Laptop too weak for editing - help!

[Kadelle13]

Hello everyone! I'd be SO SO SO grateful if any PC geniuses and laptop lovers could give me a slice of their expertise with this problem...

I used to edit on a standard desktop PC, nothing too fancy, lower price range. And I used a MAGIX editing software which ran pretty smoothly on said PC. Sure, it froze every now and then but apart from that, I was hardly ever seriously frustrated with it.

Now I'm editing with the same software (btw also rather affordable) but on my ASUS laptop. It's a lower price range one, under 300€, but my editing software freezes at every single cut I make in editing. So basically Im more or less assuming where I make my cut and have to re-render the clips often to ensure the cuts are set properly.

Can anyone tell me whether I can solve this by buying a new graphic card, ssd, tuning it up or whether I have to buy a really expensive laptop as the only option?

I could get used to the annoying editing on my current asus, I could also go back to my old PC since it's only collecting dust in the guest room. But it'd be ideal if I could edit on my main laptop.

So THANK YOU for any help!! <3

 

[PrettyKeli]

I know how frustrating editing freezes could be.

I would suggest (if you haven't tried it already) check all programs that may be running in the background and whatever is running that you can do without, disable. Hope this helps

 

[GamingRack]

I imagine that your laptop isn't powerful enough to edit so the best thing you can do is go back to your desktop not a lot you can do about the laptop since it's not like you can add better parts lol

 

[Kadelle13]

I know how frustrating editing freezes could be.

I would suggest (if you haven't tried it already) check all programs that may be running in the background and whatever is running that you can do without, disable. Hope this helps

i always edit with all other programs closed buut i'll make sure to check more thoroughly in case i've missed any hidden activities! thanks [DOUBLEPOST=1462046870,1462046802][/DOUBLEPOST]

I imagine that your laptop isn't powerful enough to edit so the best thing you can do is go back to your desktop not a lot you can do about the laptop since it's not like you can add better parts lol

thank you for the input
yeah i might try the PC again! true, i can't "add" better parts to my laptop but i can replace most parts with more powerful ones.

 

[daniel burgio]

I ended up building a better pc because my 8 year old one couldn't really handle using HitFilm too extensively. And the preview in Sony Movie Studio Platinum would jump and freeze no matter what quality setting it was on. Both took a pretty big toll on how I cut the video. It's an unfortunate reality about editing. It takes a lot of processing power.

 

[Kelkschiz]

Generally laptops have very limited upgrade options. At most you can probably upgrade the memory and the harddisk to an SSD. I am using Adobe Premiere myself and I assume it works similarly to what you are using. In my experience the actual editing of a video mainly relies on the harddisk and memory (in sharp contrast to the encoding which uses a lot of processor power), so if that is the problem then you may think about an upgrade there. You can check if that is the case by monitoring your system memory and harddisk use while editing. An SSD will help a lot if you are not already using one, speedwise that is. But you are talking about freezes which shouldn't happen in any case. Freezes are a bit more serious. The most likely cause of freezes is either that your laptop does not meet the system requirements, or that either the program or your operating system has become corrupt. I would first check the system requirements and if that checksout then you could consider reinstalling MAGIX and if that doesn't help consider doing a clean install of Windows. For future reference though, video editing is a pretty allround intensive task for a computer. It may be wise to consider that when buying your next laptops or desktop.

 

[GamingRack]

i can't "add" better parts to my laptop but i can replace most parts with more powerful ones.

You are extremely limited as to what you can upgrade or replace in a laptop since there's no space, there's very little compatibility for the parts and some laptops you either can't open or you void the warranty. if you want a more powerful computer invest in the desktop as it's infinitely more upgradeable and Easyer in every way

And as a quick point it's a laptop so putting a demanding cpu or something like that will likely burn through the plastic on the laptop haha you have to think about heat output aswell

 

[Kadelle13]

I ended up building a better pc because my 8 year old one couldn't really handle using HitFilm too extensively. And the preview in Sony Movie Studio Platinum would jump and freeze no matter what quality setting it was on. Both took a pretty big toll on how I cut the video. It's an unfortunate reality about editing. It takes a lot of processing power.

thanks for the tip about processing power, this helped with my "research" haha
[DOUBLEPOST=1462048862,1462048260][/DOUBLEPOST]

Generally laptops have very limited upgrade options. At most you can probably upgrade the memory and the harddisk to an SSD. I am using Adobe Premiere myself and I assume it works similarly to what you are using. In my experience the actual editing of a video mainly relies on the harddisk and memory (in sharp contrast to the encoding which uses a lot of processor power), so if that is the problem then you may think about an upgrade there. You can check if that is the case by monitoring your system memory and harddisk use while editing. An SSD will help a lot if you are not already using one, speedwise that is. But you are talking about freezes which shouldn't happen in any case. Freezes are a bit more serious. The most likely cause of freezes is either that your laptop does not meet the system requirements, or that either the program or your operating system has become corrupt. I would first check the system requirements and if that checksout then you could consider reinstalling MAGIX and if that doesn't help consider doing a clean install of Windows. For future reference though, video editing is a pretty allround intensive task for a computer. It may be wise to consider that when buying your next laptops or desktop.

thanks for the detailed help!
you're soo right, i should have done a bit more research before buying my current laptop. i had this "my editing program was cheap so it doesnt require a superduper fancy gaming desktop replacement laptop" - what a naive individual i was

so i checked the system requirements for my MAGIX software which are:

Processor:
At least: 2 GHz
Recommended: Quadcore processor with 2,8 GHz

Memory:
At least: 2 GB
Recommended: 8 GB

Graphic Card
At least: Onboard, min. 1280x768
Recommended: "dedicated", min. 512 MB VRAM

Local Memory
At least: 2 GB in order to install the MAGIX software

I did my best to translate the info from German into English so I apologize in advance for any awkward translations

Now this is what my laptop says it's got:

Processor (CPU)
intel bay trail m DUAL CORE 2840, up to 2.58GHz

Memory
4GB

HDD
500 GB

...Looks like I need a quadcore instead of a dual core; is this assumption halfways correct?

Thank you!

 

[daniel burgio]

Uh oh. That looks about right in terms of your processor. It's funny, because people think video editing is simple, but it actually takes power.

 

[Kadelle13]

You are extremely limited as to what you can upgrade or replace in a laptop since there's no space, there's very little compatibility for the parts and some laptops you either can't open or you void the warranty. if you want a more powerful computer invest in the desktop as it's infinitely more upgradeable and Easyer in every way

And as a quick point it's a laptop so putting a demanding cpu or something like that will likely burn through the plastic on the laptop haha you have to think about heat output aswell

haha yess i wouldn't want to cause my laptop to combust
i was hoping that any replaceable parts could be the issue (graphic card, etc) but apparently my dual core is just about sufficient to run the program. but in order for it to reach its full potential, i need a quadcore

thanks again for the advice![DOUBLEPOST=1462049085,1462049005][/DOUBLEPOST]

Uh oh. That looks about right in terms of your processor. It's funny, because people think video editing is simple, but it actually takes power.

got it, thanks!
yeah i was gullible in terms of thinking that cheap programs -> low power. I thought that as long as I don't use After Effects, I'll be fine haha - lesson learned!