appropriate monitor for photo editing
 

hi,

i am going to get a new laptop, and its main role will be photo editing using photoshop and lightroom.

i have whittled it down to the HP envy 14 or the HP envy 17, and am now finding it hard to decide which to go for.

on the one hand, if the envy 17's screen is sufficient for photo editing i will probably go with that, however if not, then i will probably go with the 14 for portability, and get a monitor for at my desk. if i was to get a monitor then it seems that the HP LP2465 is one of the best monitors in my limited budget range??

i would obviously like to be able to produce the best images possible, and with this in mind is the envy 17 screen good enough for my amateur needs? or would there be a marked difference if i was to get the envy 14 with a secondary monitor.

if anyone has any opinions on whether there are more appropriate laptops out there, then i would be very happy to hear them as well.

thanks for your time

I have a HP w2207 which is great with my PC. I'm not sure about laptops for serious editing, but the one thing you will need to check out is that when you move your head slightly to one position or another that isn't straight on, that you get no distortion or light loss of any kind. I personally feel that any screen under 22 inches is going to be hard work. In fact 22 inches isn't really big enough and I wished now that I'd gone for 24 or even bigger. Laptops have improved over the years, and the Envy is a very nice machine if not a tad overpriced, but I would still consider linking one to a larger independant monitor for editing if a PC is out of the question. Just my thoughts of course.

any idea as to whether, for amateur needs the quality of the monitor will be especially important. would it be a bad idea to be spending under £200?

Fred, whether you are an amateur or a professional, you will want you images to look as good as you can get them. The majority of low end monitors are fine for surfing and for office use, but for gaming or image editing the criteria becomes a bit more demanding. There are several important things to consider when buying a computer and a monitor: that your graphics card is the best you can afford, and you have plenty of RAM to cope with edit programmes and file sizes; that the light doesn't fade at the sides when you move your head from side to side, and the screen is large enough to be comfortable when viewing and editing. Most monitors that are built for video editing and gaming have tremendous colour stability, and the more you pay for the monitor, the better the components. It really is down to what you want to achieve, and how much of an easy life you want with your editing. Any thing worth having comes at a price with everything I have found.

thanks for your advice