Sager 5680 Review (Everything you wanted to know about it's performance)

[Gold]

OK my unit arrived. It rocks, I already set the 2nd highest 3dMark03 score ever (3798).



Taking it out of the box, I had imagined it to be much smaller. It's not thick, it's just very flat and wide. My last laptop was an Inspiron 7500, and that is one big laptop. Well this is longer in breadth. But it's awesome because it is so much thinner than the Inspiron.

Ok before you read on, I want to say that I'm one of those people that thought the 5680 was actually a slick looking machine. I know some people said it's ugly, and only looks good when painted. I can't imagine why they say this. Even before I got mine, from pictures, I liked the way it looked.

It always reminded me of the Sonyericsson T68i color scheme. I.e. First we had black, then aluminium, and then Aluminium -blue. But when I looked at the coloured 5680's I thought, wow how can people call that nice and slick looking. For me, always the original silver-blue was the slickest colour scheme.

Well imagine my surprise, when I found not one, but 2 included wristpad's, one that we always see in the pictures, the blueish purple one, and another more grayish blue one. The colour of the blueish one is perfect. It is not so blue or purple as the pictures make it out to be. It is actually much closer to the case colour, like a darker-blue-grey version of the case, very slick.

Ok the power brick is actually larger than my old I75k one, (which I didn't think was possible). But it's all good.

Ok firing it up, immediately you hear a short burst of the fan, kind of the same volume as a sigh. Louder than the old I75K. Then it stops.

I installed XP SP1, and immediately appreciated the 3,2 Ghz HT. No matter what I ran in parallel, it ran like running alone. I am one of those people that always has to push computers to breaking point when I get them. But this one was very hard. CPU wise I mean, (we'll get to GPU in a minute).

I.e. I was burning a CD on the internal drive, while downloading four 200 mb files from a 2m/bit adsl connection. I had WMP9 open and on visualisation.

I decided to run Colin Mcrae 4 demo, I couldn't believe it, normally on the behind the car view it ran at 55 fps (at 1152x8** all detailed maxed- ATI-Balanced) Now it was running at 52 fps.

So I decided to also start Spybot Search & Destroy. Something I knew would kill it. A program that scans your registry for malware (as fast as your processor will allow) I.e. taking 100% CPU on all machines.

I fired up Colin Mcrae 4....

Unbeliavably a steady 48 FPS. This stuff just isn't possible. I don't know where it's getting the cycles from.


Back to the above example, not using CMrae 4.0 and the Spybot, so just having the 4 downloads, WMP9 open and playing an xvid, while burning a CD, and having 10 or 15 IE pages open the CPU load was 14%.

Right now for example I have 9 IE windows open, Kazaalite open and downloading (which is a damn hog for all who know), wmp9 and Fraps running I opened Taskmanager.

CPU usage shows 0%.

Ok I am hooked, from now on I cannot live without HT.


The GPU. Clocked standard at 350/250

Colin Mcrae 4 (1152x8** full detail ATi defaults in CP)

Behind the car view: 55 FPS
Incar view -no dash: 90 FPS
In car with dash: 48 FPS


MS Flisght Simulator 2004:

It started up at 800x600, with full detail, and started running at 45-50 fps.
I thought DAMN!!! 45 fps on 800x600? That sucks.

When I push it to 1280x1024 surely I'll get 15-20 fps.

So I went and pushed it to 1600x1200.

My jaw dropped when I saw the fps UNCHANGED! Still 45-50 at 1600x1200.

Ok so my last comp was a Rage Pro 8mb, but still that is amazing.

All details maxed, (I.e. weather pushed more than the default "ultra high" MS setting (all at 1600x1200), results in an FPS of 35-40 on the outer limits of cities, 20-25 in central areas (NY, etc) and 60+ FPS in mountain ranges (Grand canyon, etc)

Turning off "ground scenery casts shadows" (which strangely enough can hardly be noticed), boosts all FPS by 10.


Ok onto the ATI Demos.

The 9700Pro Natural Light demo, runs at 25-28fps.
The 9800Pro gargoyle demo at 1600x1200 runs at 16-20 fps

The Nvidia (wrapped) dawn demo at 1600x1200 runs at 30 fps,

The Nvidia (wrapped) dawn ultra demo (higher quality) at 1024x768 runs at 18 fps.

(oddly enough boosting clock speeds to 450/325 (an insane overclock giving 3798 on 3dMark03, only adds 5 fps to this demo).



EA F1 2002, Full detail at 1600x1200

40fps

1280x1024

continous 60 fps.



Counterstrike 1.5 Opengl 1600x1200

Continous 99 fps
Unplayable this way without Vsync (never thought I'd hear myself say that)

Vsync on = pinned 60 FPS


Tron 2.0

Full Detail 1600x1200

Pinned at 60fps which was a pleasant surprise.


FarCry, slightly dissapointing.

All details max.

1600x1200= 20 fps
1024x768= 35-40 fps
Special effect setting set to low (which I really cannot see what it reduces)
45-55 fps (@1024)


Battlefield 1942 unsure:
1600x1200
60 fps
If I remember correctly.


NFS Underground Max details:
1280x1024
45-55 fps


Halo max settings:
1600x1200
27-33 fps

1280x1024
35-45 fps


Deus EX 2 Max settings:

1600x1200:
10 fps

1024x768:
35-40 fps




Heat:

None on bottom of machine. Very surprising, as my old Dell got much hotter than this. From the left side of the machine, hot air can be felt blowing out. Not very forcefully. You can feel heat, but can barely feel moving air against the palm of your hand.

When there is no activity this shuts off and the machine is silent.



Part 2 coming soon.

[kwick7]

thats quite the in-depth review so far....looking forward to part 2.

[prozcrito]

awesome review son.
please post part 2, i feel like it's waiting for the matrix sequels all over again....seriously. I have a 5680 v comin so i want to know b4 hand!!

[kwick7]

Originally Posted by prozcrito

awesome review son.
please post part 2, i feel like it's waiting for the matrix sequels all over again....seriously. I have a 5680 v comin so i want to know b4 hand!!

except for the fact that the matrix sequels BLEW (well, the last one, anyways, IMO).