Laptop requirements?

[old man emu]

I agree with Curious Aardvark that a built up computer is always going to be cheaper than a new store bought one, but what if you are not skilled enough to do it? That's the flaw in the otherwise flawless plan.

Besides, Shieldse was only looking for a computer to run his printer. A computer for that purpose alone does not need to be on the leading edge of technology. That old cream coloured tower you see in the corner of my workspace is running XP and has a 3Gb HDD, yet it quite happily runs Mach3, which is a similar type of program to Pronterface.

I agree that for doing design work and slicing, you need plenty of computing power, but Shieldse has a laptop for that. If he was to make an investment in computing power, he should upgrade the laptop because a laptop has a wider range of uses.

Old Man Emu

[Shieldse]

I agree with Curious Aardvark that a built up computer is always going to be cheaper than a new store bought one, but what if you are not skilled enough to do it? That's the flaw in the otherwise flawless plan.

Besides, Shieldse was only looking for a computer to run his printer. A computer for that purpose alone does not need to be on the leading edge of technology. That old cream coloured tower you see in the corner of my workspace is running XP and has a 3Gb HDD, yet it quite happily runs Mach3, which is a similar type of program to Pronterface.

I agree that for doing design work and slicing, you need plenty of computing power, but Shieldse has a laptop for that. If he was to make an investment in computing power, he should upgrade the laptop because a laptop has a wider range of uses.

Old Man Emu

So right now I am using a 2012 macbook pro with a 2.5ghz processor and 16gigs of ram. What else do I need to look into to "upgrade" the laptop? My brother in law will build me a desktop or a laptop if I need him to. He does it all the time. And he is working with me to get me the right computer and also in building my website. I just need to know what to tell him I need as far as the conputer specs as he has never worked with 3D software or 3D printing. What specs would I need for a desktop vs a laptop? I can also have him build me a PC laptop if you are not familiar with macs. I have read all the threads here and I really appreciate all your input and help! All of you!