Need a gaming laptop for WotLK

[Lilaeth]

I have an Asus W90vp and its horrible for World of Warcraft. Unplayable framerates in battlegrounds and low fps in 25 man raids. It's been RMA'd 2 times and replaced since I bought it in April. I own another notebook with a 6800mGT and it plays WoW Wrath content better and smoother. Now I hear the W90vp is discountinued, shortest run in Asus history.
Wrath of the Lich King is highly CPU intensive.. I don't know if a slower clocked quad is the route for me to go. I had to OC the q9000 at 2.0 in order to get better fps in WoW on the w90vp.. Still only a 10-15 fps increase. ATI mobile driver support doesn't impress me so far.

Here is my form filled out

1_What is your budget? $2500-2800 usd

2_What is the size of the notebook that you are considering? 17 - 18.4

3_What screen resolution do you want? 1980x

4_Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop? desktop replacement

5_How much battery life do you need? not important.

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)

World of Warcraft WrathotLK medium at least.
Farcry2 (med/high
sims 3 high ?
CoD4 high

7_What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo / Video editing, surfing the web, playing music, watching movies, Etc.)

Surfing/photos

8_How much storage (H.D.D Capacity) do you need? 500 @7200rpm


9_If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post the links to them. Unsure

10_How long do you want to keep your laptop? 2 years

11_If you would like to mention some other things about purchasing your ideal laptop, post them. I love the looks of the W90vp , but the performance of a Sager/clevo d900f

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.

I want a brand that has halfway decent support - I can't take Asus RMA's over and over again.
I called Alienware to check on the M17x and couldn't understand the accent of the rep. It was too difficult to communicate -
And Sager ... ... are they really that ugly ? I've never seen one in person.

13_What country do you live in? USA

 

[frozenlead]

30fps in Warcraft is typical for raids and such. The w90vp is one of the most powerful notebooks in the world. The only thing (arguably) better is the Sager 9850.

But, really, your WoW experience is typical. The game just gets bogged down with lots of players. It's not likely to be your notebook. Did you get similar results when playing other games?

 

[Lilaeth]

hi, thanks for your reply!
No, my Wow experience is not typical on the W90 because my G1s with a 6800m gt gets better framerate than the w90vp - and that is at native resolution of 1680x1050 all setting low except for distance at high and spell detail at medium.
. .. The w90vp with all settings on low and everything turned off ( ie: shadows, dynamic lighting etc - no AA ) , does not function as well at native res. Plus the colors are all washed out and mediocre looking ( driver related i suppose) .. A reseller told me there is a bad architecture of the bridge in crossfire. To me, that makes the unit a disaster.. I get 2-18 fps in Dalaran. Unplayable frames in battlegrounds. I don't feel that's typical results I've even disabled one card to see if performance increased to no avail..
There are also no driver updates from ATI/Asus , unless you are willing to flash your bios and do more complicated things in order to install the 9.4 or later mobile drivers.. It ships with 9.2 -- WoW does not utilize SLI/Crossfire nor does it take advantage of Quad the way a fist person shooter might. My w90vp got 11246 in 3dMark 6 and I think it was like 5100-ish in vantage, though I could be mistaken.. I was very angry and a lot has gone on since I ran vantage! This unit was RMA'd twice due to defective 4870's.

My w90vp plays the Sims 3 very nicely. And Unreal 3runs beautifully, but who wants to play that anymore? LOL... I've given the system away to a family member who does video editing and surfs the net -- They love it. So no matter at this point.


My G1s is going in for its last warranty RMA.. I get artifacts and occassional BSOD's .. There was an inherent issue with the Nvidia card and Mobo and I never got it changed out a long time ago.. I originally bought the w90vp to take its place.. So I am done with Asus notebooks for now.

Sager or Alienware ? Flip a coin?

/flips Dalaran fountain coin........ ...... ......

p.s You have a really nice laptop , btw ;-)

 

[lostandwandering]

Sager or Alienware ? Flip a coin?

/flips Dalaran fountain coin........ ...... ......

p.s You have a really nice laptop , btw ;-)

Sager. Screw Alienware and their overpriced, gaudy systems.

If you like the w90's looks then the NP9850 should match it: http/www.sagernotebook.com/product_customed.php?pid=188463&action=customize

$2400 base config and that is with dual GTX280 M's. You can take a GTX280 off and save yourself $400 since WOW doesn't need dual cards.

The other option would be the newer version of Frozenlead's laptop, the NP5797: http/www.sagernotebook.com/product_customed.php?pid=129131&action=customize

17'', single card setup.

They have another 17'' laptop with i7 processors, but that would most likely be overkill for you.

 

[Lilaeth]

Ahh,, would have been a great idea, but the 9850 only comes with SLI as of last week. -- 2 cards only.. Can't take a card off and save any money -- I suppose Sager didn't want to overlap product lines, so the 9850 has the single card option removed. USA resellers , anyway. I'm afraid to buy direct from Sager. Reseller ratings are in the dirt.. What do you think? Go Sager direct without a reseller to call for future issues instead of them? lol...


I suppose the Sager 9280 is going to have to be the route i take. I don't see a Core I7 being too much .. I do see the gtx 280m being a possible bottleneck for that cpu . .. thanks for letting me vent it out and basically come to terms with the fact there aren't many options other than what I am already considering. Plus, now i have to consider buying from Sager's site !

 

[lostandwandering]

Ahh,, would have been a great idea, but the 9850 only comes with SLI as of last week. -- 2 cards only.. Can't take a card off and save any money -- I suppose Sager didn't want to overlap product lines, so the 9850 has the single card option removed. USA resellers , anyway. I'm afraid to buy direct from Sager. Reseller ratings are in the dirt.. What do you think? Go Sager direct without a reseller to call for future issues instead of them? lol...

1) if you look at the customization page on Sager's website, you have options for both single or dual cards. So, yes, you can go single card with that chasis.

2) I bought my NP5760 direct from them. I have no complaints. My order was delayed, but that was due to a shortage in the 7950GTX's which eventually came in. They explained what was going on instead of ignoring my requests for a status update. I also recently had to replace a battery (mine is constantly on the charger so it went kaput) and a screen hinge (my mother accidentally dropped the 9 lbs beast right on the hinge). I found their support to be excellent especially considering my laptop was out of warranty for both issues. Tech support answered the first time I called, I was never put on hold and the technician was easily understandable.