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Please help me select a new gaming laptop :)

post #1 of 9
6/10/11 at 8:09am
Thread Starter 
hey all,
i'm in the market to purchase a new high-end laptop. i will be using this as my new primary machine, so it'll need to play games and normal web surfing.

in terms of gaming, i just play world of warcraft, league of legends, and heroes of newerth. i currently have a dell m1710 and it was able to play those games on the lowest settings. and i'm ok with them being on the lowest settings.

in terms of brand, i dont think i want another dell/alienware since they seem so overpriced. seems like it comes down to Sager/Clevo, or any other model i dont know about.

in terms of places to buy, i guess it would be either xoticpc or origin. i've never dealt with them, so i dont know anything about them at all.

requirements:
1. 17" screen - 1920 x 1080 res, not sure if the 120hz is really that much better. any1 have any tips on the 120hz screens?
2. good mobile quad core 2nd gen proc - preferably one with 8mb cache, which is probably i7-2820QM or higher
3. minimum of 8gb of ram - preferably 1600mhz
4. bluray player or burner
5. video: SLI seems really expensive, usually adding $1k to the price. so im willing to deal with a good single gpu. i think the nvidia 485gtx is the fastest?
6. popular wifi - Intel Centrino Ultimate-N 6300 seems to be pretty popular
7. weight doesn't really matter to me
8. storage : at least 500gb. raid isn't that big of a deal since i can always get another drive from newegg and raid1 myself.

in terms of price, money always matters but i've saved about $2700-2800 for the laptop.

any advice is greatly appreciated!

thanks all.
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post #2 of 9
6/10/11 at 9:23am
I haven't used 120 Hz screens yet, but I'm assuming the quality will be a bit better than 60 Hz. Same as TVs. The smaller screen in comparison to TVs however, is the question whether or not it's worth the extra money.

I'd recommend you check out the Alienwares first.
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post #3 of 9
6/12/11 at 4:53am
120Hz are aimed at 3D.. They look pants until you stick your glasses (3D) on and it is really, really good... You can switch it off and use it normally, through the GPU...New technology, worth waiting to see how mainstream it becomes and the prices drop... And bear in mind, even HD laptop screens are running usually at 75Hz...

If you game on a laptop, look for the fastest CPU in there and the fastest GPU you can afford.. AMD (ATI) are cheaper than nVidia, at the moment, but on a laptop this is outweighed by the other items you can get, such as screen size, Blu ray etc... my view on that though is use the laptop for the usual stuff and game on either a desktop, or get an XBox - most laptops won't survive gae thrashong with the irts expensive things to go being keyboard and mouse pad...
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post #4 of 9
6/23/11 at 9:04am
http://www.notebookcheck.net/AVADirect-Clevo-P170HM.49457.0.html

Anything with the 485M gpu will last for probably 6 years, and is powered by a couple nuclear reactors. CPU isn't too big a deal, you 'can' upgrade that fairly cheaply down the road (the road being 3 years from nowish)

Frequency is totally a 3D thing, and you're not going to see any different at all with a 75mhz screen unless you see flicker using the 60mhz screens with vsync on. If you don't, you're like most of the world. Or maybe I'm thinking about CRT screens and am just too tired this morning. I can't quite remember how it works with lcds, I thinks it's similar though.
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post #5 of 9
6/23/11 at 4:48pm
For $2,800 I'd go with a single GPU, since Dual GPU are just more pain and frustration than they are worth. Go with the Alienware M17x R3. You can get a 120hz screen with that, but as said, if you are not 3D Gaming you don't need it. If you have more than 60 FPS where 120 hz would matter, you really ought to be using vsync which will lock it at 60 FPS anyway, you will never have vsync 120 fps with current games on a notebook even dual GPU.

I'd say if you have that much money to burn, go with Alienware. Their keyboards, warranty and build are all better than Clevo. If you are on a tighter budget then go with Clevo as mentioned with 485M.

Now if you go with Alienware M17x R3, you will get a true gaming laptop. If will have all the performance you want with HD6970M, on par, toe to toe with 485M. But Alineware is the ONLY high end gaming to provide GPU switching for battery life. M17x R3 is the ONLY gaming notebook to boast reasonable battery life. That alone makes it the best gaming laptop on the market. Any gaming laptop can be configured for ram, CPU or GPU etc, but having gpu switching has to be configured by the manufacturer and only DELL opted to do it for high end.
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post #6 of 9
6/24/11 at 6:38am
Looked at the MSI GT683?

cheers ...
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post #7 of 9
6/24/11 at 8:47am
Quote:
Originally Posted by qhn View Post

Looked at the MSI GT683?

cheers ...

Well he wants a 17" and plus he wants the fastest GPU he can get. MSI stricly deals with high midrange gaming notebooks, not the high end. I still think Alienware for his massive budget is the best deal considering he will actually be able to be mobile with it, with a battery life I thought I read around 4 hours which is incredible compared to 17" gaming notebooks from Asus/Clevo lasting only 1.5 hours.

Although personally I think a high midrange GTX 560M is good enough for any of the current games out right now.
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post #8 of 9
6/24/11 at 12:44pm
Good CPU, Good gpu, wide bus, good screen, you're golden.

diddo on the SLI, unless you're gaming with crysis on uber res, the fps boost you get isn't worth the cost, heat, and problems that can crop up. (0-30ish%)

A good single gpu goes a lot farther.

Do you have a budget? BTW, I'm using a 3600M in my m1710 and although it isn't an uber upgrade by any stretch of the imagination, it's nice to be able play direct x 10 shit.
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post #9 of 9
6/26/11 at 9:51am
Quote:
Originally Posted by matchbox2022 View Post

Good CPU, Good gpu, wide bus, good screen, you're golden.

diddo on the SLI, unless you're gaming with crysis on uber res, the fps boost you get isn't worth the cost, heat, and problems that can crop up. (0-30ish%)

A good single gpu goes a lot farther.

Do you have a budget? BTW, I'm using a 3600M in my m1710 and although it isn't an uber upgrade by any stretch of the imagination, it's nice to be able play direct x 10 shit.

He said $2,800.

Also another reason to go with Alienware. If you are going to spend $2,800, having to spend $2,800 1.5-2 years later is going to suck especially when your ram, HDD, CPU, screen are all still good, but you just want to upgrade your GPU. Alienware IMO puts in the most effort to ensure you can upgrade your GPU. They provide bios updates to make sure of that often for even older models and there are plenty of AW users who find way to do so. Although Dell wants people to buy new laptops and not upgrade so recently I think they are not as keen about it.
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