops may work but not too efficently . I guess i need to find a videocard that has more than the minimum 1,500 PassMark points for small scenes,ideal 2500 or more ... But i do not think that exists(more than 2500 points passmark) for laptops in order to work with lumion with no problems... I guess is better to get a desktop.. I will miss the mobility of a laptop maybe in a near future.. Anyways thanks for your responses.. Any other suggestions, are more than welcome!! Thanks..
To lofts and cpercer.. What are you experiences working with your laptops and lumion? Are you scenes small/simple when use with your laptops?again thanks in advance for your help!

[cpercer]

I think I gave you the wrong impression regarding using a laptop with Lumion.  Please review the following post for a direct comparison between my desktop and my laptop: 

http://lumion3d.com/forum/index.php?topic=1269.0

Both machines are custom built with high performance components.  Note that the video cards, while vastly different (desktop vs. laptop) offer nearly the same performance.  Since I purchased my laptop, Nvidia has released newer high power video cards, including the 580M.  I have the 580M in a Malibal Satori but have not applied the same tests.  I can say with confidence that a laptop with the 580M, a 64 bit OS, and plenty of RAM will handle just about any Lumion file that a desktop can handle.  I am not a Malibal employee, but have had several pleasant purchase experiences within the past two months.  The Malibal Satori with a 580M will satisfy nearly all Lumion users and is even available with a 17" 3D screen.

I often must give live presentations which requires the exact same file on the laptop and the desktop.  I have yet to find a file I cannot open on either one.  My largest scene is the downtown of a city with several large bridges and thousands of trees and several hundred cars.  With all layers visible the framerate drops to 1-3fps, surely larger than a typical scene; however I am able to load the scene and edit successfully.  I'm hoping the improved animation pack in Lumion 2 will allow some traffic action!

Anyway, a good laptop will be perfect for Lumion.

[peterm]

Interesting comments.  The specification info at the NVidia site provides some indications of the differences between laptop and desktop.  There's a big difference in number of cores which would seem a critical factor to hnadling the shading/rendering done by Lumion.  Something like a 560M is more equivalent to a basic GT430 but with slightly faster bandwidth, only 96 cores.  Only the 580M starts to come up to desktop card configuration, but then costs heaps.

However its still hard to tell from that info what real performance is like, especially in the critical time cost area of rendering.

I guess the more you can afford the better off you will be but at the expense of a desktop/workstation with way more bang for the buck.  As cpercer indicates top of the range 580M starts to give some OK performance, would be nice to have laptops that could place in a full fledged v-card.

[Morten]

Jordan emailed me some time ago regarding recommended laptops for Lumion but I suggested he asked you guys.

And I'm glad he did! The posts above should be mandatory reading for anyone who needs to take Lumion on the road - thanks to all of you for sharing your experiences!

[tug]

Hi Cperder

You're right, Dell are a little expensive than Clevo, but there are some retail sellers where you can find good offers in USA and Australia, where we bought usually our workstations.

There are differences between Dell and other portable worstations, even between M6500 and M6600. We opted to buy another M6500 due the screen resolution on M6600 and others competitors in the higher range are lower than M6500, 1920x1080 against 1920x1200, this possibility offers you take screenshots with a highend resolution before rendering.

Other feature in dell's  M6500 is the amount of Ram you can dispose, 32 Gb against 24 Gb maximum in others.

Regarding Graphic Cards, now are available Quadro 5010M with 4Gb, but only in USA market, in Europe are only available with Quadro 4000M, 2 Gb.

Mountain Workstation and Azken are also specific worktations dedicated to rendering.

[jordan230]

Hi guys, thanks for your helpful information.. So far i think that the gtx 580m is the best video card for laptop and mobility (2,017 passmark points).good for medium size scenes. In conclusion, it all depends onthe size of the scene you are working.. It it looks like cpencer had work larger scenes and everything work fine with a gtx 580m video card, thats interesting!!

I will like to share some useful information Morten informed me some time ago.. It help me a lot for my future decision. Thanks morten:http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/high_end_gpus.html

"Anything below 1000 PassMark points will usually not be able to render images/videos in Lumion.
 
For relatively simple scenes, you can get by with a card that has about 1,500 PassMark points

If you want to use Lumion for slightly more complex scenes, you'll need a card with say, at least 2,500 PassMark points (avoid Quadro and FirePro cards).

And very complex scenes would benefit from a card with at least 3,000 PassMark points."

Thanks again for all your responses!

[tug]

Hi Jordan, for Lumion, Nvidia GTX 580 chipset  (M or not) is probably the best choice, but it depends on the workstation where you will install it. Check carefully the technics requests , specially power consumption and fan specifications, in other case you maybe will reach an overheating and the workstation will collapse.

[Architectural Innovation]

I am using an MSI gx660r. I really like the machine, the price and the performance with Lumion, Sketchup and other graphics software.

it has an ATI Mobility radeon HD 5870, 1gb ddr5

[cpercer]

Hi Cperder

You're right, Dell are a little expensive than Clevo, but there are some retail sellers where you can find good offers in USA and Australia, where we bought usually our workstations.

There are differences between Dell and other portable worstations, even between M6500 and M6600. We opted to buy another M6500 due the screen resolution on M6600 and others competitors in the higher range are lower than M6500, 1920x1080 against 1920x1200, this possibility offers you take screenshots with a highend resolution before rendering.

Other feature in dell's  M6500 is the amount of Ram you can dispose, 32 Gb against 24 Gb maximum in others.

Regarding Graphic Cards, now are available Quadro 5010M with 4Gb, but only in USA market, in Europe are only available with Quadro 4000M, 2 Gb.

Mountain Workstation and Azken are also specific worktations dedicated to rendering.

Good points Lofts.

I wonder though how much RAM is really required to run Lumion.  As stated before, both my machines are running 12gig with no problems.  Also, another reason I chose the Clevo over the Dell or another name brand was because I can upgrade parts without voiding the warranty.  In fact, Malibal encourages tweaking.

I just couldn't justify a $5500 Dell when I could have the exact same thing, minus the RAM capacity of course, for nearly $2000 less.  Besides, the Clevo x7200 is the fastest laptop on the planet.

[tug]

I just couldn't justify a $5500 Dell when I could have the exact same thing, minus the RAM capacity of course, for nearly $2000 less.  Besides, the Clevo x7200 is the fastest laptop on the planet.

take a look also to this two firms dedicated to render's workstation

http://www.mountain.es
http://www.azken.com/

if you're interested in Dell in a lower price I can tell you some places where to buy

[cpercer]

take a look also to this two firms dedicated to render's workstation

http://www.mountain.es
http://www.azken.com/

if you're interested in Dell in a lower price I can tell you some places where to buy

I checked out both firms. Both sell a rebranded Clevo P170hm as a mobile platform.  Also available is the x7200 which uses a desktop CPU and SLI vid cards.

[ramdy]

What do you think about going for alienware laptop? Those are specifiq for gamers so full rendering.