FHD laptop and external UHD monitor for Resolve?

I'm trying to spec a laptop for Resolve 14 and 15 that will edit and grade 1080 and 4K H.264 footage. Here's my dilemma: Dell XPS 15 9560 with UHD display but only a GTX 1050 with 4GB VRAM, or an Asus ROG GL502VS or GL702VS with a GTX 1070 with 8GB VRAM, but only a 1920x1080 display.

I haven't kept up with computers over the past six years or so because I was only shooting, not editing or grading, so my questions are:
1) Will Resolve 14 and 15 display the full interface and be usable at 1920x1080? The configuration guide says 1920x1200 minimum.
2) If I went with the 1920x1080 display for working on the road, would I be able to hook the laptop up to a larger 4K monitor at home or the office, either through mini Display Port or Thunderbolt 3 (over USB-C) and use that as my main monitor? And if over Thunderbolt 3, would I also be able run external hard drives over Thunderbolt 3 at the same time, as I figure that's how I'll be storing large projects?

Thank you for your help!

[Peter Chamberlain]

Hi, please let me know where in the config guide it says 1920x1200 only?
Thats not correct. we support 1600x900 res UI screens as found on some laptops.

Hi.

If you plan to use the TB3 can I not recommend the Dell XPS 15 9560. It only uses 2x PCIe lanes for the TB3 connection acording to this review. Other uses 4.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Dell-XPS- ... 648.0.html

Back at April 3rd Intel introduced 5 new 6 Cores Mobile CPU's. The Intel Core i9-8950HK, i7-8850H, i7-8750H, Xeon E-2186M and E-2176M.
They are 40-50% faster than the previus 4 Core versions:

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Our-first ... 462.0.html

If you need a Laptop, can't I understand that you look at some with the old 4 cores CPU's. The new only cost a few dollars more.

Regards Carsten.

Hi, please let me know where in the config guide it says 1920x1200 only?
Thats not correct. we support 1600x900 res UI screens as found on some laptops.

Hi Peter,

Thank you for your reply!
I've been looking at documents.blackmagicdesign dot com/DaVinciResolve/20180407-79c607/DaVinci_Resolve_15_Configuration_Guide.pdf

Page 6 has a section titled "User interface monitors" which first talks about Apple Retina 5K screens and says "and scales in a number of ways to even operate on laptop screens with 1440x900 resolution with abridged name and icons at the controls." But that seems to be Apple only, as the next paragraph says "For Windows and Linux systems we recommend monitors with 2560x1440 down to 1920x1200 resolution for the best layout."

Then on page 19, in the section "PC Laptops" it says "When selecting a system for operational ease you should order a laptop with sufficient screen resolution to clearly show the full UI, such as 1920x1080, and at least 16GB of system RAM."

So I was going off of page 6, but even page 19 makes 1600x900 seem insufficient.

Thank you Carsten, I was not aware there was a difference in TB3 connections, so I appreciate that information!

I have been finding laptops with the older CPUs at significant discounts over their new prices, and the current prices of laptops with the newer CPUs, but I will keep my eyes open for good deals on the new CPUs. I appreciate your input!