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BenMMusTech

One of the reasons why, I'm advocating getting rid of building computers and buying a good gaming laptop is - there's less faffing about and more music making. The issues that plagued PC laptops for creativity are gone - so long as you don't go under 2000 dollars Oz and their designed for games. And with thunderbolt or USBc you have can upgrade the laptop with new types of ports and even add on a desktop gpu - how neat is that?

For me to fully answer the OPs question, because I do 3d animation, film editing and vfxs I try and upgrade my laptop every 2 years. I suspect that my next upgrade might last a bit longer because the next gen gaming laptops with be at least as half more powerful than the one I've got currently due to hexa core cpus and 8gig GPUs

Ben

I think that is great that you can afford to do that, but really doubt that applies to the majority of users around here.
 
I view laptops with the opinion that if it breaks you cannot fix it yourself easily.  To me they are only disposable toys, and I am reluctant to spend more than $300-400 USD on one.  So laptops are a low priority for me, but they are useful for use as a mobile office, or musical scratchpad when on the road.  Even a cheap one can do decent remote location recording with a proper interface.
 
I would stick with a desktop for home studio use, unless I absolutely needed a laptop for live performance, and had the income from that to afford to do so.

Ok, I understand your point of view - but two things...first I'm so poor I'm struggling to pay rent and food. I've sacrificed everything to be the best I can be. Which if you view my latest work is far higher than even the so-called 'pros' - I make no money from work, because I don't care about social norms. This doesn't make me a bad person of course, but it does make seem like one to those unaccustomed to people like who just fire straight. The above statement for instance will probably piss you and others on this forum off for example...but to me I'm just stating a truth and haven't been infected by 'when they've tortured and scared you for twenty odd years' because I'm an ultimate outsider.

The other issue with what you've said is 'what if it needs repairing?' Well what would need repairing? A broken USB port maybe? I stated that you can use the USBc or thunderbolt port to basically replace any broken port and or indeed GPU...and spindle drives are obsolete apart from storage, so a production 500 gig SSD drive can also run off the USBc port and with a 40gbps throughout and access to the PCI buss like a device connected to the motherboard...you can drive a few things off that one port without comprising said throughput. Then there's the warranty of a laptop - if you pay a few bucks more - you get a 3 year one that can cover accidental damage. You won't get that with a home built computer!

Look I'm not knocking your opinion - we're all entitled to one! The issue is the technological eco-system has matured...and this is a fact that is still not very well understood. And this is why I've made the statement I've made and indeed why I've rebutted your opinion.

If I told you, you could make an 8 minute Star Wars short...I could make you a full length Star Wars if I had two render machines, but if I told you, you could make a short Star Wars type moving image work with only a laptop, a 4k dslr and a few other bibs and bobs - you and most others wouldn't believe me! But it's the truth! We are truly in an age of wonder when it comes to technology, the issue is we're surround by people who keep telling others that this is not possible.

Ben

problem with laptops is it's all integrated, so say your video dies you can't just swap out the video card... or upgrade individual components, other than ram or hd... having said that, i have to use a laptop due to lack of space for a proper pc
 
but it's not a toy!

and the lid/screen hinge is usually the first thing to go

If you're after ultimate high-performance, a laptop (especially not off-the-shelf) is never going to be the equal of a desktop (where you have complete control over exactly what goes in).
 
First, most laptops are using "mobile" CPUs.
By very definition, that means performance throttling (necessary due to the tight space - to keep heat under control).
 
The best custom laptops run desktop CPUs.
They're large and expensive.
That's the closest you'll come to a desktop (performance wise) in a laptop form-factor.
 
Even with the best custom laptops, you can't do things like run the latest i9-9900k with all 8 cores (16 processing threads) locked at 5GHz.  Just too much heat for a small chassis...
With a tower and proper cooling, it's no problem at all...
 
If you just bought a new Presonus Quantum (wanting to effectively work at 1ms total round-trip latency at 96k/32-sample ASIO buffer size), no off-the-shelf laptop is going to keep up with the load.
With a fast well-configured desktop, this isn't a problem.
 
 
 
 

I had a custom gaming rig built and converted it to a DAW when I decided not to game anymore. The thing with most gaming rigs is the money spent associated with the high end GPU. I do zero video editing, and I don't need a high-end GPU. I'd rather spend that money on a faster CPU or more RAM, etc.

I am about the same as Fireberd--every 4 or 5 years............I build a new system from scratch.
Just built a new 8th gen i7 intel 8700 win 10 pro machine in september of this year.
NVME m.2 for sample drive so I am set for quite  while, for my needs.

Obviously no one read the memo properly - this is that with thunderbolt 3 or USBc you can hook up a GPU and you can render video off that! And no one obviously read how many tracks and at what bit depth and khz I recorded at.

With all respect to Jim Roseberry - who I believe is in the business of building desktops for audio...I've been in this game for almost 20 years, I have 3 degrees in audio and music production and I also have an M.Phil - so a research degree. I'm not trying to sell anyone anything, I'm trying to help culture get over the hump...western culture is stuck in the post postpost blues...and without abandoning knowledge on The Digital from 20 years ago, culture will stay stuck in the post postpost blues.

I know everyone here hates theoreticians like me, but I test my theories out. I'm telling you - the present and the future is mobile. If you go to my latest work, you will see why I believe this. If I can achieve what I've achieved and with only a gaming laptop...it seems obvious. What I'm working on now is even better. And I'm speeding up the processes again.

Ben

BenMMusTech
Obviously no one read the memo properly - this is that with thunderbolt 3 or USBc you can hook up a GPU and you can render video off that! And no one obviously read how many tracks and at what bit depth and khz I recorded at.

With all respect to Jim Roseberry - who I believe is in the business of building desktops for audio...I've been in this game for almost 20 years, I have 3 degrees in audio and music production and I also have an M.Phil - so a research degree. I'm not trying to sell anyone anything, I'm trying to help culture get over the hump...western culture is stuck in the post postpost blues...and without abandoning knowledge on The Digital from 20 years ago, culture will stay stuck in the post postpost blues.

I know everyone here hates theoreticians like me, but I test my theories out. I'm telling you - the present and the future is mobile. If you go to my latest work, you will see why I believe this. If I can achieve what I've achieved and with only a gaming laptop...it seems obvious. What I'm working on now is even better. And I'm speeding up the processes again.

Ben

I've got both a desktop setup (actually 2 identical ones - one in the house, one in the studio), and a gaming laptop.
 
What you say about laptops is true, however...
 
I had to search far & wide to get a laptop that would allow me to upgrade the memory, hdd - even the battery in most modern laptops isn't replaceable. The ASUS laptop I got was the previous generation, which was marketed on its expansion options... the one that replaced it was practically a sealed unit. 
 
I got a great deal at £850 for my laptop, but even before upgrading from 8GB to 16GB RAM and upgrading the internal SSD from 256GB to 1TB, it STILL COST TWICE AS MUCH as my desktop equivalent.
 
My desktop has 12 USB ports, 6 SATA slots, 3 "old" PCI slots + 2 PCIe slots... compared to my laptop's 3 USB slots + 1 USB C. You don't even get PCMCIA slots on laptops nowadays.
 
The biggest thing for me is that with a desktop system, you can upgrade bit by bit, as and when your budget dictates.
 
With a modern laptop, you pretty much have to decide on a maxed out system right away.
 
I wanted a mobile setup, so I was prepared to pay for it... but unless you need a mobile setup, a desktop/tower system in my opinion wins hands down.
 

BenMMusTech
With all respect to Jim Roseberry - who I believe is in the business of building desktops for audio...I've been in this game for almost 20 years, I have 3 degrees in audio and music production and I also have an M.Phil - so a research degree. I'm not trying to sell anyone anything, I'm trying to help culture get over the hump...western culture is stuck in the post postpost blues...and without abandoning knowledge on The Digital from 20 years ago, culture will stay stuck in the post postpost blues.

I've been in this "game" for 30 years.  
As an individual, few (if any) have more experience building/configuring/using Digital Audio Workstations.
We sell both custom laptops and desktops.  That has nothing to do with my comments.
Numerous of our clients are college music professors. 
I could lecture at Ohio State University if I chose to do so.
Many of our clients have won Emmy's, Grammy's, and performed in front of hundreds of thousands.
 
The reality is that, due to the laws of physics (thermodynamics), a laptop is not the equal of a fast desktop.
Mobile CPUs were created specifically to keep heat in-check in tight enclosures.
There's no arguing that Performance Throttling is a positive thing in a high-performance application (Digital Audio Workstation, Video NLE, etc).
Case-in-point, the new i9-9900k was just released.
It'll happily run all 8 cores (16 processing threads) locked at 5GHz... and do so running near dead-silent.
Prerequisites:

• proper cooling (won't fit within the confines of a laptop shell)
• access to all necessary BIOS parameters

You absolutely can not do this with ANY current laptop (including the best custom built models using Clevo shells).
There's simply too much heat for the small space.
 
Most off-the-shelf machines do not expose all BIOS parameters necessary to fully optimize a machine for maximum DAW performance.  This is done to prevent less tech-savvy users from fouling up their machine.
This isn't my opinion, it's the reality of what Dell, HP, etc release... and the reality of those companies trying to keep their tech-support load under control.  The machines are "dumbed-down".  Apple has been moving this direction the past decade (no user-serviceable upgrades/expansion).
 
The general-purpose user (Facebook, Office apps, Email, Photos - to which most laptops are marketed) is much more concerned with long battery-life than absolute maximum performance. 
Extended battery-life means performance throttling/compromise.
 
If you need the ability to go mobile, the performance compromise may well be worth it to you/your scenario.
But... a machine that uses a Mobil CPU, C-States, Enhanced Intel Speed Step, etc... is a performance compromise.
 
For those wanting to push the limits at the smallest ASIO buffer sizes, performance/speed are important.
ie: With an audio interface like the Presonus Quantum, you can now do things like run Helix Native (software plugin version of Helix guitar processor) at 96k with 1ms total round-trip latency.  
Using a 32-sample ASIO buffer size at 96k, the machine has ~0.3ms to process/fill the next ASIO buffer... or you'll hear a drop-out/glitch.  This type of thing isn't possible with an off-the-shelf laptop; that's not what they were designed to do.  With a custom desktop, you have complete control over the parts/configuration... which allows pushing performance boundaries much further. 

If the day ever comes when I have to record on something as small as a smart phone that will be the end of my recording days.  I refuse to work on something that small.
 
JB