Best laptop for video streaming.

[rnorr54]

Looking for a laptop for my husband that he can use to play online darts...basically he takes a web cam and aims it at the dart board (to prevent cheating), and he sees the other guys dart board on his screen. So I need something that is going to keep up with the streaming video outgoing and incoming. Price range max is $2000.

 

[photonboy]

1) $2000 seems really excessive just to play online darts. Are there OTHER TASKS or GAMES he would use it for?

2) Could you specify SCREEN SIZE at least?
- 15.6" is lighter, more transportable
- 17" is heavier but a larger screen (recommend 1600x900 or 1920x1080 resolution)

3) VIDEO STREAMING:
- the ROUTER is also a factor
- your NETWORK BANDWIDTH is also a factor (especially your UPLOAD SPEED)
- the DISTANCE between laptop and router is also a factor

*Probably any laptop is fine for wi-fi connectivity bandwidth, but you can BUY a USB adapter if you need better.

Feel free to ask any questions but I didn't give a specific laptop as I thought you should understand this first.

 

[photonboy]

1) $2000 seems really excessive just to play online darts. Are there OTHER TASKS or GAMES he would use it for?

2) Could you specify SCREEN SIZE at least?
- 15.6" is lighter, more transportable
- 17" is heavier but a larger screen (recommend 1600x900 or 1920x1080 resolution)

3) VIDEO STREAMING:
- the ROUTER is also a factor
- your NETWORK BANDWIDTH is also a factor (especially your UPLOAD SPEED)
- the DISTANCE between laptop and router is also a factor

*Probably any laptop is fine for wi-fi connectivity bandwidth, but you can BUY a USB adapter if you need better.

Feel free to ask any questions but I didn't give a specific laptop as I thought you should understand this first.

 

[rnorr54]

1) $2000 seems really excessive just to play online darts. Are there OTHER TASKS or GAMES he would use it for?

2) Could you specify SCREEN SIZE at least?
- 15.6" is lighter, more transportable
- 17" is heavier but a larger screen (recommend 1600x900 or 1920x1080 resolution)

3) VIDEO STREAMING:
- the ROUTER is also a factor
- your NETWORK BANDWIDTH is also a factor (especially your UPLOAD SPEED)
- the DISTANCE between laptop and router is also a factor

*Probably any laptop is fine for wi-fi connectivity bandwidth, but you can BUY a USB adapter if you need better.

Feel free to ask any questions but I didn't give a specific laptop as I thought you should understand this first.

 

[rnorr54]

1: Money is not an issue for us therefore we do not think our max dollar amount is expensive. Other tasks would be normal; email, music, movies...

2: Screen size doesn't matter period! Mostly concerned about the memory, hard drive, processor, video card, etc.

3: I don't know what kind of router we have because I am at work an unable to look at. But I will glad take advise on what type of router I should have. Network bandwidth I will have to check into also. (I don't know much about these details, this is why I am here looking for advice, not everyone is a computer wiz.) Distance might be an issue because the dart board is so big that its downstairs in our basement (walk out basement not underground).

Thank you for pointing out the flaws in my question, please understand if I knew what I was doing I wouldn't have asked.

 

[photonboy]

Hi again,
If you have an existing computer setup you can try communicating with someone else's PC via SKYPE. There are two main factors in the video quality:

a) camera quality (built-in or external web cam)
b) UPLOAD network speed

Your UPLOAD capability is probably 1/8th of your DOWNLOAD capability and this is controlled by your network provider. This is probably your main bottleneck not the laptop.

These two factors determine what the OTHER PERSON sees. The video YOU see is dependent on HIS camera and upload speed.

Most laptops should be able to communicate via Wi-Fi fast enough to transmit a good HD-quality video signal two floors apart (i.e. 2nd floor to basement), and again you can use a better USB Wi-Fi device if you ever require more than this.

SIZE:
If you're going to spend a lot of money and it's meant to be fairly STATIONARY, my advice is get a 1920x1080, 17" laptop.

GPU:
This will be the main factor in price, but if you don't play video games you're really just throwing money in the garbage as ANY laptop from $350 up can handle basic tasks like e-mail, music, movies...

Summary:
- need to narrow it down, as a good non-gaming laptop is far from $2000 (do you NEED a good video chip ?)
- main bottleneck is likely the UPLOAD bandwidth which you have no control of
- can TEST your video upload/download using Skype on existing PC.