Basic Editing Computer

For an editing system. Sony Vegas or if I can get my hands on...steal...some new Adobe set up.

do you have a budget in mind?

easy option if you want a laptop is a used macbook pro. Anything in the past few years will have enough power, at least fro the 15"/17" models. Grab an external hard drive, mouse/keyboard, and a 24" monitor and you are all set.

You don't need a mac, I'm just saying that among those models you can take your pick, where as with a pc there is more variation, so some might not quite have enough power.

If you want a desktop, the mac minis/mac pros are great, or you could build a pc (or mackintosh). Even if you don't know computers, if you are patient and liked legos, you can do it. It will take a little bit more research for parts, but you can have a very solid set up for under $1000 with a monitor (you will likely have to exceed $1000 if you want to use a graphics card/CUDA)

I am more looking for some Specs. I am not doing anything crazy, no crazy affects or long movies or stuff like that. Few small stuff for my company that is just for fun and I film some friends for fun and put stuff together. Like 5-8 min stuff.

Lenovo y410p works great for me...

a quad core processor, I would say i7 or better to take advantage of hyper threading
8gb ram minimum, 16gb would be great
a high speed hard drive minimum (7200RPM), small ssd as boot drive and a larger storage drive would be better
an nvidia card to use cuda, assuming your editing program supports it
and I would say 20" 1080p as a minimum for an external monitor. I have 1 24" for now, and it is nice for editing, but it would be nice to move to a high res 27/a pair of them
and then a nice external mouse. I have the apple magic mouse and I love it, but this one is largely personal preference

thats sounds wayyyyyyyyyyy overkill for what OP is trying to do

So to combined the last two responses and maybe make a bit more sense out of this...

Id go with the 8gb of ram if I were you, in editing it can make a big difference since your timeline is being held in ram while you edit, then written to your drive as it renders. The more ram you have the longer you can edit without waiting for it to render. As far as other specs go check out the suggested specs for the software you will be using. Also if you want to use dual monitors make sure to check that the computers graphics card will support that, some cheap cards cannot support more than one monitor.

definetely want to get a graphics card

dont get core 2 duo or core duo, those things are outdated as fuck. get a i5 if you cant afford a i7. sandy bridge og ivy bridge

ahhhh i dunno if this is completely true. the footage is stored on a drive and the timeline is just a place you put the shot and when you export it creates a new video on your drive from other videos.


BUT

the more ram the better for sure, 8gb is a minimum IMO

I would say i7 for a laptop, even a few generations old, because it can take advantage of hyper threading, which can make a big difference for video editing. For a desktop, a new has well i7 is more than enough, but theres nothing wrong with getting it if the budget allows. I was simply saying i7 because many gamers push for the i5 (better price to performance), and while may editing systems and game systems are similar, I wanted to highlight the hyper threading feature.