Asus N550jv vs MSI GE40 vs MSIGE60

[Kaleb Clark]

Hi,

I have looking online trying to find myself a laptop. I've done a fair bit of research, and all the laptops listed above in my post fall within the category what I am looking for. What is hard to find is decent reviews on current models or a list of things that people have found as pros and cons of each. This is where I am hoping this groups expertise can help me out.

What is your budget?
$1,500 AUD

What country will you be buying this in?
Australia

What size notebook do you prefer?
14" or 15"

Monitor Collaboration?
1 or 2

Battery Life?
3.5-4.5 hours

What weight are you looking at?
Don't quite know but something between 2-3k

Would you consider a refurbished laptop?
No

What are the primary tasks you need this notebook for?
Web Surfing, Listening to Music, Video Chat and Conference, Movie Streaming and Viewing, Output Video to Large Monitor, Casual Gaming, Graphic Intense 3D Gaming and Photoshop

Where will you be using this laptop?
Home, School, Meetings

Will you be buying online or in store?
would rather In store but may buy online

List the screen resolutions that interest you:
Max Resolution (1920 x 1080) Or higher

Do you prefer a glossy or matte screen?
Matte

Is the laptops design important to you?
Kind of, would rather back lit keyboard and Black colour outside

How long do you want this laptop to last?
4-5 years

How much storage capacity do you need?
1TB hdd and/or 128gb ssd

Do you want a built-in optical drive, what type?
Yes, would rather blue ray.

So if you gals/guys have any thoughts on the listed laptops please let me know!

MSI GE40, MSI GE60 or ASUS N550JV Or any others (Would rather those brands though)

 

[Tradesman1]

Of those three, I'd look to the Asus, just had a good review on it at notebookcheck.net a few days ago

http/www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Asus-N550JV-CN201H-Notebook.98311.0.html

and I, myself, won't touch MSI, poor QC and support....

 

[Kaleb Clark]

Of those three, I'd look to the Asus, just had a good review on it at notebookcheck.net a few days ago

http/www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Asus-N550JV-CN201H-Notebook.98311.0.html

and I, myself, won't touch MSI, poor QC and support....

Can you get The N550 with a Matte or non glossy screen, as i haven't been able to find one?

 

[Tradesman1]

That I'm not positive about

 

[Kaleb Clark]

That I'm not positive about

ok i will have a further look into that. Also do you have any idea if and/or when it will be released in Australia. (Asus N550)

 

[Tradesman1]

Nope, most companies generally have a rough timetable they plan for on releasing things and where but if sales are way up say in the initial release area, maybe the States, then demand may delay additional releases elsewhere....also if sales are extremely flat they may speed up releases elsewhere to sell what they can or drop a line entirely

 

[Gazeebo900]

I got an MSI GE60, works great and It has never gotten very hot, my friend has an ASUS and works great also but I have heard bad stuff about both, just take care of your laptop.

 

[Kaleb Clark]

I got an MSI GE60, works great and It has never gotten very hot, my friend has an ASUS and works great also but I have heard bad stuff about both, just take care of your laptop.

Does the MSI get very hot?

 

[Gazeebo900]

I saw 2 reviews and they said yes but I personally haven't experienced extreme heat, I only feel a lot of heat when I touch the main exhaust which all heat gets out from but other parts are not hot nor warm, I heard some experience extreme heat but they re install the drivers and it works properly then. I myself didn't have to do this.

 

[chaosdsm]

This is probably a little late, but I received my ASUS N550JV-DB72T with 1920x1080 touchscreen & GeForce GT-750m graphics just over 2 weeks ago. Initially it was advertised as having a matte screen, but that was an error on ASUS's part; every place that noted it online, initially listed the screen as Matte - when xotic got mine in, they found out then that it was actually a glossy screen

RE heat: I had mine upgraded to IC-Diamond thermal paste & Copper heat sinks, and it still gets very hot, up to 75C running folding @ home, but that's also plugged in & with the CPU clocking at 3GHz while on a flat wooden table top with no added ventilation. Under normal web-browsing, watching videos, checking email conditions (while plugged in & on same table top) it rarely goes over 50C. On battery, the CPU is clocked way down to about 1GHz & runs significantly cooler, barely reaching 55C while playing Skyrim.

Battery life sucks No if's and's or but's, it just sucks. If your in a room with no external light sources, you can lower the screen brightness down to 0 & get decent battery life, enough that I can watch about 2.5 hours of Netflix movies in bed. But with the LCD at usable levels in a lighted room (20-30% brightness), I can only play Skyrim for about 45 minutes, & general use without gaming or videos maxes out at about 3.25 hours. In a very bright room, though where you need at least 60% or more on screen brightness, it really chops down that battery life to under 2.5 hours without video, & about 30 minutes of Skyrim.

Hard Drive that came with it also sucks, 1TB 5400RPM SATA II that maxes out at an average 48MB/sec read (don't know if mine was a bad drive, or just really sucks that bad...), fortunately, I had a 256GB 840 Pro waiting to drop into it once it arrived! With the included HDD, the system is painfully slow, with the SSD, it's as fast as my i7-3930k desktop. Fortunately, the back is really simple to remove & access to all internal components is super simple, you just need a #5 Torx bit / screwdriver to remove the screws.

Gaming wise, this thing is surprising. I though I would have to lower the quality settings, but Skyrim's auto setting put it at Ultra High Quality (WITHOUT the optional "High Resolution Texture Pack" installed), and so far, I haven't run into any noticeable slowdowns. Though watching Fraps when I could, I did see frame rates dropping down to around 30 - 32 fps during heavy action.

Fortunately, it's unlikely that I will need more battery life than what this thing gives me, still it's the one thing that bums me out on this laptop especially considering the upgrade to the SSD with arguably the lowest power usage currently available. Still this does everything I wanted, comes with all the features I wanted except the matte screen, and at a price I was very comfortable paying, $1248 shipped to my door. As for the matte screen, I'll just add a matte screen protector to it & be happy!