Sager 5792, impressions?

So I bought myself a 5792 earlier this month from XoticPC, and awaiting its arrival tomorrow morning. It's been a long, arduous 3 weeks, but I hope its worth the wait.

17" WSXGA+ (1680x1050) Matte
T7500 2.2Ghz CPU
4GB RAM
100GB 7200RPM HDD
8800m GTX
Bluetooth

In total, I payed just $2260. I think that price is absolutely amazing, considering that I was very close to spending nearly $3k for a dell with a single 7950. I hope to come back to this thread tomorrow and be able to have at least a short review for anybody who wants one.

In the meantime, does anybody have this notebook now and could share some of their impressions? I keep looking and turning up the same reviews over and over again.

Well, it's here, and so far it's great! I am still installing software and drivers and getting everything set up.

I'll give you my very first impressions so far. The bad news first, it is a bit noisy. But by no means is it LOUD. See, I've lived with a crazy loud desktop for the last several years, this thing is like a soft whisper compared to it. I had a bit of trouble with the chipset drivers, had to install them twice for my USB host controllers to work... kinda odd, but so far almost everything is working fine. I am now having a bit of trouble getting the webcam to install; keeps telling me the device cannot be found.

Anyways, now the good parts. It runs quite cool. There is a warm spot directly below my right wrist, but it isn't hot.The exhaust from the back is lukewarm.

I am still getting used to the new keyboard. Always takes a while, but it is much better than the one on the Inspiron 9300 I was using before. The keys are very sturdy with little play, and soft yet firm to press.

I have only really run rthdribl so far, and the 8800m GTX tore it apart, though it isn't anything I can compare. 3DMark06 will be done DLing in about 30 mins and I'll post my score. Gonna try to install Oblivion now as well. So far so good.

XP, 32bit. (edit - SP3 RC1)

Not a big fan of Vista so far, and as much as I would like to install 64bit XP, I've heard more bad things about that.

(edit again - Don't know what I did, but apparently I can install the PC cam drivers now o.O)

8838 3DMark06.

Not bad, right on par with the benchmarks posted not long ago. I imagine that it is capable of a good amount more, considering these aren't optimized drivers, and my antivirus program updated in the background while the benchmark was running... BTW, the laptop isn't even warm to the touch. The exhaust heated up a very small bit, but it really didn't get warm, and the fans stayed remarkably quiet. All in all, 3DMark06 seemed to be a breeze for this video card.

I'm off to install some Oblivion, and I'll post some impressions of it's playability in a few.

While Oblivion is installing (over wireless network... gg), I thought I'd take a minute to say that the built in speakers are very disappointing. Tinny, lacking nearly any bass, and lacking a ton in volume. They work okay, but they are a far cry from the quality of the Inspiron 9300 speakers.

On the other hand, the fingerprint reader is freakin' awesome. Very easy to set up, and very accurate. Makes managing my many many passwords so much easier.

The USB ports being on the right side of the notebook is... confusing. I guess it makes sense to left handers though =P.

The screen is very crisp and bright (mind, I got the Matte screen). No dead pixels!

That was my train of though exactly when I picked out that screen. That and well, it would drive me nuts, all the smudges that glossy screens get.

Anywho, no dead pixel guarantee. Chose to be adventurous and got lucky I 'spose, though I really wouldn't care if there was a dead/stuck pixel. Have had a red pixel for 2 years on my 19" LCD and I can only see it on black screens.

Oblivion is just about done installing now, few more minutes. Can't wait... it's one of the main reasons I wanted a new computer. Been wanting to actually PLAY it for a long time now.

Okay, I don't have any definitive FPS benchmarks, but based on what I have seen, this laptop is amazing. I have a very high perception of FPS, and in general, I can't stand low frame rates (<25).

So far I have played Oblivion and World of Warcraft. First off, lag in WoW is nonexistent even at maxed settings, 1680x1050 with 8x anti-aliasing. I will say, playing the game at those settings with such fluid motion is like playing a brand new game.

Oblivion, with all maxed settings, using HDR and no AA (haven't got it set up to use both yet) runs very steady. Indoor frame rates are perfect, but I did notice some very small stuttering while things loaded. Outdoor framerates are fluid, and look like they hover between 25 and 50fps or more. There again is an occasional stutter, but it is perfectly playable.

The best part, I can play games in my lap, like a laptop should. It doesn't get hot, and the keyboard is very comfortable to use. This laptop continues to impress me. I will have more time tomorrow to play around (out of work early, woot), and might get some FRAPS and pics to ya's.

edit - I just wanted to add that I have every setting in the video drivers set to High Quality, including Supersampling, Trilinear Filtering, etc. (AA and AF are set to Application Controlled, of course)

Also, I found a suggestion elsewhere on either this or another forum to improve sound quality. Setting the EQ to 'Soft' greatly enhances the audio, and setting the Environment to Carpeted Hallway also helps (very minor, but I don't use it because I have problem with environment effects in the past)

So far I have installed CS1.6, CSS, F.E.A.R, HL2, Oblivion, The Sims 2 and all the xpacks, UT99, UT2k4, and WoW.

I have been playing all these games with 100% maxed settings, and I barely get a single hiccup. In fact, several of the games like both UTs and both CSs, I have forced into 16xQ AA and 16x AF. And Oblivion is running Qarl's Texture Pack 3 (4x larger textures, delicious eye candy) and several LOD enhancements. And the 8800m GTX has breezed through everything.

I believe the drivers for this new card are still rather immature, though. I'm waiting patiently for somebody to come along and mod them, and preferably give me back the functionality of the old Nvidia control panel...

Couple of things I have noticed as well with this laptop, not so good things. I am not sure if it is normal, but my GPU fan makes a very annoying... for lack of a better description, grinding sound. I guess it isn't really grinding, it's just a bad metallic sound. In addition, I have had two occasions now where I shut the notebook down normally, or restarted it, and when it came back up, the screen was black. The HDD was thrashing, and it looked like it was loading windows, but nothing appeared on the screen. The first time I had to shut it down and start it up on battery to get the screen back, the second time just a shutdown and restart did it. Not sure what it was all about, but it hasn't happened since.

I want to get some temps to post, but I don't know of a good program to use. I would prefer something lightweight, if anybody has any suggestions.

Some more infos, if anybody is still reading this thread...

UT3 Demo runs flawlessly at max settings, I am proud to say. =)
Can't wait to buy the full game.

Temps are as follows:

System was idle for about 10-15 mins when I took these readings.
Idle CPU (1): 19C
Idle CPU (2): 20C
Idle MB: 40C
Idle HDD: 50C
Idle GPU: 50C

System was under load from The Sims 2 playing itself in the background, while playing the UT3 demo for about 15 minutes (note, there were no hitches from playing the two simultaneously).
Load CPU (1): 45C
Load CPU (2): 47C
Load MB: 59C
Load HDD: 51C
Load GPU: 66C