Hey all,
It's been surprising that there hasn't been too many indepth reviews of the new 4780 being that a lot should have shipped already. I thought I'd give it a shot, since I found it very helpful to read as many reviews as possible to get a good sense as to how these Sager machines were working out. The nice thing about these forums is you don't ONLY hear the moaning coming from people having issues with thier machines. You get to hear the positives and the negatives - and that is why I chose the Sager 17"er over those other brands.
Yesterday it arrived, as UPS predicted. However, it didn't come until 5:30 pm, and since I took off work that day to set the thing up...that pretty much bit.
I ordered a: 4780 w/the 2.8 Ghz chip, the 7200 rpm drive and the DVD burner option
So, first with the photos:
Out with the old (my old Inspiron 8K), in with the new!
Some more random shots of the thing:
I fired up the same website to see if either one looked better. Both looked nice. The colors on the 4780 were maybe a bit richer, but the screen space on the I8K was greater because of its 1600x1200 resolution.
Some shots of Indiana Jones and the Emperor's Tomb at 1152x864:
A couple shots from Enter the Matrix. Man is that game boring. Sometimes taking the pictures would result in a blueness. Maybe I should have just taken print screens. Thought this might be more informative. Stupid game has only 5 hard-coded resolutions, so I had to run these at 1024x768:
It's nice that GTA3 supports 1440x900, the native resolution. However, I really didn't notice all that much different from from running at 1024x768......it sure ran smooth though.
And finally, for now, a personal old-school favorite...Sacrifice. Seemed like I was the only person who liked the game and the graphics. I had everything pumped up and was running at 1152x864. Might have to go through the single player scenario again after seeing this. Very nice.
To finish off the review, I'd like to list the positives and negatives that I have noticed so far.
The screen is extremely nice. Just looking at the size of the screen and the bright, rich colors it gives off, is quite startling at first. I seemed to have lucked out with having no dead pixels, which is very nice.
The machine feels very solid and is very attractive with the charcoal and silver. The brushed metal and decal on the top are a nice touch.
I haven't done too many sound tests, but using a decent pair of headphones, everything sounded great. I'll have to comment on the speakers and subwoofer at a later date...
Setup went smooth using WinXP Pro. All the drivers, except for the camera and TV card, are on one CD. I still have my USB 2.0 controller with a yellow exclaimation point next to it though. They only provided W2K drivers for that, not WinXP drivers, so I didn't install that - didn't want to risk any instability. I don't have anything that uses USB 2.0 yet so this isn't an issue yet.
I haven't been able to get the TV tuner thingy to work correctly. When I plug in the antenna the picture is all blocky. I don't know if I'm just not getting decent reception or what, but it is unwatchable. The sound is fine, just the picture sux.
As to the concerns people have expressed about the loud fan. Yes, they are pretty loud when they're on. No louder than my I8K... Actually they may be a bit softer, but higher pitched, so more noticable at the moment. They don't run all the time and don't bother me at all.
The 6-in-1 media bay is a nice touch. I was able to just pop in my card from my camera and use it just like a drive. One slightly annoying thing is all of them showed up as drives on my machine. So, drives C through F are these removable drives. My hardrive is drive H which is a bit weird. No big deal really, just unexpected.
The one thing that I have to say is annoying, but manageable, is the heat being generate under my left palm. It is quite warm, not HOT, but definitely warm. I think the battery is under there and I am suspecting that if I take the battery out, that may help. However, I don't really want to do that because I like the built in UPS-like feature that the battery gives you. I'm sure I'll get used to it eventually. Really the whole battery design is kinda strange. I think you have to unscrew something to take the battery out. But really, if this is the only real design problem I have with this thing, that's not too bad.
In summary I am very pleased with this machine. It is very zippy (all the games were played while transferring 50 gigs worth of files from my old machine and with a couple IE browsers up - kudos to the HT!). The screen is very impressive and I don't feel I'll notice the slightly less resolution from my I8K.
I would highly recommend this machine to anyone looking for a desktop replacement, gaming notebook.
-- Aaron
It's been surprising that there hasn't been too many indepth reviews of the new 4780 being that a lot should have shipped already. I thought I'd give it a shot, since I found it very helpful to read as many reviews as possible to get a good sense as to how these Sager machines were working out. The nice thing about these forums is you don't ONLY hear the moaning coming from people having issues with thier machines. You get to hear the positives and the negatives - and that is why I chose the Sager 17"er over those other brands.
Yesterday it arrived, as UPS predicted. However, it didn't come until 5:30 pm, and since I took off work that day to set the thing up...that pretty much bit.
I ordered a: 4780 w/the 2.8 Ghz chip, the 7200 rpm drive and the DVD burner option
So, first with the photos:
Out with the old (my old Inspiron 8K), in with the new!
Some more random shots of the thing:
I fired up the same website to see if either one looked better. Both looked nice. The colors on the 4780 were maybe a bit richer, but the screen space on the I8K was greater because of its 1600x1200 resolution.
Some shots of Indiana Jones and the Emperor's Tomb at 1152x864:
A couple shots from Enter the Matrix. Man is that game boring. Sometimes taking the pictures would result in a blueness. Maybe I should have just taken print screens. Thought this might be more informative. Stupid game has only 5 hard-coded resolutions, so I had to run these at 1024x768:
It's nice that GTA3 supports 1440x900, the native resolution. However, I really didn't notice all that much different from from running at 1024x768......it sure ran smooth though.
And finally, for now, a personal old-school favorite...Sacrifice. Seemed like I was the only person who liked the game and the graphics. I had everything pumped up and was running at 1152x864. Might have to go through the single player scenario again after seeing this. Very nice.
To finish off the review, I'd like to list the positives and negatives that I have noticed so far.
The screen is extremely nice. Just looking at the size of the screen and the bright, rich colors it gives off, is quite startling at first. I seemed to have lucked out with having no dead pixels, which is very nice.
The machine feels very solid and is very attractive with the charcoal and silver. The brushed metal and decal on the top are a nice touch.
I haven't done too many sound tests, but using a decent pair of headphones, everything sounded great. I'll have to comment on the speakers and subwoofer at a later date...
Setup went smooth using WinXP Pro. All the drivers, except for the camera and TV card, are on one CD. I still have my USB 2.0 controller with a yellow exclaimation point next to it though. They only provided W2K drivers for that, not WinXP drivers, so I didn't install that - didn't want to risk any instability. I don't have anything that uses USB 2.0 yet so this isn't an issue yet.
I haven't been able to get the TV tuner thingy to work correctly. When I plug in the antenna the picture is all blocky. I don't know if I'm just not getting decent reception or what, but it is unwatchable. The sound is fine, just the picture sux.
As to the concerns people have expressed about the loud fan. Yes, they are pretty loud when they're on. No louder than my I8K... Actually they may be a bit softer, but higher pitched, so more noticable at the moment. They don't run all the time and don't bother me at all.
The 6-in-1 media bay is a nice touch. I was able to just pop in my card from my camera and use it just like a drive. One slightly annoying thing is all of them showed up as drives on my machine. So, drives C through F are these removable drives. My hardrive is drive H which is a bit weird. No big deal really, just unexpected.
The one thing that I have to say is annoying, but manageable, is the heat being generate under my left palm. It is quite warm, not HOT, but definitely warm. I think the battery is under there and I am suspecting that if I take the battery out, that may help. However, I don't really want to do that because I like the built in UPS-like feature that the battery gives you. I'm sure I'll get used to it eventually. Really the whole battery design is kinda strange. I think you have to unscrew something to take the battery out. But really, if this is the only real design problem I have with this thing, that's not too bad.
In summary I am very pleased with this machine. It is very zippy (all the games were played while transferring 50 gigs worth of files from my old machine and with a couple IE browsers up - kudos to the HT!). The screen is very impressive and I don't feel I'll notice the slightly less resolution from my I8K.
I would highly recommend this machine to anyone looking for a desktop replacement, gaming notebook.
-- Aaron
j/k
