Need help deciding between laptops

[BMWDrew]

Hello,

I need help deciding between two laptops based on some opinions of machine reliability and cpu/gpu. I'm down to these two, so I'd just like some help deciding on these, not offered another opinion on a different system.

I'm deciding between a MSI gt780 with a I7 2630QM 2.0Ghz chip (w/ turbo boost) and a GTX 560m and an alienware M17xR2 with a I7 940XM extreme chip 2.2 ghz w 3.3 turbo boost and radeon 5870M in crossfire.

-I'll pretty much only be playing SC2 and it doesn't really support crossfire/SLI so for all practical purposes the alienware qould be equivalent to 1 5870m radeon.

-I can upgrade ram on either and will be putting a SSD in either, so these are my real factors here.

So my real questions are:

-Is the 940XM a really great chip because its the extreme edition or is the other one better? is there a big difference?

-Is alienware reliability really that sketchy? from reading a bit MSI seems great but alienware seems very mixed reviews.

Thanks so much for the input & help

 

[k1114]

The 560m can play sc2 on ultra. Both cpus are about the same performance but the 2630qm uses less power and with nvidia optimus, so does the gpu; and a lot less since 5870m are cf. A single 560m is better than a single 5870m but only by a little so cf put those ahead quite a bit if a game supports it. Both laptops are see good ratings. What is the price of each?

 

[BMWDrew]

Both are about $1000 or so on eBay. Originally I really wanted Alienware because I've always wanted one but as i started researching it I was surprised to read so much negative feedback I saw about Alienware laptops and you really are paying for a name rather than internals. Now I'm leaning more towards Msi since the internals are much better for the buck, still has a cool design and backlight keyboard and an overclock button. However I'm still a bit of a sucker for wanting that Alienware design. I'd be pissed to spend $1000 on a laptop though and a year from now start having blue screens or crap like that

I often don't game at all and will probably never play anything besides Starcraft2. So reliability is far more important and has to be the bottom line for me

 

[k1114]

Ever since dell bought alienware, its nothing but marketing now. Asus is the brand now or going with someone custom like sager. I personally wouldn't buy a $1000 laptop off ebay. You should be able to find new for around the same price/specs.