Suggestions for new quiet gaming laptop

[crate]

Hi there on Toms..!

I am in to buy myself a new laptop, top priority is that it is QUIET! Next is an SSD large enough to hold the OS and standard apps, like MS Office. (Thinking at least 120GB)

I will be using it mainly for small office tasks, but it has to be able to do a bit of gaming too, although I have a desktop which I use for gaming, and the laptop is not supposed to replace it.

I think it is difficult to find one that suits my needs perfectly, I care a lot about low noise and good build quality. I don't want it to be too big and heavy, as it is meant to be a portable PC. I have had one Acer laptop once, which I didn't like too much. From work I know Lenovo pretty well, and think they are well built with low noise, at least when idle, but from reviews I get that it isn't quite the same with the y500 series, but I don't know.

I copied and answered Maziar's questions for you guys to help me better.

1. What is your budget?
N/A - Willing to put the money, but not paying apple prices

2. What is the size of the notebook that you are considering?
Maximum 15.6" as I want it to be somewhat light and easy to pull around

3. What screen resolution do you want?
N/A - Most are 1920x1080 these days, right? Don't need higher than this, don't care if it is less.

4. Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop?
I need a portable laptop - no desktop replacement.

5. How much battery life do you need?
As much as possible No show stopper

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 - Highest
Battlefield 4 - Medium/Low

7. What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo/Video editing, Etc.)
Browsing, Word, Excel, Mails, Office tasks

8. How much storage (Hard Drive capacity) do you need?
At least 260GB. I need an SSD, it could be 120GB, then a HDD of 500GB would do fine. A bigger SSD would also be great instead of having a HDD for storage. Something like that.

9. If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post their links.
komplett.dk - elgiganten.dk - wupti.com - edbpriser.dk (Price comparison site)

10. How long do you want to keep your laptop?
At least 2 years, hopefully longer

11. What kind of Optical drive do you need? DVD ROM/Writer,Bluray ROM/Writer,Etc ?
Bluray is preferable, but an Optical drive is not required

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.
Don't like:
Apple, they just don't fit in my way of doing things, although I like their builds.
Acer, those machines I came across were bad build quality.
Every other brand is okay for me as long as it is:

Good build quality, doesn't get too hot, QUIET and that I can see everything on the screen, even in sunlight and from an angle and all that stuff.

13. What country do you live in?
Denmark

14. Please tell us any additional information if needed:
Most important:
Low noise, SSD, build quality, good display, not too big and heavy

Important:
Gaming ability, great wifi performance in both a and g bands, gigabit LAN, HDMI, USB3.0, battery life

I really hope that a laptop passing all these requirements exists.

Thanks for taking your time to read all this and help me find it

 

[Prostar Computer]

Take a look at Clevo and MSI laptops. They both produce good quality systems, often high end, for a fair price.

Suggested Clevo models: W650SR, W355STQ

Suggested MSI models: GP60

There's also the Lenovo Ideapad/Y series. That might be perfect for you, actually.

"Not paying apple prices" is a little vague, so if you could be more specific, I may be able to advise further.

 

[crate]

Take a look at Clevo and MSI laptops. They both produce good quality systems, often high end, for a fair price.

Suggested Clevo models: W650SR, W355STQ

Suggested MSI models: GP60

There's also the Lenovo Ideapad/Y series. That might be perfect for you, actually.

"Not paying apple prices" is a little vague, so if you could be more specific, I may be able to advise further.

Thanks for the reply.

I'm heading to bed now, and will look at your suggestions tomorrow.

I see what you mean - I actually have no limit, but keeping the cost as low as possible was what I meant with that.

 

[Prostar Computer]

If right around the $1,000 mark is not too steep for you, take a look at the Asus N550JV as well if you like. Very nice system, and if you order from one of Asus' resellers ( 😉 ), you can select from a variety of SSDs to replace the stock hard drive.

 

[jaguarskx]

Any laptop will become noisy when playing games because of the heat generated by both the CPU and GPU. The little fan / fans needs to spins really, really fast to move lots of air. Small fans spinning fast makes lots of noise. Actually, anything spinning fast makes lots of noise. Without fans your laptop will heat up and die.

 

[crate]

If right around the $1,000 mark is not too steep for you, take a look at the Asus N550JV as well if you like. Very nice system, and if you order from one of Asus' resellers ( 😉 ), you can select from a variety of SSDs to replace the stock hard drive.

Out of these you have suggested I think best of the Asus. I read the reviews at notebookcheck.net to compare, and the Asus is the quietest one, and also seems to be best in build quality.

The two Clevos didn't get good words from notebookcheck in regards of build quality and are also way louder than the Asus. The MSI just recently came out on the street and I can't find a decent review of that one, but Anandtech's news article doesn't sound too promising.

In Denmark, the Asus costs around $1700, without SSD - but it is always roughly 2/3 of the price on top of the US prices.. And I can go a little more expensive than this, if I get something that convinces me more.

About the Lenovos - I think the Ideapads aren't that impressive in terms of build quality and I don't like the SLI option - I know I can just pick one without SLI though.. But I have more trust in the Thinkpads actually - maybe I should have a look at those - one of them must be able to a bit of gaming, don't you think?

The Asus is a great option, but I would like to see if something better suits me.

 

[crate]

Any laptop will become noisy when playing games because of the heat generated by both the CPU and GPU. The little fan / fans needs to spins really, really fast to move lots of air. Small fans spinning fast makes lots of noise. Actually, anything spinning fast makes lots of noise. Without fans your laptop will heat up and die.

And that is clear to everyone.. I didn't mention that in my opening, but I think it is quite obvious that a laptop gets noisy when gaming - but there are differences - the suggested Clevo are 45-51 dB, while the Asus is 38-42 dB - that is a difference you can actually hear. Fans come in great variance in terms of quality and how much noise they generate. Also the chassis of the laptop/computer can make a huge difference - again, good build quality.