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Gateway's New 17" Laptop with 8800GTS card for 1399! - Page 2

post #21 of 120
1/30/08 at 7:23pm
where did you buy all the upgrades?

Does the LCD fit well?
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post #22 of 120
1/30/08 at 7:48pm
I got the RAM from frys.com, other 250gb WD drive from best buy, CPU and LCD I took from another laptop I had.

The LCD was from a Dell 1720, model is SEC3155 from Samsung. It's a great screen, no light leakage, very good viewing angles and very bright. The stock 1440x900 is also a Samsung but had very poor viewing angles but was also bright. If you are looking to upgrade the screen to a 1920x1200 WUXGA one, make sure it's one of the newer models since the older WUXGA from the Dell 9300 series and XPS Gen 2 are more dull and less bright. 1920x1200 is perfect for High Def video files and DVDs and since the laptop has a HD capable video card and HDMI, it should have a WUXGA standard since it seems more of a Media Center laptop than a strict gaming rig.

I breakdown the upgrade cost to:

RAM - $50
Extra Hard Drive for RAID - $140
CPU - $200
LCD - $250

That would put this laptop at a $1900 price tag but it would be in the top tier of laptops.

If you're looking to go RAID, just make sure you match the brand and model numbers with the one you have. I had Western Digital and others have Seagate.

Best bang for the buck CPU in my opinion would be the T7500. It has a 4MB Cache and 800mhz FSB. The T7300 is similar but 2.0GHz but with the price difference I would opt for the T7500. Anything below I wouldn't bother and anything above is just too much money for the minimal gains. The more expensive CPUs are great but might be overkill for a budget gamer laptop like this one.

My last upgrade would probably be an internal toshiba HD-DVD drive for HD movies. They can be had for about $150 and you can watch 1080p on your laptop with a WUXGA screen. Even though I prefer blu ray DVDs, I can find HD-DVD movies for good prices. A blu ray drive is about $350+ for a Blu ray reader and a blu ray burner is $400 plus. Just too much money to put in this rig.


My previous laptops were: XPS M170, M1710, Inspiron 1720 and I have been surprised on how this thing blows away those laptops in benchmarks even when I had a 7950GTX.
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post #23 of 120
1/31/08 at 12:23am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Spinitch View Post
I found the second WD hard drive at best buy. Funny thing is that the retail drive is more expensive then the external drive. The external 250gb WD drive is on sale for around $140 so I just got that one and opened it up and it was the exact same drive, WD2500BEVS SATA. Go look for a 10% coupon also.

I read on Tom's Hardware or anandtech that these drives were very fast RAID 0 and indeed they were. They are a lot faster than my single 200gb 7,200rpm 16mb laptop hard drive. Here's a comparison:

HD TUNE:
200GB 7,200rpm 16mb cache
Minimum - 32.5mb/s
Maximum - 65.1mb/s
Average - 52.2mb/s
Access time - 14.9ms
Burst Rate - 61.6mb/s
CPU Usage - 9.3%

Single WD 250GB 5,400rpm 8mb
Minimum - 15.0mb/s
Maximum - 51.8mb/s
Average - 40.1mb/sec
Access Time - 25.0ms
Burst Rate - 65.7mb/s
CPU Usage - 11.7%

RAID 0 WD 250GB 5,400rpm 8mb cache
Minimum - 50.0mb/s
Maximum - 87.8mb/s
Average - 68.5mb/s
Access Time - 17.9ms
Burst Rate - 57.6mb/s
CPU Usage - 13.2%


So you can see the RAID 0 WD 5400rpm are very fast and helps a ton on load times in games. Overall it's a huge improvement over a single drive configuration as well as the fastest laptop drive out there, the Hitachi 200gb 7,200rpm plus you get 500gb.

Let me know how the RAID 0 60gb 7200rpm are. I don't think they have perpendicular tech and they seem to have very close seek and latency as the 250gb 54000rpm ones as well as the same cache. I have had a single seagate 160gb 7200rpm drive before, also a 100gb and 60gb 7200rpm IDE and the hitachi 200gb 7200rpm trumps it, but these RAID WDs are killers. 16mb cache was fun though.

Oh and the T5450 has to go. I was going insane on how slow it was and upgrading the CPU was a cake walk. You can get a T7500 for less than $200 and it is totally worth it, even if you are waiting for the penryn CPUs.

Also the 2x2GB RAM is also a decent upgrade. You can get a 4gb dual channel set at frys.com for $50-60 shipped after rebate. Windows score went from 4.5 to 4.8 and helped other benchmarks tests. Even though Windows still sees 3GB, for some reason the 4GB was still faster in tests over the 3GB.

I'll try to find the part number for the LCD. I forgot to write it down before I installed it but I'll search through Windows for it.
Which External 250gb WD Drive? Are all the Western Digital - Passport 250GB External Hard Drives the same?

Where do you find these 10% coupons?

Thx.

.
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post #24 of 120
1/31/08 at 12:53am
This one: http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1177113149231

Coupon: https://moversguide.usps.com/img/cou...clientarea.gif
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post #25 of 120
1/31/08 at 1:22am
Thx,

The hard drive in the Passport is the exact same model as the one that comes in the FX?

I wish I knew about this before ordering the two Hitachi's from Newegg.

Oh, I went and bought an OEM version of XP Pro, which I'm going to try to install, pending XP drivers for the FX, instead of Vista.

.
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post #26 of 120
1/31/08 at 1:43am
yup, same exact model WD2500BEVS and SATA also.

I got most of my drivers from the Gateway P-6825, you can see which ones are XP compatible drivers:

http://support.gateway.com/support/d...param=1014978R

You would need to update the wifi driver from intel itself as well as the video driver.
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post #27 of 120
1/31/08 at 1:58am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Spinitch View Post
yup, same exact model WD2500BEVS and SATA also.

I got most of my drivers from the Gateway P-6825, you can see which ones are XP compatible drivers:

http://support.gateway.com/support/d...param=1014978R

You would need to update the wifi driver from intel itself as well as the video driver.
Thx

.
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post #28 of 120
1/31/08 at 3:25am
Glad to see you're enjoying the rocking spanking laptop. My question goes out to your lcd upgrade, I don't mind the 1440x900 native res, but I've seen pics of the viewing angles and wow, eyeball melting fun.

How did you swap the lcd with another company's lcd? Are all 17" laptop lcds the same design? Plus, think you can refer me to a wide view angle lcd that has a native res of 1680 or lower? 1920x1200 is nice but makes things real tiny, and more strain on graphics card when playing games =p

Thanks! Been looking all over to seeing someone swapping lcds and you've just brought me one step closer.
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post #29 of 120
1/31/08 at 3:42am
I work on laptops a lot, it's my business, so I swap LCDs all the time and almost all are compatible with other brands but no guarantees since there will be some issues.

I would recommend the 1920x1200 just for viewing pleasure. You can easily enlarge fonts and icons and the 8800gts can play almost any game on native resolution of 1920x1200, except of course crysis. There are 1680x1050 res LCDs but I'm not sure if it would be worth the upgrade cost since the wuxga is easier to find.
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post #30 of 120
1/31/08 at 8:35am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Spinitch View Post
I work on laptops a lot, it's my business, so I swap LCDs all the time and almost all are compatible with other brands but no guarantees since there will be some issues.

I would recommend the 1920x1200 just for viewing pleasure. You can easily enlarge fonts and icons and the 8800gts can play almost any game on native resolution of 1920x1200, except of course crysis. There are 1680x1050 res LCDs but I'm not sure if it would be worth the upgrade cost since the wuxga is easier to find.
I too have 1710, which I can switch the LCD over. But it's wasting my m1710, what do you do with ur M1710? I am thinking to return this laptop and keep my m1710 (7950 gtx).
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post #31 of 120
1/31/08 at 4:52pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by CTSxViper View Post
That's pretty nice.. The top one makes no sense as they put a decent chip in a scaled down laptop which to me negates what one would buy it for. I guess unless someone wants to game and doesn't care about the resolution and can live with the slower processor..
You doof, its a 1440x900 res. CPU is fine as most of the time lately its the GPU that is lacking in the latest games, besides you can easily upgrade it!
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post #32 of 120
2/1/08 at 1:38am
@Spinitch

Ok, I guess I'll just stick with the 1920 res since you say it's more common and probably cheaper. Now the big question is, where do I find one that will be compatible with the gateway? And I kind of like the gateway lid design, does that mean if I change lcd's I lose it? Or am I opening the lcd frame and swapping the screen part itself? My guess is, you just swap the whole lcd for simplicity sake. Anyways, let me know, thanks!
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post #33 of 120
2/1/08 at 1:46pm
You would disassemble the lid and swap the actual LCD screens. As far as a part number, I do not have that info.
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post #34 of 120
2/1/08 at 7:07pm
Yup, just disassemble the LCD casing and swap the actual panels.

I think the LCD I swapped over to my Gateway was a Samsung LTN170 WU-L03. Pretty sure it was but I forgot to write it down before I put it back together again.
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post #35 of 120
2/2/08 at 4:41pm
well I went to best buy and saw this beast and was sticker shocked at the low 1250 price tag with an 8800 GTS with 3 GB's of ram packed in. I wasn't a fan of the 1.66 processor so i went ahead and called gateway.

After a lot of finagling I was able to get the price of their P-171S FX down to 1450 shipped to my door, which isn't too bad later on this year I think I'll look at upgrading the processor again, one thing I was curious about is if it was possible to toss a second 8800 in, I know its doubtful, I'm just wondering.

I can't wait to get it, it seems like A very well built laptop and should hold up really well it blew my mind seeing that it was from gateway though...I wanted to stick with the 1440 res screen, If needed maybe later I'll toss in a 1920x1200 screen hopefully a quad will go in =D
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post #36 of 120
2/2/08 at 5:49pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Spinitch View Post

HD TUNE:
200GB 7,200rpm 16mb cache
Minimum - 32.5mb/s
Maximum - 65.1mb/s
Average - 52.2mb/s
Access time - 14.9ms
Burst Rate - 61.6mb/s
CPU Usage - 9.3%

Single WD 250GB 5,400rpm 8mb
Minimum - 15.0mb/s
Maximum - 51.8mb/s
Average - 40.1mb/sec
Access Time - 25.0ms
Burst Rate - 65.7mb/s
CPU Usage - 11.7%

RAID 0 WD 250GB 5,400rpm 8mb cache
Minimum - 50.0mb/s
Maximum - 87.8mb/s
Average - 68.5mb/s
Access Time - 17.9ms
Burst Rate - 57.6mb/s
CPU Usage - 13.2%
Here's my HD benchmarks in Vista.

HD TUNE:

2x 60 gb Hitachi 7200 RPM, w/8 mb Cache HD's, setup as RAID 0.

Minimum - 37.8 mb/s
Maximum - 66.7 mb/s
Average - 51.4 mb/s
Access time - 15.0 ms
Burst Rate - 48.3 mb/s
CPU Usage - 4.9 %

It looks like the stock WD's are faster than the Hitachi's. The Hitachi's Access Time is a little faster, probably due to the RPM difference, as well as the CPU Usage being less w/them.

.
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post #37 of 120
2/2/08 at 6:36pm
The 7200rpm hard drivers definitely have better access times. Thanks for the test comparisons.

There will be probably be no way to put dual video cards in SLI in here unless they have two cores on one board.

I'm glad Gateway is negotiable though on their prices. Seems as though they really want a segment of the gamer market.
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post #38 of 120
2/2/08 at 7:46pm
Gateway has awesome support. I think its due to the fact that their CS is based in the US and not oversees. Ive personally worked with CS and I must say almost every agent is on the ball.

I wish I could say the same about Dell
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post #39 of 120
2/3/08 at 12:57am
I have a question.
I saw both a P-6882 and this laptop in the bestbuy.
Looking at the p-6882 I noticed the case was exactly the same which got me thinking.
I currently have a dell 9300 which I upgraded with a go7800gtx from the xps version dell had. This p-6882 appears to have the same board inside. It even has the same inputs including HDMI.
My question is would this be upgradeable?
http://laptops.engadget.com/2007/10/...series-desktop

I should mention I bought the FX while in the store but cant bring myself to open it. The p-6882 was an open box and was 700.00
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post #40 of 120
2/3/08 at 1:01am
Spintch, how did you mount your second WD, when it came to the fasteners?

You need very small headed ones, like the ones that came mounted w/the original HD.

Did that second HD that you bought at BB, that came in the WD 250GB 2.5" Passport Portable USB 2.0 Hard Drive, have the same fasteners?

Thx.

.
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