Solved! Another kid looking for gaming laptop.

[sean518]

1. What is your budget?

I'm willing to spend around 2k

2. What is the size of the notebook that you are considering?

I've been looking primarily at 15, but I can see myself going to 17. I would like a HD screen.

3. What screen resolution do you want?

I'd like to go with 1920/1080 - 1920/1280

4. Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop?

I am a busy college student so I do need to be able to throw it in a bag and move it around, but I will rarely, if ever, use it without being plugged in. I'm looking more for a desktop replacement.

5. How much battery life do you need?

Very little.

6. Do you want to play games with your laptop? If so then please list the games that you want to with the

I play a few MMORPG's that my current laptop can barely handle which is the primary reason I am upgrading my system. I want the ability to play the most intense games at maximum settings, and I'm looking for longevity in terms of graphic performance.


7. What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo / Video editing,watching movies, Etc.)

Gaming, High Def video watching/streaming, wireless streaming capability would be nice.

8. How much storage (Hard Drive capacity) do you need?

500GB +

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

I've been looking at custom boutiques but I'm really overwhelmed at this point since there are so many options

10. How long do you want to keep your laptop?
2-3 years

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

I rarely ever use my disk drive unless I'm installing a game. If I can save money opting out of a blu ray player I would do that as I get pick one up as a peripheral later.

12. Please tell us about the brands that you prefer to buy from them and the brands that you don't like

I'm really open to anything. Like I said I'm just really overwhelmed with the amount of choices and I'm not sure who should by from and what parts will offer the best performance.

13. What country do you live in?
USA

14. Please tell us any additional information if needed.

I started out looking at alienware and have since browsed dozens of sites but I realized

1 - I don't know what components will offer the best performance.

2 - I don't know what brand is going to offer me the best price.

So any help would be appreciated. I'd rather spend more and have a system that can handle everything I want to handle than cheap out and be disappointed a few months from now.

 

[sean518]

I would like to grab a faster graphics card than the GT 540 that is my only issue with that system.

 

[AntiZig]

Hello sean, welcome to the forums.

To start off, I'd recommend this website I found while doing research on a new laptop I recently purchased.
http/www.notebookcheck.net/

Now, in terms of boutique vendors, there is indeed a myriad of them out there, but the best choice is to look how long they've been in business, what kind of reviews they got from gaming community and also from official agencies like BBB (http/www.bbb.org/)
Basically, when looking at a custom vendor look for the link to their BBB rating, that will be able to give you some objective information about the business.
Another very big issue to consider is location. Many of these custom vendors offer wonderful lifetime support and 3 year warranties. The problem is, you want them to be relatively close to you, if you ever need to mail the laptop in for service. Because for example, you live on east coast, and you buy from digital storm, who are in California; if you need to mail laptop in for service it takes about a week to get to CA from east coast, they will need some time to work on it, say a week and then ship it back for another week. In total you sitting without your laptop for 3 weeks to month. While if you find a local or relatively close vendor, shipping to them will take about a day or two, that's a lot better.

Now, to recommend some vendors by location I found in my own research recently:
West coast:
http/www.digitalstormonline.com/ - CA
http/www.falcon-nw.com/ - WA
Mid west:
http/www.xoticpc.com/ - NE
East Coast:
http/originpc.com/ (former alienware executives) - FL
http/www.maingear.com/ - NJ

Now, out of those, the cheapest one I've found to be are xoticpc and digital storm (these are mostly the preffered ones by the TH community). DS has a little less customization options, but they have nice premade models to select from, you are sure to find something that will suit you, xoticpc just has nice prices and good options. origin is former folks from alienware that created their own company after alienware got bought out by dell, they haven't been around for very long, but I haven't seen any major complaints about them. falcon nw, has been around for quite a while, but they are pricey, so is maingear.

That's as far objective as I'll go, rest of choosing is up to you.
From personal experience, I've got very similar needs to yours myself and here's the laptop I just bought myself:
http/www.xoticpc.com/sager-np8150-clevo-p150hm-p-2972.html
for me a major factor was the casing layout, I knew I wanted a clevo case after looking around at all different ones on the market. your priorities might be different, but, this will give you a place to start.

All best, and hope this helps you to make the choice you'll be happy about

 

[sean518]

Can I ask what options you opted for?

I think I'm going to go with xoticpc, even the model you recommended. I do have a few questions about some features though..

1- Do I need to spend an additional $40 on the IC diamond thermal compound? I've never heard of such a thing.

2- Is it better to opt for more Ram now (6GB as opposed to 4GB) or can I upgrade that later if I see a need? will 2GB extra RAM provide a huge increase in performance?

3- Assuming I get the "Intel® Advanced-N 6230 - 802.11A/B/G/N Wireless LAN Module + Bluetooth" wireless option that will provide Bluetooth support, I don't need to get the USB Bluetooth adapter add on as well right?

4- Is having them overclock my system worth the performance? I'm afraid I'm cheaping out my only getting the lowest tier I7 CPU is it better to just upgrade the CPU?

 

[AntiZig]

1. I didn't ask what is the default thermal paste that they use, but you can find out from them and then compare. thermal paste is always applied, it's just a matter of which brand/type. I'm no expert on this so no idea what the exact benefits of IC diamond are.
2. the E65 intel motherboard has 4 slots afaik. so even if you get 4GB now and need more later you can upgrade, since you will have 2 extra slots open
3. N6230 comes with blue tooth connectivity, no need for extra
4. Not sure about this one, the processor has the turbo boost. Plus, I'm not too comfortable overclocking a laptop knowing there's no additional cooling to account for it. You can talk to them to find out tho.

My machine: 2720QM, GTX 485M, 8Gb RAM, 750GB HDD, N-6230 wireless, regular dvd rom burner (no blueray), Win7 Home, everything else stock as they offered. The only reason I got 8 Gb of ram is I do AutoCAD for work, so the extra ram is helpful when having multiple big drawings open.

Note, they also have a small sale, Sager 8150-S1. It's the same thing, just with default options being at higher values, it comes out about $100 cheaper than if you do the same options on the regular 8150. Just a note if you are choosing to get a lot of upgrades that one might be a better option

 

[sean518]

Can anyone point out anything that would cause these two systems to perform differently, one significantly better than the other.

http/www.xoticpc.com/sager-np8150-clevo-p150hm-p-2972.html?wconfigure=yes

http/www.cyberpowerpc.com/system/Xplorer_X6-9400_Notebook/

The only difference I can see between the options that I am looking at is the graphics card. The one from xoticpc would come with a ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD6970 with 2GB while the cyberpower system would come with NVIDIA GTX 460M 1.5GB.

I know the ATI card is better but how much would that effect performance?

The xoticpc would cost me 1650 or so while the cyberpower would cost me 1210 or so and the only difference I see is that graphics card? Any suggestions?

 

[AntiZig]

Note: the link to sager doesn't link your choices, so I have no idea what exactly you're picking on that model.

One thing I see is Cyberpower uses HM67 mobo, while sager uses hm65. I don't see much performance impact.

There's different wireless cards, not sure on performance comparison.

As for 460M vs 6970M, see this thread: http/www.tomshardware.com/forum/67638-35-advice-review-laptop

 

[dev111]

Hello all
well I want to know whether should i buy lenovo 570 or 570d with 3d.
now a days some movies and games are released in 3d,whether 570d is capable of playing 3d movies and games in 3d?some people say right now there isn't much 3d content in the market so i am bit confused with 3d version and the normal 570,is 3d version reliable,please let me know should or i go for the normal lenovo 570 or else with the one with 3d.I know accept 3d both the models are same so lemme know ty.

 

[AntiZig]

Hello all
well I want to know whether should i buy lenovo 570 or 570d with 3d.
now a days some movies and games are released in 3d,whether 570d is capable of playing 3d movies and games in 3d?some people say right now there isn't much 3d content in the market so i am bit confused with 3d version and the normal 570,is 3d version reliable,please let me know should or i go for the normal lenovo 570 or else with the one with 3d.I know accept 3d both the models are same so lemme know ty.

if you want advice, make your own topic. Don't hijack someone else's topic just because you saw similar models being discussed.

 

[cbrunnem]

Can anyone point out anything that would cause these two systems to perform differently, one significantly better than the other.

http/www.xoticpc.com/sager-np8150-clevo-p150hm-p-2972.html?wconfigure=yes

http/www.cyberpowerpc.com/system/Xplorer_X6-9400_Notebook/

The only difference I can see between the options that I am looking at is the graphics card. The one from xoticpc would come with a ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD6970 with 2GB while the cyberpower system would come with NVIDIA GTX 460M 1.5GB.

I know the ATI card is better but how much would that effect performance?

The xoticpc would cost me 1650 or so while the cyberpower would cost me 1210 or so and the only difference I see is that graphics card? Any suggestions?

the 6970 is about 30-40 percent better in gaming.

notebookcheck.net

 

[sean518]

If there is that much a difference in the performance of the graphics cards then I'm going to hold out for a system with a 6970 or a 485M.

Both the systems I picked above could be configured the same way with the exception of the graphics card except there was a major price difference thats why I wanted to know if the graphics card alone would make a huge performance difference.

 

[sean518]

what is the next best option compared to the Radeon 6970?

 

[cbrunnem]

the 485 is not much better than the 6970 and about 200 dollars more. the 460m is a really good card its just that you were comparing it to one of the fastest mobile cards out there. other fast cards are 480m 470m 460m 560m 285m. those are just nvidias cards and they are all above or at the 460ms performance. as for amd, you have the 6870, radeon 5870, 6950, 6970, and the radeon 4870

 

[AntiZig]

Here's the list in the range you want:

 

[sean518]

Thank you very much. Is that in order of performance? I'm going to assume so since the 485 and the 6970 are near the top.

 

[AntiZig]

yes, it's the order based on benchmarks at http/www.notebookcheck.net

 

[sean518]

Do you have any suggestions of sound quality? I would like to get decent quality sound out of the system as well. Is that a sound card issue or will buying a nice pair of speakers take care of it?

 

[cbrunnem]

Do you have any suggestions of sound quality? I would like to get decent quality sound out of the system as well. Is that a sound card issue or will buying a nice pair of speakers take care of it?

i wouldnt rely to much on a laptops speakers. i would invest in some high quality head phones if you want great sound.

i have these and they are loud enough that i dont even have to have them on to hear the audio.
http/www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826262102&Tpk=jvc%20ha-rx700

do yourself a favor though.... if you go that route dont invest in some Beats, they are just as good as headphones half the price, just my opinion.