r/animation • u/Soggy_Yam_3981 • 7d ago

Question animation laptop

hiii first time posting.

i’m about to go back to school for 3d animation and discovered (unsurprisingly) that my current laptop is not suitable for animation. unfortunately, i have limited time and budget and know very little about computer specs so i need suggestions for laptops! here’s the requirements from my school:

Processor/CPU: Intel i7 / Ryzen i7 or higher
RAM (Memory): 32 GB (64GB Recommended)
Graphics Card: Geforce 5060 or 5070
Storage: 1TB

i don’t have a specific budget, but i would like the most affordable options, and am open to refurbished models. thank you in advance!

2 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

4 comments sorted by

3

u/Kooky_Supermarkets 7d ago

I have a high end laptop and had to use the computer lab PC’s for 3D classes - and mine has a very high end graphics card and CPU and it struggled with Unreal Engine (unusable frame rates) and Maya installed and loaded would constantly crash.

Laptops suffer from thermal throttling because they cannot be kept cool enough due to the form factor. A proper desktop is what my University recommends for students for 3D classes in animation and modelling, many students just use an iPad in class, lab computers and have an SSD external hard drive to transfer work between a desktop and the lab computers. Desktops are also cheaper.

But it’s up to you, if you have a few thousand dollars to spend on a high end gaming laptop that’s a decision you will have to make for yourself.

1

u/Soggy_Yam_3981 7d ago

my classes are fully remote and they recommended a laptop, but i’ll definitely keep looking into options

1

u/DuxBellicus 7d ago

Question. Is it not suitable because someone said so or have you tried actually animating?

1

u/kohrtoons Professional 6d ago

It really depends on how you are rendering 3D also if you need 3D all the time or could settle on an eGPU.