what is everyone recommending for a laptop spec to run tbs efficiently?
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I recently asked a somewhat similar question. Here’s a link to that thread. It might have some relevant information. Other than that, I’m no help in this department.
There is a post that covers this on the community already, however we have just purchased some new hardware with higher specs than we have purchased previously and we are going to be running some tests here over the next 6 weeks to see how well those perform vs other computers that we already have and have been using.
I want to run the same processes on different specs so that we can provide concrete advice around this as to what are the most important items to purchase in a laptop for the money you are prepared to spend to get the best performance for the types of task you do.
On the face of it any decent laptop in the 3 to 5k$ price range will work, you need Intel processor today but I heard that a future version of TBC will also “fully support AMD” but that is not available today.
RAM - minimum 32GB Fast RAM, ideal 64GB, Best 128GB or more if you are handling large point clouds - but if you are doing that you may be better with a desktop for that.
Graphics Card - 8GB is what I would do as a minimum but you can likely get away with Less if you are not doing big point clouds - this is one area that I want to really validate in the coming weeks. I now have cards that go from 8 to 32GB and should be able to determine if 32 makes any real difference to graphics performance - it may in things like BIM objects or point clouds or mobile mapping, but my first pass with a 32GB box is that it made little difference for CAD work - but testing so far has been minimal.
Hard Disk - a fast Solid State drive with good read write tines.
CPU - I have been told that the new low power use CPUs are as good as the older higher power CPUs - they generate less heat and run higher clock speed so give better performance. We always go with high speed I9 but I cannot say that they do / do not perform better than an I7 - we have no experience of I7 so cannot comment. We are doing more and more multi thread applications in the RPS Tools so we are starting to get better performance as a result of using more of the resources available - TBC has some multi thread processes - especially in point cloud workflows but for Corridors and Takeoff - TBC Standard is using single core processing so that does not get any real benefit from high end multcore processing.
Trimble has a white paper that outlines computer requirements based on your modules.
The lidar, photogrametry requires a very robust laptop.
Device name Jeff-Laptop-7670
Processor 12th Gen Intel(R) Core™ i7-12850HX (2.10 GHz)
Installed RAM 64.0 GB (63.7 GB usable)
Device ID F817E677-2E94-4B00-BA14-D782BA414254
Product ID 00355-63138-61592-AAOEM
System type 64-bit operating system, x64-based processor
Pen and touch No pen or touch input is available for this display
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I’ve added one of these fan boards to my laptop and have seen a pretty nice boast to speed just being able to move more heat off the components likely a good bang for the buck.
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Even with a high-end workstation, this is a solid move! I’ve got an older precision laptop from 2020 and it still runs strong. I can’t help but think its longevity and stability under heavy loads is directly tied to the $25 fan sitting under it.