Will Apple Manufacture Good Lapops Again?
Best laptops for music production 2022: featuring portable computers for musicians, producers and DJs
For years now, Apple has produced some of the best laptops for music production. As the only portable platform for Logic Pro X, the Apple MacBook Pro is synonymous with the craft of music-making. By comparison, those of united states using a PC have traditionally been chained to the desktop format, but that has inverse considerably in recent years. Dell, Microsoft, Samsung, MSI, Asus, Lenovo and others big tech brands are all muscling in to give Apple a serious run for its coin, and some of them have proper music-making clout too. All of which is great for the consumer, as it gives us genuine selection when it comes to music production.
Regardless of which platform you opt for, there are some considerations which remain consistent. When it comes to choosing the best laptop for your abode studio, you'll want to pay shut attention to the power and memory specs of the machine yous're eyeing upwards. While the basic requirements for most DAWs is a multi-core processor, around 4GB of RAM and a few gigabytes of storage, this won't be plenty for real-world applications. Ownership a music laptop based on the 'minimum recommended' specs is a recipe for hereafter angst and a need for an early upgrade. Instead, you need a laptop with plenty power to handle the latest software and expanding file sizes, with enough juice in the tank to cope with whatever y'all may need down the line.
For any DJs or traveling musicians reading this guide, weight - and portability - is probable to exist some other major factor. Some of the highest spec, beefiest laptops as well counterbalance a off-white amount, and your shoulders will chop-chop tire of lugging those behemoths around.
Then, the best laptop for music production should be powerful and lightweight, while also rocking a good bombardment capacity, for those situations where you're away from mains ability. if you want more guidance, caput to our buying advice section. Continue scrolling for our recommendations...
Best laptops for music production: Our top picks
A driving gene for many producers looking to source a new laptop is toll. In days gone past this meant sacrificing, or compromising, on what you desire versus what you tin can beget. Now, even what might be classed as 'entry level' machines can cope with a huge variety of production scenarios without much fuss.
At the top end, notwithstanding, nosotros find information technology difficult to wait by the new Apple MacBook Pro fourteen" lineup; ok the prices are enough to make your wallet anguish, but the numbers it puts up in terms of sheer production grunt are impossible to ignore. It's a laptop you tin can buy and then non have to retrieve near over again for another 5 years.
If you desire something a piffling more lightweight, the MacBook Air (opens in new tab) now comes consummate with the M1 chip, making it a genuinely capable proposition as a music-making laptop for nigh users.
For Windows users, in our feel the Dell XPS 13 OLED (opens in new tab) is a super solid histrion, and more than than capable of withstanding some hefty DAW sessions without breaking a sweat.
We'd also recommend looking to the globe of gaming laptops. Don't be put off by their visual stylings – gamers require lots of power and very quick processors, which is good news for you. For our money, we're taken with the Razer Blade 15 Studio (opens in new tab) Edition. It'south incredibly powerful, looks astonishing and would brand a worthy studio powerhouse across a range of creative pursuits.
Best laptops for music product: Production guide
If you've used Apple MacBook Pro models in the past, you'll exist well enlightened of the hit industrial blueprint, Retina screens and the optimised marriage of in-house hardware and software combining to brand a highly desirable, hugely capable laptop for music production. So to look at the 2022 Apple MacBook Pro 14", you might feel a little underwhelmed - we certainly were. It doesn't have a flashy new design, or a vastly upgraded screen. Only what has happened out of sight, within the body of the machine, has been completely enhanced though.
Making utilise of the newest M1 Pro or M1 Max chips, the xiv" model now has enough in the fashion of processing power and cutting-edge operation to arrange even the most demanding of creative professionals. Configurable to include some frankly crazy specs, similar upwards to 64GB of RAM and 8TB of SSD storage, this is a laptop for music production unlike any other. Aye, it'southward expensive - maxing out the configurator on Apple'south website shows you lot could exist paying around £/$vi,000 for the highest spec version, but if y'all can beget it there is literally no other machine capable of doing what this laptop can exercise. Yous tin can read the full results of our testing in the review, linked below.
Read the full Apple MacBook Pro 14" review
Some other year, another addition to the formidable Dell XPS line-up. Billed as the ideal laptop for on-the-go creatives who don't fancy signing up to the Apple tree walled-garden, and the closest Windows culling to an Apple MacBook Pro, the Dell XPS line has built upwardly a strong reputation thanks to its sleek design, gorgeous screens and powerful spec.
The XPS range delivers similar levels of way, quality and performance to the MBP, just using Windows as its OS. As it stands, other than looking at high-spec elite gaming laptops, you're not going to go a much better package for the money.
The 2021 vintage packs in an updated 11th-generation Intel Core i5 or i7 processor, plus the add-on of a 4K OLED screen. This perhaps won't be the showstopping headline feature a music maker will go for, just if the laptop is to serve other purposes like watching films or generally staring at in wonder, so the Dell XPS 2021 OLED might just be the perfect choice.
In that location's a beefier xv" model further upwardly the range, but for about people the XPS thirteen makes for a pretty compelling bundle.
Read the total Dell XPS 13 9310 OLED (2021) review
If you read the generalist mainstream tech media reviews of the latest Apple tree silicon laptops, you'd be forgiven for thinking we'd witnessed a paradigm change. Apple's new in-business firm M1 chip does seem to perform streets ahead of its competition, promising unprecedented boosts in speed, performance and bombardment life. It does this by combining CPU, GPU and retention into 1 chip, greatly reducing power usage and delivering a hugely optimised computing experience. Does that mean musicians and studio owners should invest right away? The more easily-on time nosotros've had with the M1-equipped machines, the more nosotros're heading in that management.
While having a powerful machine is ane function of the equation, we're also reliant on the hardware playing nicely with the software packages nosotros apply in our work. Equally yous'd wait, Logic Pro X and Garageband users can immediately have advantage of all this extra optimization, but for users of Live, Cubase, Pro Tools et al the picture show is less clear. Full back up is coming though. If Apple'due south lofty promises over functioning are kept – and commonly, they are – then this could be a revolutionary auto.
Read the full Apple MacBook Pro M1 13" review
- The best MacBook Pro M1 deals online right now
Information technology used to be that if you were a serious music maker, annihilation under Apple'southward MacBook Pro line but wouldn't cut it for the processor and RAM intensive tasks put upon it past sound production. With the new M1 chip inside the 2021 Apple MacBook Air yet, we've been convinced that this statement can largely be put to bed, at least for the bulk of habitation producers. Add into that the inherent benefits of the Air – slim course factor, weighs the aforementioned as a crisp packet – and you've got a pretty formidable production automobile, particularly if your workflow involves travelling around.
If we were being picky we could say it's slightly disappointing there hasn't been a pattern revolution – information technology looks largely the same as the Air range ever has – and a few more than USB ports would always be overnice, but opting for Apple's cheaper model no longer means missing out on production functioning in the way it once might have done.
Read the total Apple MacBook Air M1
Think of a gaming laptop, and you probably imagine garish colours, RGB lights all over the shop and enough power nether the hood to light upward a continent. With the Razer Blade 15 Studio, however, we accept a monstrously powerful laptop with its origins in the gaming world, only with its sights very much assail creative pursuits. There are some nice visual touches, from the customisable RGB backlighting on the keys, just otherwise this is a strong, slick studio beast which demands attention.
Microsoft'south second attempt at a pure laptop device is an absolute winner in our view, and while it doesn't represent a huge overhaul of the original Surface Laptop, it offers improvements in all the areas nosotros were hoping for, including updated hardware that brings serious performance benefits.
This is a laptop that finally delivers on what Microsoft set out to do with the original: a pure, powerful Windows 10 laptop experience. If yous're not sold on the ii-in-1 nature of the Surface Book 2, only love Microsoft'due south premium build quality and design, then the Surface Laptop 2 is the laptop for you. A very worth add-on to our best laptops for music production guide.
At the higher cease of the gaming PC spectrum - not a bad place for music producers to look when sheer power is required - there are some serious studio contenders. The Asus Rog Strix Scar is evidence of this; with an Intel i7 processor and a base spec of 16 GB of RAM, you know this machine can chew through any audio product task you throw at it.
Hudson Mohawke, the Scottish electronic producer, is a known fan, and with practiced reason. Once yous become past the garish colour scheme and 'edgy' gamer branding, you take an immensely capable, lightweight figurer that would rival many traditional desktop arrangements.
MSI is one of the more respected names in gaming PCs, so it figures that their flagship mid-range offer features some decent internals. The MSI GF63 is the ideal blend of performance and aesthetics, and would brand a superb laptop for anyone using their laptop for alive operation or as a portable studio on account of its thin form cistron and cooling features.
Performance-wise, it's packing a 2.4 GHz i5 processor, so solid enough to cope with most tasks. We liked the potential for upgrading though; it ships with 8GB of DDR4 RAM installed, but with infinite to house up to 64GB then the potential for future-proofing your rig is clear. Every bit your live sets or studio sessions grow in size, then too can your laptop.
While it may not have the best keyboard in the world, the Samsung Notebook 9 is still 1 of the best laptops you tin purchase. Packed with more horsepower than the MacBook Pro, merely at a much lower price, Samsung has crafted a laptop that has just as much substance every bit it does style.
Plus, on top of its killer specs, it's lightweight and thin, making this one of the most portable xv-inch laptops you lot can purchase today.
As Microsoft'south riposte to Apple's dominance, the stakes were loftier when information technology released the Surface Pro serial. With Apple's concord on creative professionals existence and so potent, the Surface Pro had a lot to live upwards to. And, with the Microsoft Surface Pro 7, information technology it edging ever closer to bridging that gap.
Admittedly, a razor thin 2-in-one is never going to exist the production powerhouse that a defended PC or Mac would be, but as a device geared towards portability it'southward nearly impeccable.
The main stumbling block will be the toll; for a fully tricked-out version with Intel i7 processor and 16 GB of RAM, you're looking northward of $2k. Simply as a premium device that can handle music, along with everything else life tin throw at y'all, it's a solid option. A quoted full twenty-four hours of bombardment life is not to exist sniffed at either.
Asus has struck golden with its new refresh of its ZenBook Flip S 2-in-1 laptop, with the Asus ZenBook Flip S UX370 impressing u.s. so much it's made it'southward manner into our listing of the 10 best laptops for music product y'all can buy right now.
With a new Kaby Lake R 8th-generation processor powering the device, plenty of RAM and a super-fast PCIe SSD in certain models, this is an absolutely stunning addition to our rundown of the best laptops for music product.
Its ii-in-1 design ways you can utilize it as both a laptop and a tablet, and while information technology's non equally affordable every bit some machines on this list, if you take the upkeep you'll be actually happy with this fantastic device.
While you may have been convinced that 'budget Ultrabook' was an oxymoron up until this betoken, the Acer has turned this common misconception on its head with the Swift 3. That's considering the company has taken the all-aluminum chassis of the Acer Swift vii and blimp some more affordable components inside for everyone to enjoy.
It doesn't run macOS, but the Acer Swift 3 does put the age-old MacBook Air to shame in about every other regard, including the nigh-unbeatable price tag. Of course, in the procedure of demolishing the competition, Acer did have to cutting a few corners in order to keep the price so impressively low.
So although you can't expect much in the way of an Ultra Hard disk display or quality onboard sound, the performance benchmarks lone requite even the Surface Laptop a run for its money.
Best Laptops for music product: Buying advice
How to choose the best laptop for music production
Choosing a laptop capable of running CPU-intensive sound production piece of work tin can be tricky. Some options focus heavily on bombardment life. Others major on operation, and favour higher-grade processors (CPUs) to ensure operations run snappily. Add into that differences in screen sizes, aesthetics and any number of other variables and we can easily see how information technology's hard to justify buying one model over another.
At that place are certain characteristics yous'll look for in a laptop, regardless of whether it'southward for producing music or editing video. Namely, you are looking for that sweet spot of power, functioning and toll. We all wish that final part wasn't a factor, merely it is. Not to worry though, as at that place are supremely capable laptops coming in at some very sensible prices right now. And then what are the specifics that make a great production laptop?
Ultimately, when we say performance, in this context we mean how fast the laptop tin can process things, and how quickly it can admission, write and alter stored information. If you're a sample-based producer and have gigabytes of stored loops and one-shots, then yous volition want to focus on a automobile that offers super-snappy admission to your stored media. And, while they come up in a piddling bit more expensive than traditional hard disc drives (HDD), the but real option nowadays is a laptop that comes with a solid-state drive (SSD). Solid-state ways there are no moving parts - so nothing to go incorrect or neglect - but with rapid data transfer speeds so you're not waiting on that pesky progress bar.
Which CPU is best for music production – Intel, AMD or Apple?
Essentially, a faster processor (or CPU) means two things; your figurer can handle more tasks being thrown at it, and it can 'procedure' those things a lot quicker. You lot may see only minor differences; maybe an audio file will render one minute quicker using the faster of two processors, but over time this clearly adds upwards.
In the CPU world, there are two major players. Intel is the big name, with a huge share of the market. Intel's range goes from i3 – the to the lowest degree powerful – all the mode upward to i9. Well-nigh mutual in mid-to-upper tier laptops, however, are the i5 and i7 variants, and within that sphere you take different speed ratings, measured in gigahertz, every bit well equally the pick to turbo-heave when you lot're placing the computer under major stress. The other name to look out for is AMD, which produces the Ryzen processors. These follow a similar nomenclature to the Intel versions, so R3, R5 and and so on, and are popular among the gaming crowd.
At that place is another path to consider though. Apple has a great heritage in producing machines designed for creative pursuits, and just as the residue catch upward with them, it flips the script again. You may have seen newer Apple tree machines with something chosen an M1 bit inside them. This substantially combines many of the laptops internal components onto a single chip, resulting in incredible power and overall organization efficiency. This has since been further succeeded on Apple's newest machines with the M1 Pro and M1 Max chips.
The good news is that these gains absolutely benefit producers, offering all-time-in-form functioning and processing grunt, while also delivering longer battery life and other optimisations. Put simply, Logic Pro X users on an M1-based motorcar are at the head of the DAW pack right at present. The bad news, however, is that many third-party software brands haven't all the same fabricated the switch required to make the almost of it. More are catching on, with large names like Ableton and Akai offering full native support, but others - similar Native Instruments - are still working on optimising their catalogues to have total advantage.
The all-time communication nosotros can give is to do your enquiry - all of the major developers are aware of M1, and are probable working on native back up, and so it depends on your electric current setup and desire to rock the boat. If you tin can, and don't conceptualize major problems, and then we'd absolutely suggest looking at these new breeds of MacBook.
How much RAM does your music making laptop need?
With RAM, as nosotros mentioned, y'all tin can ignore the 'minimum specs' listed on the websites of the major DAWs. Everyone who tries to run a multitrack Ableton Live session on a laptop with 4GB of RAM is braver (or more patient) than we are. That's because RAM is effectively the brusque-term memory of your machine. With audio applications, particularly those involving lots of recorded sound, a higher amount of RAM means your audio playback is buttery polish and glitch-free because the computer isn't having to 'catch' the audio from the hard drive each time information technology wants to play.
If you lot're buying now, with the side by side few years of use in heed, nosotros'd suggest 8GB of DDR4 memory is the absolute minimum you should be looking for. Ideally, you lot'd want 16GB, as this will handle much larger arrangements, although there is a price to this extra resource.
Information technology'south too worth investigating whether the laptop you cull can be upgraded with actress RAM in the future. Apple laptop fans won't take this luxury, due to their sealed chassis, but laptop PC users might.
How much storage exercise I need?
Storage memory comes a shut second. For audio applications, particularly those involving sample libraries where audio is streamed from deejay, you'll want to use a solid country drive (SSD). The benefit of these drives is the rapid data transfer, meaning files load quicker, although they are slightly more expensive than their hard disk drive (HDD) equivalent. For music production applications, however, the actress expense is totally justified.
It's not uncommon however to run into a combination employed – a HDD for storage of files, photos and videos, and an SSD for tasks where more instantaneous responses are required. The alternative involves using external difficult drives; SSDs, especially those that take advantage of USB-C engineering science, are more than capable of the types of transfer speeds required for music production.
How we choose the all-time laptops for music production
So, conspicuously there is a lot to think about when choosing the best laptop for music production.
It's easy to meet why a skillful all-round laptop tin can fetch a premium price tag, but, as with anything from the best samplers and studio monitors to home studio mixers, you get what you pay for, so information technology'southward always wise to become the best you lot can afford, rather than skimping and regretting your purchase subsequently (often quicker than y'all thought). Our cost comparison software volition come in handy here. Adjacent to each production entry on this guide our price widgets will display the all-time deals online right now to save you shopping effectually.
In this guide we don't focus on various legacy ins and outs, such equally the number of USB sockets, or lack of, for your sound interface, and and then on. With and then many dongle and docking options available, this shouldn't exist a deciding cistron in your purchasing journey. In this guide we're talking sheer horsepower for music-making. For example, can your portable rig cope with large multitrack sessions, running handfuls of plugins and MIDI instruments?
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I have intendance of the reviews on MusicRadar and Future Music magazine, though tin can sometimes exist spotted in front of a camera talking piffling sense in the presence of real musicians. For the past 30 years, I accept been unable to decide on which instrument to master, so haven't bothered. Currently, a lover of all things high-gain in the guitar stakes and never one to resist churning out sub-standard funky breaks, the likes of which y'all'll never hear.
Source: https://www.musicradar.com/news/best-laptops-for-music-production
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