~$1200 gaming laptop

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1. What is your budget? ~$1200, can be a tad higher, say around ~$1250, not really that hard set in stone. But I do prefer <=$1200

2. What is the size of the notebook that you are considering? Prefer at least 17", with at least 1600x900. Optimally, it would be more like a 17.3" with 1920x1080

3. What screen resolution do you want? At least 1600x900, preferrably 1920x1080.

4. Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop? Don't care what type, 10 pound laptops are a breeze to carry for me lol.

5. How much battery life do you need? Not very picky about this. Prefer at least 3 hours, but would rather have a well performing machine.

6. Do you want to play games with your laptop? If so then please list the games that you want to with the settings that you want for these games. (Low,Medium or High)?
Starcraft 2 - High/Ultra only for streaming/recording. During actual play I play at lowest.
WoW - Best possible.
Will probably get D3 when it comes out, and since that will be more eye candyish... as best as possible for that too!


7. What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo/Video editing, Etc.)
Some video editing from screen capture material.
There will also be a lot of coding and the subsequent compilation, but compilation is chair riding/spinning time so I really don't care too much how much longer or shorter that might take with minor component changes.


8. How much storage (Hard Drive capacity) do you need? At least 500gb would be preferrable, but again, I'm more into the performance. Storage is cheap anyways.

9. If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post their links. Wherever

10. How long do you want to keep your laptop? 3 years

11. What kind of Optical drive do you need? DVD ROM/Writer,Bluray ROM/Writer,Etc ? DVD writer at least.

12. Please tell us about the brands that you prefer to buy from them and the brands that you don't like and explain the reasons.
No real preferences, as usually I use a desktop + shitty laptop, but am going to delay my next desktop cycle and get a laptop now instead due to infuriating annoyance with my laptop!

I do however like how the Asus G73/74 series looks, if that gives you an idea of visual taste.


13. What country do you live in? US

14. Please tell us any additional information if needed.
Well, to summarize my preferences, though these are not set in stone requirements (feel free to come as close or not :O)

Monitor: 17.3"+
Resolution: 1920x1080
RAM: 6 or 8 gigs at 1333mhz or higher, preferrably 8. 4 makes me queasy even though it shouldn't...you can probably convince me out of that lol.
HDD: 500gb+ @ 7200rpm
GPU: At least the performance of the 460m
Battery life: Subordinate to performance!! Just optimize it for gaming, I tend to have a lovely time coding on gaming machines haha.

If there's a good deal that requires me to OC the gpu or whatever to make it worth the $, I'll do it.


Thanks :)

edit - If you happen to be able to find a super great deal that has a smaller screen/resolution, do feel free to post it. I can use my main monitors while at home, though while away I must resort to the laptop screen for coding display! 15.6" at non full hd is a pain sometimes, but I'll deal with it if the rest of the laptop is really that great.

edit2 - Would also be nice if it came with Windows so I don't have to cannibalize Windows from one of my other computers.

edit3- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=34-230-028&SortField=0&SummaryType=0&Pagesize=10&PurchaseMark=&SelectedRating=-1&VideoOnlyMark=False&VendorMark=&IsFeedbackTab=true&Page=2#scrollFullInfo is my leading candidate so far. Haven't yet checked to see where it can be found cheapest.
 

amk-aka-Phantom

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N73 is good, but it's not a full gaming laptop due to an inferior GPU. For $1200, Asus G73SW is your best bet. And forget that above-mentioned Dell XPS 17, because its graphics card isn't as good as G73SW's. It satisfies all your requirement perfectly and you can find all kind of sweet configurations with SSD or better CPU, if you like (or upgrade it manually in the future). Just make sure it has USB 3.0 =) Otherwise, nothing is better for that price, you're gonna be very happy with this machine. Good to finally see someone who doesn't care about short battery life or weight - that's the true spirit of the gaming laptop's owner! =) Good luck!

P.S. There're better laptops out there, sporting much more powerful GPUs (sometimes even SLI/CF), such as GTX485M, 6870M and, in very near future, GTX570/580M. But the price is way above $1200, so G73SW is the way to go.
 

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One thing that I am half worried about but couldn't really find any info on. The $1200 version of the G74 (which you can find on best buy) is marketed with the 560M but really is using a 128-bit version, apparently just the 555M with better RAM. Seeing as how this is in the same price range, I'm wondering if maybe the 460M in the G73SW might also be a toned down version of the 460M.

If not, or if there is no reason to believe so, I'll go ahead and order it!
 

amk-aka-Phantom

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I read the article about G74 on notebookcheck.net and they're saying that it's not clear whether G74 will be sold with the 128-bit GTX560M or the normal one. But as far as I know, the GTX 460M in G73SW is the standard version. Check this article: http://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Asus-G73SW-Notebook.45917.0.html

That said, are you sure you need a laptop? For $1200, can build much more powerful desktop =)