Ask FreelanceSwitch #2
In this issue of Ask FreelanceSwitch, Travis King and Thursday Bram look at what’s a good freelancing laptop and when is it a good idea to work for free.
Ask FreelanceSwitch is a new regular column here that allows us to help beginners get a grip on freelancing. If you have a question about freelancing that you want answered, send an email to askfreelanceswitch@gmail.com.
Let’s get started!
Question #1
I am a freelance web designer, and developer that is going to college soon. I need to buy myself a laptop, but I don’t know what would be a good laptop brand for freelancing. I would prefer a PC, but you are free to suggest Macs.
-Nicole
Thusrday: During my first two years of college, I went through two different PC laptops. I did have some trouble getting the design software I needed to work on those computers, but I was able to use an on-campus lab pretty extensively. During my junior year, I was able to borrow a MacBook for most of the year and it sold me on using Macs exclusively. I purchased a MacBook Pro the next year and it’s lasted me ever since. I’ve never had a problem getting Adobe Creative Suite to run, although I know a few people had some issues getting Creative Suite 3 and earlier versions of Adobe software to work with the newest upgrades to Mac OS X (Snow Leopard).
However, the price of Macs is a big sticking point. If you’re not comfortable with the price difference, which is entirely understandable, Dell has a good reputation with the web designers I know who work primarily on PCs. The Inspirons offer a lot of bang for your buck and are available with larger screens — which is a must if you plan to do a lot of design work on your laptop.
Allow me to offer a bonus tip, as well: buy an external mouse for your laptop no matter what kind of laptop you actually get. When you’re doing design work, relying on a track pad can be tough. Just having an external mouse made a big difference in how my wrists felt after working on Photoshop for a couple of hours.
Travis: I’m going to get serious for a moment Nicole because I spent over a decade working with, selling and fixing computers in the retail environment. And if there is one thing I’ve learned, you don’t want to spend a decade working with, selling and fixing computers in the retail environment. I still get the shakes when I hear the opening bars to Jingle Bells.
When you talk laptops and designers you’re going to hear a lot of talk about Macs. Designer sometimes mistakenly believe that you need a Mac to look sexy. Let me tell you, I use a PC and I’m plenty sexy.
What you want above everything, is plenty of RAM. RAM stands for really awesome memory (the fact that I know that is one of the reasons I don’t need a Mac to be sexy). When you’re ready to buy the laptop and the sales person asks “Who wants more RAM?”, jump up and down and say “I do I do!”
Size is also going to a determining factor. If you want to take your work on the road then you don’t want to lug around a heavy laptop (unless you get your boyfriend or husband to carry it for you…they love doing that kind of stuff). If it’s a stay at home laptop, go for one with a honking big screen.
Also, if you’re planning on working out of coffee shops, look for one with some type of spill protection. I had a friend of mine who once dumped an entire cup of coffee on his laptop. It completely destroyed it. The good thing about it was that it was a Tim Horton’s cup of coffee, so at least it saved him from having to drink it.
Oh yeah, and don’t buy any laptop with a brand name you’ve never heard before like Suny or Maxnatronic. They’ll try and tell you that it’s got all the same components of an Asus or a Toshiba, but they’re full of the ol’ hornswoggle, the flimflam, the bum steer, the diddle… I think you know exactly what I’m talking about *wink* *wink*
Question #2
As a 17-year-old aspiring freelance writer, I understand my age has me at a bit of a disadvantage. For example, while I am confident in my writing abilities, I do not have a solid portfolio and am unsure how to go about creating one. Offering my services for free seemed like a good idea, but now I’m not so sure; I’ve heard it hurts more than it helps. In regards to establishing credibility, what’s the best way for me to build up my portfolio?
-Anna
Thursday: I actually started freelancing in high school. One of the ways I built up my portfolio was targeting magazines that specifically request submissions from students. These publications tend to expect you to submit on spec (have the article already written when you submit it), but they’re a little more willing to work with a writer with a short list of clips.
Beyond that, though, you’ll be building up a portfolio like every other beginning freelancer, regardless of age. I’d actually suggest leaving your age out of any queries, though, at least until you’re established. It may not always work against you, but it’s hard to move past an editor’s preconceived ideas.
When it comes to building up your portfolio, there are a couple of different approaches you can take.
- You can target publications that look for articles on spec. While you have to do more work up front, such publications are more likely to judge you on the basis of your writing than on your portfolio.
- You can create clips for yourself by blogging. Not all editors will take a close look at a blog as an example of your writing, but many are becoming more accepting. The blogging strategy can also help you write guest posts for other blogs, which can be used in your portfolio.
- You can write for low-paying clients who are less concerned about clips. I wouldn’t recommend working for low pay any longer than you have to, but with the number of bid sites and content sites out there, you can get a coule of clips quickly that can help you move on to better work.
Travis: You know what’s the best part of working for free, Anna? That’s right, you guessed it. Nothing.
Thursday gave a lot of valuable tips about starting up your portfolio and I’m going to agree with her. Target a few big name blogs and submit a few guest posts so that you can add it to your author byline. But after that, take a page out of Snoop Dog’s book and drop it like it’s a bad idea.
You’ll often come across people who will promise you the world if you work on spec. It reminds me a line from the movie Young Guns II when Emilio Estevez’s character offers to make any of the would be bounty hunters famous by putting a bullet in them. I may not be a cowboy, but I know that’s a bad idea. Also, in the movie, the musician Jon Bon Jovi played the role of a cadaver, which proved to be the high point in his career.
So I hope you understand my point – that you can learn a lot of life lessons from Young Guns II.
You know, my Mom had a saying about doing stuff for free, too. It was about cows and milk. You’ve probably heard it before – No one is going to want to buy the cow if it has bovine spongiform encephalopathy. I think that says a lot about working for free, and it says even more about my Mom.
If your writing is good, then by all means someone will pay you for it. You may not realize this, but I get paid to write this stuff. Right now, Joel is paying me in compliments, but I’ve heard talk that Canadian Tire money may be in my future.
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Thank you so much for publishing the question about laptops!
I’m a 24 year old college student & freelance designer and I’ve been debating taking the plunge and buying a laptop to replace my 5-year old desktop (which thankfully has 2 GB of RAM!). But because I’m a designer AND a developer too, I could never decide between Mac or PC. This made me a little more confident!
Thanks again!
As a 19 year old web design freelancer, I wish I would have had this advice when I started! Here are some other things I think are important when buying a laptop.
-Consider getting a custom-built desktop and a netbook! If you research computer guys/gals in your college town, you can compare rates and find someone who is willing to build you a pretty sweet gig for a very reasonable price ( sometimes significantly cheaper than the big name computer manufacturers) Cases are getting smaller too, so request a mid-sized tower and a 20-23 in. moniter to make it easy carrying to and from your dorm room. If you are set in having something portable, maybe a netbook would help? They’re perfect for keeping your school stuff on and having portable internet access for client meetings!
-Avoid HPs. While I think the products are fine for regular use, they do run very warm. Maybe it’s just my run, but I have gone through lots of power cords and lots of cooling pads.
-If you do buy a laptop, buy “business class” or its equivelent. You’re going to spend A LOT of time on your machine and the last thing you want is for the hinges to break, keys to fall off, or power cords to break constantly. Also invest in a sturdy power cord and cooling pad.
-Make sure you buy a laptop with a decent graphics card. Built-in graphics cards are just not designed to run Photoshop and Illustrator. Ensure you don’t lock your PC up by having at least 512MB of dedicated graphics RAM.
If you go the Windows route you may want to have your computer built from scratch so you can avoid all the extra junk that is installed which will slow you down.
As for Apple I’ve been able to get by with my newer MacMini with the RAM upgraded to 4 gigs. It’s comparable to the regular MacBook so I’d imagine that, so long as you’re projects aren’t too large in file size, you should be able to consider it as well and squeak by until you graduate and can afford something beefier. That’s assuming you’re on a budget. If not then just go crazy with the Pro (don’t bother with the Air).
I’ve never owned a Mac, however how are they for component lastability compared to PC laptops? I’d agree about the amount of pre-installed crapware you need to remove from the average new Windows laptop in order to maximise it’s usefulness, though.
I’ve owned an entry level Dell laptop, which lasted out its 2 year lease period OK, although its keys were starting to stick a bit towards the end. And my current laptop/netbook is an Asus eeepc, which hasn’t had any issues at all to date (touch wood). What I like about the eeepc however, is that if something *does* go wrong, the parts are cheaply available and the machine is easy to pull apart, so you’re not forking out hundreds for a simple repair.
My main question though, is why the costs of Photoshop etc aren’t mentioned? It’s been a while since I priced such programs but from memory, they could be the cost of the laptop again, per program! Unless you snagged an academic version. I’ve used both Photoshop and GIMP, and apart from Photoshop having a better interface there are few things GIMP can’t do.
Finally… linux? Not trying to start a flame war, but there are some very mature, stable linux versions out there now (eg Ubuntu). And from memory, Apple’s OS now runs on top of linux/BSD now anyway (probsbly why it’s more stable than Windows).
Food for thought.
I’ve used a Windows Machine for my web design all the time.
I’ve got a Lenovo (IBM) Laptop, but I use it more for on-the-go stuff and not actual design because I just can’t work without a larger set of screens anymore.
As far as desktops, a custom build like said above is the best option out there. Tigerdirect has great prices on their barebones kits and you can get a powerful PC that’ll run whatever you’d like.
Anna – Offering your services for free to a select couple of clients makes sense IF you have a strategic long-term plan behind that decision. If you do, then this is a non-issue — you should do a few projects gratis to build your portfolio and get a couple of testimonials from happy clients.
The problem occurs when the market you’re going after is beyond competitive and rapidly declining (e.g., magazines and other pubs). In that scenario, going work for free (even just to build your portfolio) is counterproductive, because as soon as you get out of the “free” business and start prospecting for clients, you’ll find yourself in a highly competitive situation where price is king.
I would look into markets that are still paying handsome fees — specifically the corporate market. In the corporate world, it can make perfect sense to do some pro bono work to get started. Just know when to draw the line and start charging.
remember too. these days you can put windows onto a mac and so you can, say if you were a web developer, test your work on ie6 *cough* *splutter*
Thank you for answering my question! I was waiting for a very long time to get an answer.
I want to thank Travis especially for saying you can still be a sexy web designer with a PC. PCs are no different.
I also figured RAM and hard drive were very important, but I figured I would get a freelancer’s opinion before I buy my laptop.
Thank you guys so very much!
Nicole
@Nichole – Alright, I’ll bite on the Mac vs PC thing if no one else is going to.
I’m a web design college student, freelance web designer, and geek, and if you’re serious about doing web design I’d definitely say go Mac.
As painful as it might sound at first, my advice would be to buy the most expensive Mac laptop you can afford. The MacBook Pro specifically with upgraded RAM if you can do it. Remember that you’re going to spend *hours and hours* staring at whatever you end up getting, so it’s worth getting something of quality.
My Macbook Pro bought in the summer of ’07 is still going strong, and has actually gotten a little faster with the various operating system upgrades that have come along. (As opposed to the opposite that seems to happen with Windows machines.) Although Adobe’s software is pretty much identical Mac/PC, there are many other tools and applications like Panic’s Coda that are Mac only. It’s also the best of both worlds for web development, because you can browser test both on the Mac platform and on Windows by running it inside Parallels or Fusion.
Also, with all respect to Travis, if you’re going to college you’re probably going to feel a little uncool with a PC when everyone else has Macs. Because they probably will.
Oh, and if you’re already enrolled in college somewhere make sure to shop through the education section of Apple’s online store. Being a student can save you a couple hundred bucks.
Wow. That got really long. This is why I don’t leave comments on websites. Good luck!
Thank you for the suggestion Bryan, but though Macs are reliable, PCs are too. Plus, I don’t care if I’m not a cool kid for having a Mac
I have to agree with you on Coda though. I am jealous of the Macs for that application, but I think I can live for now.
Nonetheless, I don’t have many problems with Macs, but with many years on both Macs and PCs, they are not very different from each other. PCs work just as good for creative people, most PCs are high-quality and you can get any computer to have high RAM. Plus, I find PCs are more affordable and as a high-school-almost-college student, I need something inexpensive, but high-quality.
Anyways, I don’t mean to start a Mac vs. PC war, but I just want to have all my options open for both. Thank you for your advice Bryan, I will think about it (:
Aaaannnd I just realized my smilies got turned into little pictures and I spelled Nicole’s name wrong. Where’s the edit button on this thing?