Having a good computer system is important with this type of work, so a special thank you goes to HP for keeping us on the cutting edge of workstation hardware by providing us with a fully decked-out EliteBook 8760w, which was our primary computer in writing this book. What struck us about the laptop was that it was not only portable, making it easy for a writing team to collaborate; it was also powerful enough to run truly demanding tasks. It takes a special machine to run graphics-intensive applications, such as the Autodesk^® 3ds Max^® software, and we were thrilled to write this book on the HP EliteBook.

Running an Intel i7 CPU with 16GB of RAM and an NVidia Quadro 5010M (with a whopping 6GB of memory) gave us the muscle we needed to run multiple applications alongside 3ds Max splendidly. Dual 320GB hard drives gave us plenty of space for Windows 7 Professional and its applications, and still left lots of room for renders. We opted out of the RAID option to mirror the drives (you can also stripe them for performance), but that doesn’t mean we neglected our backup duties with this machine! The 8760w was easily integrated into a Gigabit network in the home office, and on fast Wi-Fi everywhere else, so we had constant access to the home network and the hundreds upon hundreds of files necessary to write this book (and all their backups!).

And since we are so very image-conscious (as in the screen!), we wondered if the images we created and captured for this book would be done justice on “just a laptop screen.” The EliteBook has a stunning 17-inch, 30-bit IPS display panel that put those questions to rest very quickly! The HP EliteBook screen is no less than professionally accurate and calibrated for optimum image clarity and correct color. Barely a handful of high-end mobile workstations could even come close to meeting the demands image professionals put on their gear. But this notebook HP DreamColor display is remarkable—there’s just no other way to put it—going as far as besting any of our desktop screens in color and vibrancy.

With performance at such a high level, and in a nice portable form, we were easily convinced that we should perform all of our intensive work for this book on the EliteBook. Going back to a desk-bound tower quickly became a non-option. Thanks, HP!