Karaoke Forums

Santa Claus has promised me a new laptop for Xmas this year to use as my show PC to DJ and KJ with.  There are just so many choices for Santa to make.
I need something reliable of course so I was leaning towards something from DELL which I could buy online.

Basics I think I need are  Pent4 /512mb / 80gig HD /
I plan to get a external sound card card like a GIG A PORt or a MAYA USB

A) Do all internal Laptop video cards offer DUAL DISPLAYS for a monitor ?
         What do I need  to look for ?
B) Will 80 GIG HD be enough for 15,000 Mp3's and 15,000 mp3+G's
     If not am I better paying for a 40gig internal HD and buying a 300GIG external?

Appreciate any suggestions on laptops Pros and Cons etc.

Personally I prefer the Dell's myself. Great price, customer service, blah blah blah.
Pentium IV, but try 1G of ram, especially for the KJ part. 80GB HDD, do the calculation (count 7MB per mp3+g average, or 6MB if in zipped format) and keep in mind you still need space for the OS and utilities.
All Dell laptops have a LCD (Duh!) and an external port for video, so that problem is solved. Remember to get a backup HDD as well. External soundcard? the choice is yours, but get something decent. I still use the internal (or build-in) sound card, and am still happy with that.

my laptop has an 80gig hardrive I have about 14,800 songs,, its full...I now have an external hardrive

Stop!

I suggest you consider a laptop with a true laptop processor, not a desktop chip like the P4....All desktop chips need lots more power and run much hotter than their mobile counterparts. With a good mobile chip you can expect lots more battery time.

A 1.4 (or whatever) mobile will perform just as well as a P4 cause all desktop chips are programed to slow down considerably as they heat up....But you fersure want lots or RAM.

I also suggest you get one that has wireless builtin so you don't need a wireless card sucking up your only card slot and always in danger of getting broken.

Get the 80 gid HD and partition it with your OS and all aps on one partition and your music files in the other, but make sure to keep your full library on a large external.

Running the show off an external drive can often induce a ground loop type hiss that can be difficult to eliminate.

Sounds like you have a great relationship with Santa!

why would you need wireless for a player? you do NOT want to be hooking up to the net with a sucker like this. Not having other kinds of software such as antivirus and other such nonsense just saves valuable cpu and memory.

I know I personally wouldn't trust a show with less than a 2.0 processor, and I'm quite comfortable with the gig of memory I have... but the less I have running, the better!!

When you get smarter about true processor speeds and the real life comparisions between laptop chips and desktop chips you will understand why a slower mobile actually runs faster than a desktop chip in a laptop application....And the battery life from a true mobile is more than twice that in the same laptop running a desktop processor.

All computers need net access eventually....How else to update drivers, the OS and all other aps?...Besides that, how better to transfer files from one to another machine?

I run three computers thru a high speed wireless network behind a hardware firewall with paid for version of AVG....I have never had a virus in almost three years and hardly ever get any spyware, and never much spam mail.

I have a computer with no internet, any updates or file transfers are done via my intenet computer.  Drop to updates or files external hard drive, move hard drive to non-internet computer & upload.  Sure it's a couple extra steps, but there are no problems & it's never been connected to the net.

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in a "stand alone" system, you don't need to update ANYTHING!

you're correct in that I have very little experience with laptops, so I'm going by my experience with desktops... so I bow to your knowledge on that.

But not on hooking the pc up to the net. You are setting yourself up for virus attacks, and having to run additional software that is not necessary.

I NEVER hook my show computer up to ANY net or lan base! It's a karaoke player, and the only thing I hook up to it is my external hard drive to transfer my new songs!

Am in complete agreement with Knightshow on this one.
Keep the laptop or desktop you are using to play your karaoke offline and you shouldn't even have to update it unless you change programs you are using for karaoke. My belief is keep what works and don't change a thing.
Now that said, I will be switching as soon as KJamp is ready from RoxBox to the new player.  I will also be upgrading to twice the ram I already have which will max out my machine. Sax Lost me as a customer when he made his program xp/2000 only. I would rather run on a lower mhz machine in a bar gig.

And to try and answer your question about video cards, I think it is safe to say that any remotely decent laptop will already support and external monitor.  I personally have an HP DV1000, which has as S-Video output on it which can be hooked up very easily to a TV.  I run my software on the laptop's screen, and the TV gets the floating karaoke screen.  And you'd be amazed how easy it is to set up.

hate to say this but I have seen laptops that only have VGA at staples and officemax.  And even if you get one that does have it then you might run into one that does not support dual view (NVIDIA) or extended desktop and you're stuck with everyone watching you enter requests as what is on your laptop lcd.

Dell has the option when you order it to selectively get the video card options you want... and there are laptop vid cards that you can get... I just detest workin' on them.

I'd rather have a shuttle!

I think I'm gonna build one of those for my next project- I just love building computers.

a little pricey but another good solution for creating a dual monitor setup on older laptops with a single VGA connector (or even older tower PC's)...
http://www.anandtech.com/displays/showdoc.aspx?i=2621
be sure when ya get to the bottom of the article to go to the second page where there are some very good shots of the device...

- tig

The Dell 6000 system I'm looking at consists of the following
Pent m - 1.73Ghz
1 Gig Shared DDR2 memory
80 Gig HD
Standard Video Card
NO other add ons -

Of course I'll be looking at an external HD with about 300 gig of space
for the mp3 files.

You will be very happy with the M series processor....It will deliver great speed and provide lots longer battery life than the P4 desktop chip...It will also be quieter as the fan will not tend to remain on high speed and the laptop will not burn your lap after a few minutes of operation.

Contact Dell and see if fersure the video card will support dual screen displays....If not discuss with them an upgrade card that will support an independent display.

I gig of shared mem is plenty, even tho it's shared....Just remember to not attempt to surf the web and play videos when hosting a show!

Good choice!

Ordered Lap Top today should be here by the 16th.

To all KJS using Laptops - Do you all use an EXTERNAL sound device ?
Or do you use the internal soundcard?

I use PCDJ/KJ and they reccomend using an external usb sound card.
I'm sure an external device will give a better sound but I want to ask
you Pro's already using laptops?

Been using laptop for over three years now.  I go straight from the ear phone connection to my mixer.  I couldn't ask for a better sound.  Not really sure why an external card would be recommended.

Kelly

I think the reason they recommend a usb sound card is because it will isolate the ground from the power. I have used 4 laptops over the last few years, and it is kind of hit or miss whether you will have a ground loop (hum...or a highpitch squeel from hard drive) from an internal sound card. I have had to use a ebtech hum eliminator on most laptops, if I didnt use a usb soundcard.

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