It can be argued that everyone should have a good quality, reliable laptop regardless of what they’re using it for, but this especially applies to anyone using AI tools on a regular basis.
Unless you’re planning on running your own servers to host a cloud-based application with thousands of users, you don’t need anything too special. You just need to make sure your laptop has a powerful processor among several other necessary components. A good laptop will be a financial investment, but it doesn’t have to drain your wallet. For instance, HP always has quality laptops on sale with a wide range of specs and prices to meet any budget. By narrowing down your requirements, it’s easy to find what you need.
With that said, here’s why AI enthusiasts need a quality laptop.
AI apps won’t always run on poor quality machines
Every application made, whether it’s for MacOS, iOS, Android, or Windows, has certain requirements to run. If your operating system and specifications don’t meet those standards, you can’t use the application.
An example of some of the most basic apps with AI-powered features are DeepL, Grammarly, YouTube Studio, and even Canva. If you’re running generative AI apps, like Midjourney through Discord, Playground, Kittl, or Ideogram, your laptop needs to be fast enough to handle the tasks. Even though these are all cloud-based applications with most of the computing power being handled on the server side, your laptop will still need to do some of the heavy lifting.
A quality laptop with a strong and fast processor will be able to handle all of the tasks you’ll need to perform using the above-mentioned apps (and other similar apps). You can still use browser-based generative AI applications on a slow laptop, but you will need to wait much longer to get results.
AI-powered tools run faster with a better processor
Using ChatGPT won’t tax your computer’s processor, but other applications might. For example, if you’re training an AI model, whether it’s text-based or image-based, you’re going to need some decent computing power. The applications available will almost always be cloud-based, but again, you’ll also be required to use a significant amount of resources on your end.
There are no-code, low-code, and code-based applications available, but just because you use a no-code application doesn’t mean it’s going to be any lighter. It might, but that all depends on what software you’re using.
The bottom line is that running any resource-intensive application on your laptop will require a decent processor and it’s not worth trying to force it on a poor-quality device.
You’ll need a lot of storage space for AI generations
One of the most important specs for regular AI users is storage space. If you’re saving prompts in text format, that’s not going to take up much space, but the images most certainly will max out your internal hard drive quickly. If you can get a laptop with at least 1TB of disk space, that would be ideal. However, if you can’t, then you’ll need an external drive.
AI-generated images quickly fill up a hard drive because it’s common to download the standard image, then download the upscaled version, and several additional variations. For every image you save, you could end up with between 1-5+ images. If you’re paying for services that charge monthly for a certain daily limit of generations, like Kittl, you’re probably going to max out your generations each day. If all you do is save 80 generations per day, that’s 2,400 per month. If your average upscaled image is 3.5MB, you’re saving around 8.4GB worth of images per month. That’s just with one program. If you pay to use multiple applications, that number will be much higher and you’ll need storage to accommodate.
If you’re a designer, you’ll need space for your mood boards
Designers regularly use AI to generate assets, but there’s also the dilemma of mood boards. Old-school designers and people who need to select colors directly in Photoshop don’t use online tools. However, a collection of custom mood boards can take up significant space on your hard drive. This is yet another reason it’s crucial to buy a quality laptop that has adequate storage space for all of your files.
If you use AI tools, you need a reliable laptop
Whether you’re training an AI model or just using online tools, a laptop with a fast processor will help. It will make your generations smooth and enable you to run multiple applications at once so you can achieve maximum efficiency.