Is there a laptop or what is the best and most efficient laptop for 3D with low power consumption and as eco as possible.

[Animat]

Hi,
I am a 3D artist… and lately I have been asking myself the same question over and over again, because it is time to upgrade my old working laptop which is power hungry as hell and I would like to minimize on this aspect and to use a laptop that can be more eco-friendly and less power hungry to do my 3D animation work.
But I know… it really doesn’t make sense because anything that requires high-end graphics like 3D, be animation or modelling, etc. it requires higher power which translate at the end of the day to hungry power usage.
I know there might be really no way around this, but just dropping the question out here.
Is there a laptop or what is the best and most efficient laptop for 3D with low power consumption and as eco as possible.
Hopefully, some of you might have some ideas.

Thank you beforehand

 

[Jerry James]

Hi,
I am a 3D artist… and lately I have been asking myself the same question over and over again, because it is time to upgrade my old working laptop which is power hungry as hell and I would like to minimize on this aspect and to use a laptop that can be more eco-friendly and less power hungry to do my 3D animation work.
But I know… it really doesn’t make sense because anything that requires high-end graphics like 3D, be animation or modelling, etc. it requires higher power which translate at the end of the day to hungry power usage.
I know there might be really no way around this, but just dropping the question out here.
Is there a laptop or what is the best and most efficient laptop for 3D with low power consumption and as eco as possible.
Hopefully, some of you might have some ideas.

Thank you beforehand

Well, here's another way you can think about this - a less-powerful laptop will just take longer to do a certain amount of work (like rendering) compared to a more powerful one. So, the power you save may not be as much as it seems when looking at just the numbers. Going the mid-range route would be the best way to keep your power usage down.

That said, if you want the best performance/Watt, I'd recommend grabbing AMD Ryzen 5000-based laptops. That combined with something like an Nvidia 3060 GPU at an 80W power rating would be ideal to maximize performance without going overboard on the power used for 3D work.

 

[Animat work]

Well, here's another way you can think about this - a less-powerful laptop will just take longer to do a certain amount of work (like rendering) compared to a more powerful one. So, the power you save may not be as much as it seems when looking at just the numbers. Going the mid-range route would be the best way to keep your power usage down.

That said, if you want the best performance/Watt, I'd recommend grabbing AMD Ryzen 5000-based laptops. That combined with something like an Nvidia 3060 GPU at an 80W power rating would be ideal to maximize performance without going overboard on the power used for 3D work.

Hi Jerry,

Thank you for taking the time to go over my question, I really appreciate and my sincerely apologies for my late reply.

Yes... certainly you are right there, and I do understand your point of view... it is a bit of common sense really.

I think your observation to go mid-range make a lot of sense... I think I should keep going that direction to find a laptop that could provide your recommendations, I am going to do some digging to see what I find in prices. Do you have any recommendations' laptop wise?

One thing that I am aware is that Maya utilizes Arnold for rendering do you know if I'm grabbing an AMD Ryzen 5000-based laptop with an Nvidia 3060 GPU would I have any issues later when I try to render a scene or animation?

Thank you

 

[Jerry James]

One thing that I am aware is that Maya utilizes Arnold for rendering do you know if I'm grabbing an AMD Ryzen 5000-based laptop with an Nvidia 3060 GPU would I have any issues later when I try to render a scene or animation?

Depends on what you mean when you say 'issues.' If you mean, will it get stuck, then no. Will it be slow? Well, depends on what device you're coming from. Since you're switching over from an old laptop, it'll be a very noticeable upgrade all around.

Do you have any recommendations' laptop wise?

Laptop availability varies by quite a bit across regions. Could you check for a few options with Ryzen 5000 processors near you and we can help recommend one out of those.

Some popular ones I've seen around are - Lenovo Legion 5, ASUS ROG Strix G15, Acer Swift X, 2021 Dell G15 Ryzen Edition

 

[Animat]

Thank you

 

[Animat]

Hi Jerry,

How are things!!

After looking around I have put my eyes in these two laptops, one is the gaming.

OMEN 15-en1003ns Gaming Laptop with NVIDIA® GeForce RTX ™ 3070 Graphics

Windows 10 Home 64

AMD Ryzen ™ 7 5800H (up to 4.4 GHz maximum clock boost, 16 MB L3 cache, 8 cores, 16 threads)

RAM DDR4-3200 MHz 16 GB (2 x 8 GB)

1 TB M.2 PCIe® NVMe ™ TLC SSD

15.6 "(39.6 cm) diagonal FHD, 144 Hz, 7 ms response time, IPS, micro-edge bezel, anti-glare, 300 nits, 72% NTSC (1920 x 1080)

NVIDIA® GeForce RTX ™ 3070 Notebook GPU (8 GB GDDR6 Dedicated)

And the other is the HP ZBook Power G7 Mobile Workstation

Windows 10 Pro 64

Intel® Core ™ i7-10750H (2.6 GHz base frequency, up to 5.0 GHz with Intel® Turbo Boost Technology, 12 MB L3 cache, 6 cores)

RAM DDR4-3200 MHz 8 GB (1 x 8 GB)

256 GB PCIe® SSD

15.6 "(39.6 cm) diagonal FHD, IPS, anti-glare, 250 nits, 45% NTSC (1920 x 1080)

NVIDIA® Quadro® P620 (4 GB GDDR5 dedicated)

I know this might not make much of a sense... but... I like both machine, but there are few things that I am trying to avoid at this moment, my old computer had the following and that is the stuff I will try to avoided in the new machine.

- I will try to avoid a machine that is constantly on a full blast fan noise.

- I also will try to avoid intensive heat as much as I can (I know this can deteriorate the life of the machine)

- Power consumption is another thing, I can see that the Omen takes about 200W and the HP ZBook Power G7 takes about 150W AC is which lower but of course this could lower the performance is someway I am guessing. But as you mention " Ryzen 7 CPU will be good and will run on less power than a full on gaming or workstation system."

My head is heading to get the HP ZBook Power G7, because the reviews that I have read most then are saying that it is a quiet but powerful machine, it has an NVIDIA® Quadro® P620, but I know NVIDIA Quadro’s are getting out the door and the model with this machine is a basic one, but still an NVIDIA® Quadro® P620. I will upgrade the RAM to 32 GB if I finally choose this unit, I also like the aspect that not many people had reported many problems with the machine, and it seems a well put machine.

The thing that I am not really clear about is the Intel® Core ™ i7-10750H (2.6 GHz base frequency, up to 5.0 GHz with Intel® Turbo Boost Technology, 12 MB L3 cache, 6 cores) as the work I do is 3D animation, that means PCU will be important. The Omen has an AMD Ryzen ™ 7 5800H (up to 4.4 GHz maximum clock boost, 16 MB L3 cache, 8 cores, 16 threads) which it seems better than the Intel Core i7-10750H, but I could be quite wrong on this.

So is the Intel® Core ™ i7-10750H good for 3D animation with Autodesk MAYA or will be better the AMD Ryzen ™ 7 5800H?

What will be your thoughts on this?

 

[Jerry James]

OMEN 15-en1003ns Gaming Laptop with NVIDIA® GeForce RTX ™ 3070 Graphics

I would pick this.

The Quadro P620 is considerably weaker compared to an RTX 3070 (performance sits somewhere around a 1050 Ti, iirc)
That's why you're seeing a lower power usage on the HP model.

You should only consider the second option if the applications you use require workstation graphics (some software like Solidworks only unlock certain features when they detect workstation GPUs).

So is the Intel® Core ™ i7-10750H good for 3D animation with Autodesk MAYA or will be better the AMD Ryzen ™ 7 5800H?

Definitely the latter.

 

[G7MT7]

Greetings enthusiasts!

G7 here-

Read the threads Jerry listed above and while they were helpful, I do have a few questions of my own about the best computer for my own brand of 3D Mod. & Animation.
I use Cinema 4D as well as Adobe Cloud- mostly After Effects, Photoshop, Illustrator and Audition. I push my machines to their limit and need a laptop that can take industrial strength use and not take forever to render.

I have my eye on this machine: Legion 7i Gen 6 Intel (16") with RTX 3060 (BUILT TO MY SPECS)
$2,979.99

-Processor
11th Generation Intel® Core™ i9-11980HK Processor (2.60 GHz, up to 5.00 GHz with Turbo Boost, 8 Cores, 16 Threads, 24 MB Cache)

-Operating System
Windows 11 Pro 64

-Memory
32 GB DDR4 3200MHz (2 x 16 GB)

-First Solid State Drive
1 TB PCIe SSD

-Graphic Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® RTX™ 3080 16GB

Ok- to the questions:

Is 32 GB of RAM enough for robust 3D animation, or do I need more? Less not better but adequate?

Can I add RAM/ Update a laptop with any real significant parts?

Do you or anyone reading this have experience with 3D work on a Lenovo?

Any help and advice would be great! Thank you!

 

[Jerry James]

Is 32 GB of RAM enough for robust 3D animation, or do I need more? Less not better but adequate?

It's considered adequate unless you're into very complex scenes, etc. Our recommendation starts out at 32, so you should be good to go.

Can I add RAM/ Update a laptop with any real significant parts?

Yes, RAM sticks are usually user-upgradeable. But make sure you check with the manufacturer or look for instructional videos to be 100% sure.

Do you or anyone reading this have experience with 3D work on a Lenovo?

@Alex Glawion would be better equipped to answer that one

 

[G7MT7]

Thanks so much Jerry!