Forum Discussion

RaevenFowler's avatar
RaevenFowler
Community Member
10 months ago

Best Laptop for Instructional Designers

 

Hello! Does anyone have advice or guidelines for selecting the best laptops that meet the performance requirements for eLearning creation? Or possibly a recommend a laptop model that you've found effective for building robust Storyline projects?

As a graduate student, my current laptop, an HP Envy, serves me well. However, I do encounter lag and occasional crashes when working with Storyline 360, especially when I'm quickly navigating the system. With graduation approaching, I anticipate working on more complex Storyline projects in the future and considering investing in a high-performance laptop to meet my future needs. However, I want to ensure that such an investment is warranted and that my current laptop isn't already ideal.

If you have any tips regarding specific laptop models, minimum storage requirements, or CPU specifications, I would greatly appreciate your input!

General E-Learning
  • PhilHaley's avatar
    PhilHaley
    Community Member
    10 months ago

    Hello,

    My laptop at work is a Lenovo ThinkBook 14 G3 ACL. It has an AMD Ryzen 7 5700U processor rated at 1.8 GHz, 24 GB of RAM, and a 500 GB HDD. The graphics processor is integrated. I do not experience any lag, even with multiple Storyline projects open. My laptop at home, which I also use for work, is an MSI GF65 with an Intel Core i7-10750 6 Core processor rated at 2.6 GHz. It has 32 GB of RAM, a 512 GB SSD, and NVIDIA GPU.  I experience no lag with it, either. I use both laptops with dual screens connected by HDMI. The MSI laptop, although equipped with 2 USB C ports, requires the Docking station to be connected via one of the USB 3.0 ports, while the Docking station connected to the ThinkBook utilizes the USB C port. I hope that helps!

    Thanks,

    Phil   

    • RaevenFowler's avatar
      RaevenFowler
      Community Member
      10 months ago

      Hi Phil, this information is wonderful! Thank you for taking the time to share, I will look into these suggestions! 

      • PhilHaley's avatar
        PhilHaley
        Community Member
        10 months ago

        You're welcome Raeven! I should also mention both these laptops are pretty reasonably priced. The AMD Ryzen 7 processor (8 core) scores higher on the benchmark tests than the Intel Core i7-10750 (6 core), but they both seem to work reasonably well. I've been told, regarding the ability to handle program loads easily, faster CPUs mean more than RAM, and an integrated GPU will handle most of the tasks we regularly perform. Take Care!  

  • SarahHodge's avatar
    SarahHodge
    Former Staff
    10 months ago

    Hi Raeven! Looks like you're already getting some great suggestions here. I don't have a specific recommendation, but since you mentioned working in Storyline 360, I just wanted to chime in and share these software requirements.

    Also, you might be happy to know that we recently released a 64-bit version of Storyline 360 for faster authoring and increased stability. You can learn more about it here.   

  • IngridCampbe285's avatar
    IngridCampbe285
    Community Member
    8 months ago

    - Lenovo ThinkPad
    - 1 terabyte of RAM
    - solid state drive
    - video card
    - i7 processor (minimum)

    • KarlMuller's avatar
      KarlMuller
      Community Member
      8 months ago

      32 GB of RAM is more than adequate. 

      1 terabyte SSD.

  • ArchieOsborne's avatar
    ArchieOsborne
    Community Member
    7 months ago

    Well, I’m biased but I’m totally satisfied with my M2 chip and Parallels.

    Just couldn’t leave macOS.

    • MarkMoran-f4bca's avatar
      MarkMoran-f4bca
      Community Member
      3 months ago

      Hey Archie. I am doing everything in my power to stay with macOS but it seems to cost a pretty penny to do so. Can I ask what specs your device is? Would a MacBook Pro M3 pro chip, 512GB SSD Storage with 18GB RAM be enough to run Parallels, several Creative Cloud apps (not video) and Articulate Storyline all at once? TIA

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