I am stressing out so bad trying to pick a new laptop for DaVinci Resolve. I have this huge freelance gig starting in three weeks here in Chicago and my current rig is just choking on 4K footage from my Sony A7SIII. I need to upgrade like yesterday.

I've done a bunch of reading online and everyone seems split. Half the people say just get a MacBook Pro M3 Pro because the media engine is amazing for 10-bit 4:2:2 h.264 footage. But then the other half says a Windows laptop with an RTX 4070 or 4080 is way better because Resolve loves GPU power and CUDA. Im so confused because some benchmarks show Mac winning and others show Windows crushing it.

Here is my situation:

• Budget: Max $2500, absolutely cannot go over that
• Use case: Heavy 4K editing, color grading, and some light Fusion work in DaVinci Resolve Studio
• Preferences: Needs to not thermal throttle constantly and I really want a decent screen so I don't have to carry a monitor everywhere

Can someone please just tell me what to buy? I'm literally losing sleep over this and don't want to waste $2.5k on something that will stutter during playback...