Time to upgrade my laptop – need advice please
Looking for a high-performance PC (non-Mac) for data-heavy workloads — suggestions?
It's time to upgrade. I'm looking for a Windows/Linux-compatible machine (no Mac) that can handle:
Large spreadsheet workloads (think multi-GB Excel/CSV files)
4K+ video editing and exports
Possibly some ML experimentation later on
I was considering a high-end gaming PC for the GPU + RAM benefits, but not sure if that’s the best tradeoff for thermals, noise, and form factor. Open to desktop or laptop, though portability is a plus.
What builds or machines would you recommend in 2025 for blazing speed + stability?
Framework, the AMD versions.
Can take the 48GB SODIMMs that are on the market now. That'll handle a spreadsheet or two.
Great - thx!
for local ai seems unified mem may win.
no non mac laptop today has that with good thermals.
so some boxes has amd ai 390 or 395 with 128gb.
for laptops need to wait for good thermal releases.
so it feels that macs dominate these days in all your points, and has good resell price later, except being mac)
Excellent, thank you!
A gaming PC is probably your best bet. PC workstations for ML are extremely expensive.
I was kind of thinking this. thx
You get what you pay for.
Yeah, absolutely.
Thank you!
There's really only two choices in terms of laptop: a built in discrete GPU aka a gaming laptop, or one with the ability to add an external GPU through Thunderbolt or OCuLink.
Pretty much any desktop is going to outperform a laptop, especially the GPU.
External GPU is actually a really good option here. Get a laptop with a beefy CPU (definitely Ryzen; Strix Halo chips are really good and would be decent at standalone AI as well) and Thunderbolt/Oculink, then grab an eGPU dock and get the best GPU you can afford. For gaming, eGPUs suffer from bandwidth constraints, but for LLMs it shouldn't matter as much since the model only needs loaded once; after that it can sit in VRAM.
This is great - thank you!
Workstation laptops can be specified with powerful GPU’s.
You can spend $10k on a Dell with 4 drive capability, 128gb of ram and 24gb of gpu.
Super helpful - thank you!
What is your budget?
about $2-$3k.
https://h20195.www2.hp.com/v2/GetPDF.aspx/c09086887
Not sure how much the 128 GB RAM version costs or when it will ship.
Sweet - thank you!
I’m happy with my AMD framework. Though you said ML so maybe want Nvidia?
Cool - thx for the tip!
Wait for Q1 2026 and Nvidia will have probably announced their laptop product. Otherwise your best shot is a beefy Ryzen laptop.
I've been looking at Ryzen - thx for the tip!
A laptop product for ML and not for graphics?
They're (over)due to start shipping miniPCs aimed at being AI/ML workstations, using a SoC that's a collaboration between Mediatek and NVIDIA, with 128GB of DRAM. They have not yet announced intentions to put those chips in laptops and run Windows on them, but the writing has been on the wall all year. It would be entirely unsurprising to see NVIDIA(+Mediatek) overtake Qualcomm for ARM Windows PC sales next year. But it's too soon to start making purchase plans around that.
Thank you!
Unless it uses an entirely bespoke GPU architecture, presumably it will support both.
Thank you!