Desktop or laptop?...

[Craig E Hood]

I'm just curious what everybody uses for post processing. Do you think a desktop monitor gives more accurate color reproduction than a laptop monitor? I am using a laptop currently, but I found a pretty good deal on an HP bundle that includes a 22" widescreen monitor. Wondering if size will be the only advantage...

Craig

 

[Furgus]

Dell Inspiron 530 - Intel® Core2 Duo Processor E8200 (6MB L2 Cache,2.66GHz,1333FSB)

3GB Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 800MHz - 4 DIMMs

2408WFP - Dell 2408WFP Ultrasharp 24 Inch Widescreen Flat Panel LCD Monitor

e-GeForce 8600 GT 512 MB DDR2 PCI Express Graphics Card


That is what I use now. It screams....

 

[Suburbanmom]

I use both and I don't notice much difference between them. Sometimes I think that I over-contrast on tha laptop without realizing it, but that's all. I can't give you all the specifics on the makes/models/powerfullness, but I can tell you that they are both less than one year old.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

I use both. I prefer the desktop, but it doesn't leave my office and I don't always want to be there. The desktop is much faster, the monitor is larger and brighter, the viewing is wider, and the resolution is higher. Also, the keyboard is much better. The laptop is portable, which is great.

My laptop is about a year old. I've forgotten the specs on it. My desktop is a quad core running at 3ghz with 4 gig of RAM. My monitor is a 30" Dell widescreen LCD. My computer doesn't scream...it's actually very quiet.

 

[Craig E Hood]

The biggest aggravation that I notice with the laptop is that the contrast changes drastically depending on the viewing angle. I do notice a little color difference between the screen and the printed image. Possibly over correcting on my part. And, my laptop is rather quiet as well .

 

[11290]

I also use both but MUCH PREFER the desktop. Screen is larger (and color calibrated - never could seem to get the laptop correctly calibrated properly), colors are more accurate and MUCH faster processing the large file sizes.

 

[bigphil]

Desktop

 

[Groucho]

Laptop monitors are usually quite a bit worse than desktop monitors... there are still folks who prefer CRT monitors for color reproductions but LCDs have gotten close and maybe even eliminated the gap by now (kind of like digital vs film!) Viewing angles is a huge issue for me - with most laptop screens, you need to be looking exactly straight at it to get anything close to correct colors, and moving even a tiny bit up or down will start to distort the colors. For this reason alone, I really don't like trying to work on photos on a laptop display. Even a smallish monitor will be a good improvement.

Like others have said, color calibrating them helps a lot, whichever display you use.

 

[Craig E Hood]

I just got my Dell Inspiron 530 up and it is great. 22" widescreen LCD. I decided against the HP, the Dell has an Intel 2.6 Ghz dual core processor, 500G of memory and 4G of Ram. I feel like I'm looking at an IMAX screen coming off that laptop.

 

[YesDear]

I use at 17 Mac powerbook laptop and a pc. I prefer the mac.

 

[JR6ooo4]

Laptop monitors are usually quite a bit worse than desktop monitors... there are still folks who prefer CRT monitors for color reproductions but LCDs have gotten close and maybe even eliminated the gap by now (kind of like digital vs film!) Viewing angles is a huge issue for me - with most laptop screens, you need to be looking exactly straight at it to get anything close to correct colors, and moving even a tiny bit up or down will start to distort the colors. For this reason alone, I really don't like trying to work on photos on a laptop display. Even a smallish monitor will be a good improvement.

Like others have said, color calibrating them helps a lot, whichever display you use.

Is that why I have been tilting my head up and down a few inches to double check the viewing angle/contrast/brightness etc. heheheheheeee

Mikeeee

 

[Chikabowa]

My graphic designer uses a Mac G5 (I think that's right... I'm more of a PC girl myself) with a really really really big color calibrated monitor. It's great.

I personally use a Mac Book Pro which has an excellent monitor that is pretty spot on when it comes to color. I don't post process on the laptop though... anything like that goes straight to my graphic designer.

I also work on a 17" HP laptop; the color couldn't be worse on that!

 

[Craig E Hood]

What do you guys recommend to color calibrate?

 

[handicap18]

I have an HP desktop with the 22" HDMI monitor and I haven't come across a laptop that can come close to the performance of this monitor. It is very sharp and represents the colors very well. I'm glad I upgraded. It cost me $329 but it was only $90 more than the monitor I was originally looking at getting. I haven't felt the need to calibrate it yet, though I did have to play with the settings. The factory settings weren't very good. So I loaded the software for the monitor and was able to change it and am VERY happy. Especially with the computer next to our 32" HDTV, I can use the 22" monitor and 32" TV as dual monitors. VERY cool.

 

[dr_zero]

Desktop

Overall a desktop offers the most options,
you can upgrade the screen if you don't like it
upgrade Video cards as improvements are made
Less expensive to add more memory or HD room as needed

BUT you cant haul it around with you like a laptop.

I work on the side doing computer repair and so I'm partial to desktops laptops are a pain in the backside to work on.

 

[Groucho]

What do you guys recommend to color calibrate?

I use a Spyder2Express, it's pretty cheap and works well. My understanding is that the hardware is the same with the various flavors of Spyder calibrators, the difference is how powerful the software is - but the basic one works fine for doing standard LCD and CRT monitors.

 

[puddleduck]

To get the best color matching you really need to get a good hardware and software package. I have used x-rite but it is professional grade last time I looked it was fairly expensive. Most of this stuff is. This page should help get you started. You probably will be able to hire a graphic designer to help you or do it for you. ICC profiles of your monitor and printer work the best but require dedicated software and color sensitive hardware to create.
http://desktoppub.about.com/od/colorcalibration/Color_Calibration_and_Profiling.htm