Best Laptops for TouchDesigner

Spend any time in one of the various public TouchDesigner forums or groups, and you’ll likely see the question “what laptop should I buy??” asked somewhat regularly. It’s a common conundrum for TouchDesigner developers of all levels of experience, but especially those that are just starting to “get serious” with the program. While a custom-built desktop is often the go-to choice for professional developers (at least when working from home), a laptop can be an indispensable tool for developing projects on the go, running live events, or even performing yourself! In this post, we’ll take a look at a number of currently available laptops that could be a great choice for TouchDesigner developers, along with some tips and tricks for choosing a machine for yourself.

Choosing The Right Laptop for TouchDesigner: Consider These Factors

There are a few things to consider when choosing a laptop for running TouchDesigner.

The first is your budget — no one can really define this but you! However, most laptops with a decent specification run at the low end around US$1200-1500, so keep that in mind when starting to save for a computer.

In terms of the laptop you end up choosing, one place to start is with the operating system! Most (but not all) TouchDesigner developers use Windows machines, as there are a number of operators that are specifically only supported in Windows. These include the NVIDIA Background/Denoise/Flex/Flow/Upscaler operators, Kinect operators, ZED operators and more. With that in mind, we’re going to limit this list to Windows machines.

In terms of CPU, it’s not particularly important whether you choose an Intel or AMD processor. For TouchDesigner purposes, having more CPU cores doesn’t necessarily equate to a huge boost in performance, as a lot of CPU-based work is single-threaded. The general consensus is to try and find a CPU with higher speed rather than more cores.

One of the most critical features we look for in a laptop is a dedicated GPU! We recommend sticking with an NVIDIA GPU to take advantage of the NVIDIA operators in TouchDesigner. In general, when it comes to the GPU more VRAM is better, so it’s worth getting as much as you can afford.

The same is true of RAM. We’d recommend 32GB at minimum these days (64GB if you can afford it)! Thankfully, RAM is typically user-upgradable, so you can usually add more later if the need arises.

Another consideration is the amount of storage the laptop has. In general, as with the previous specifications, the more the better. We’d recommend 1TB or more. Some of the laptops listed here offer a second slot for adding an additional SSD, which can be a great option for upgrading your storage space later on.

The display size and resolution are up to you. In terms of screen size, a 16″ display seems to be a common choice, one that gives enough real estate for working on the go without sacrificing portability. It’s worth aiming for a QHD (2K or 2560×1440) display or UHD (aka 4K or 3840×2160) display if possible. High refresh rates aren’t particularly important in our experience, 60Hz is usually enough for most projects.

The amount of available ports the machine has is something to consider — you probably don’t want to have to carry around a bunch of dongles! In our experience, the more ports the better.

Finally, the size and weight of the laptop are important, too. If you’re a frequent traveler, you might not necessarily want to be carrying around a brick of a machine for the next couple of years. That said, go too thin and you can run into issues with heat/adequate cooling, leading to system throttling and/or your machine running very hot!

Budget Friendly: Sager NP7550D Notebook

Link: https://www.sagernotebook.com/Notebook-NP7550D.html
Cost: Starting at US$1,449.00
CPU: Intel Core i9-14900HX
Display: 15.6” Full HD (1920×1080) 144Hz
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 8GB
RAM & Storage: 16GB DDR5 SDRAM, 1TB M.2 SSD (both have options for upgrades)
Weight: 5.08 Lbs
Dimensions: 14.21″ (w) x 9.72″ (d) x 0.98″ (h)

If you’ve been around the TouchDesigner community for a while, you may have seen reference to a brand of laptops called Sager. Sager is a well known white-label laptop manufacturer, who have been producing highly configurable (often quite high performance) laptops for a while now. Because they eschew the typical marketing associated with most commonly known brands, their laptops usually cost significantly less while offering comparable levels of performance.

Although it might not look like much at first, don’t underestimate the Sager NP7550D! It has a powerful CPU and GPU for the price, and offers a number of options for upgrading storage space and RAM from the factory. What it doesn’t offer, though, is the high end UHD/4K OLED screens that we see in more expensive laptops.

Worth noting is the cheaper NP7550C model, which has a lower end RTX 4050 6GB GPU and starts at US$1,349.00. Check it out here: https://www.sagernotebook.com/Notebook-NP7550C.html

Budget Friendly: Lenovo LOQ (15″ Intel) with RTX 4060

Link: https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/loq-laptops/lenovo-loq-15irx9/83dv00fxus
Cost: Starting at US$1,319.99
CPU: Intel Core i7-13650HX
Display: 15.6” Full HD (1920×1080) 144Hz
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 8GB
RAM & Storage: 16GB DDR5 SDRAM, 512GB M.2 SSD (both have options for upgrades)
Weight: Starting at 2.38kg / 5.25lbs
Dimensions: 21.9-23.9mm x 359.86mm x 258.7mm / 0.86″-0.94″ x 14.17″ x 10.19″

Coming in at ~US$129 less than the Sager NP7550D, this configuration of the Lenovo LOQ offers pretty similar specifications. Compared to the Sager, the Lenovo has a lower-end processor, and half as much storage as standard, but otherwise has the same GPU, RAM, and relatively similar dimensions.

A Solid Middle Ground: ASUS ROG Strix G16 (2024)

Link: https://rog.asus.com/us/laptops/rog-strix/rog-strix-g16-2024/
Cost: Starting at US$1,699.99
CPU: Intel Core i9-14900HX
Display: 16″ QHD+ 16:10 (2560 x 1600, WQXGA)
GPU: GeForce RTX 4060 8GB (configuration with RTX 4070 8GB available)
RAM & Storage: 16GB 5600MHz RAM, 1TB M.2 SSD
Weight: 2.50 Kg (5.51 lbs)
Dimensions: 35.4 x 26.4 x 2.26 ~ 3.04 cm (13.94″ x 10.39″ x 0.89″ ~ 1.20″)

The ROG Strix G16 strikes a good middle ground of performance and price. It features specifications nearly as good as those of laptops in the ~US$2,500 price range, especially when equipped with the RTX 4070. The screen resolution, while not 4K, is a step up from the FHD/1080p screens seen in the budget friendly laptops. Upgradability on this model is good, with two slots for RAM and two M.2 PCIe slots for storage.

High End MacBook Pro Alternative: Razer Blade 16 (2024)

Link: https://www.razer.com/gaming-laptops/razer-blade-16-2024
Cost: Starting at US$2,599.99
CPU: Intel Core i9-14900HX
Display: 16″ Dual UHD+FHD+ Mini-LED (2560 by 1600 resolution), 240Hz
GPU: GeForce RTX 4070 8GB (RTX 4080 12GB optional)
RAM & Storage: 16GB 5600MHz RAM, 2TB M.2 SSD
Weight: 2.45 kg / 5.40 lbs
Dimensions: 21.99 mm x 244 mm x 355 mm (0.87” x 9.61” x 13.98”)

At the pricier end of this list, the Razer Blade has been a popular choice among developers for years now as an alternative to the MacBook Pro line. Like the MacBook Pro, it features an anodized aluminum case that gives it a feeling of quality compared to many of the plastic-bodied laptops in the same price bracket. Under the hood, the Blade is a high end gaming laptop, with a Core i9 processor and NVIDIA GeFroce RTX 4070 8GB (4080 w/ 12GB VRAM optional). In past years, the Blade was considerably thinner and lighter than many of the laptops you’d see with similar specs, but the thickness increased with the introduction of the Blade 16 model to address previous issues with battery bloat and reliability.

One final thing to note is that there is a new version of the Razer Blade 16 on the way! New features include a thinner design (14.9mm / 0.59″ thick), redesigned keyboard, GeForce RTX 50-Series GPUs, AMD Ryzen AI 9 CPUs, and more. If you’re interested in this model, it might be worth the wait — check out this page for more info: https://www.razer.com/gaming-laptops/razer-blade-16

High End Creative Professional: Asus ProArt P16 (2024)

Link: https://www.asus.com/us/laptops/for-creators/proart/proart-p16-h7606/
Cost: Starting at US$2,699.99
CPU: AMD Ryzen™ AI 9 HX 370
Display: 16″ 4K (3840 x 2400) OLED, 60Hz, Touch screen with stylus support
GPU: GeForce RTX 4070 8GB
RAM & Storage: 32GB DDR5 RAM, 2TB M.2 SSD
Weight: 1.85 kg (4.08 lbs)
Dimensions: 35.49 x 24.69 x 1.49 ~ 1.73 cm (13.97″ x 9.72″ x 0.59″ ~ 0.68″)

Aimed more at the creative professional (think content creators) than the gaming laptops we’ve looked at previously, Asus’ most recent ProArt laptop features a nice 16″ 4K OLED display, powerful AMD Ryzen AI 9 series CPU, and GeForce RTX 4070 GPU. Although priced around the Razer Blade 16, it has more RAM standard, it’s over 1lb lighter and slightly thinner, and has a higher resolution OLED display standard.

Also worth noting is that there are more affordable configurations of this machine available with somewhat lesser specifications — a version with an RTX 4060 and smaller SSD is available for US$1,699.99.

Wrap-Up

So many laptops, so little time! One final word of advice that we’ll leave you with: do your research before impulse buying the first laptop you see (and that includes the ones we’ve listed here)! New laptops are released all of the time, prices tend to change as new ones are released and sales throughout the year can offer pretty decent discounts. On top of that, different retailers will sometimes offer a better deal on the same machine, so it’s worth checking a few. We hope that this post has been helpful as you start the process of figuring out which laptop to buy for TouchDesigner!