Well, it’s been over a month now and I decided when I got my Sager 5690, I would wait a month to do any kind of reviews to assure accuracy.
Here is a brief explanation of my story and how I ended up with the Sager. I originally started looking for a laptop back in January mainly for a business startup venture. To this point I’ve only owned desktops. I found this forum and at the time was very interested in the Alienware. That was pretty much my predetermined choice, no real questions. I started browsing notebook forums doing a little research. I saw the Sager model and determined the 8790 was a little big for my needs, I was uncertain about the screen resolution (it seemed low), and I was really just unfamiliar with the product. After all of the information generated on the 9700, I decided to wait it out. In February the dell came out with the iXPS with the 9700. I had a lot of prior business experience with the dell’s but had never owned one personally. I got my dell and here is what happened.
http://notebookforums.com/showthread.php?t=18088
So back to the drawing board. I went back to looking at the AW, determined to stick it out for 9700, after seeing the performance increase. March passed, April came and almost went. In April I read that the 5690 came out with 9700, I was quite familiar with Sager by this time but still felt the 8790 was to big and heavy for my needs. I thought, well, let me check out the 5690. Hmmm, 9700, Clevo design which I like, Dual channel, $923 cheaper than the AW (with the 9600) and I don’t have to wait any longer. I’m in. I got my 5690 on Cinco De Mayo. Below are my thoughts. I will make a lot of comparisons to the iXPS, simply because I have experience with both, and it is the only other laptop that I had experience with up until now, next to an old Toshiba Libretto 70 which I view as more of a big organizer.
First Impression.
It’s a he!! of a lot nicer than the iXPS, but then again, I’m not buying it for its looks. It just seems sleek. Let’s see what it’s got under the hood.
Opening it up:
I opened it up and check the tension on the hinges. It is tight, I did this because prior to receiving the laptop and read a lot about the tension cracks. I can see that this could be a concern. I got the extended 3 year warranty as well as paid shipping, in large part because of what I read on this issue. At some point I may need to loosen the hinges, but I really got this as a desktop replacement and have only closed the lid maybe 3 times in the last month. So this is something that can wait.
Screen 15” UXGA 1600x1200:
When I owned the iXPS I thought the screen was nice, I thought the resolution was a little high, I had 1 dead sub pixel and light leakage. To be real honest though, I was really happy with the screen. I turned on the 5690, and I am really amazed. No dead pixels, nothing flawed that I can even speak of. It seems quite viewable from up to 70-80 degrees of either side. The resolution is still high, but much less strain on the eyes. To suit my wife, I have since lowered the resolution on Web Browsing and e-mail to 1280x1024. She really didn’t care for the small print. I was Leary to do this, when I did it on the dell, or changed the dpi, the screen seemed a little fuzzy to me, this is not the case on this screen. I am really pleased to have a 4:3 ration, I had every intension of saving the money on the AW for the Wide SXGA. I was annoyed the wide screens still have black bars on the top and bottom, so I saw no real advantage, even on DVD Playback. DVD playback on this screen is smooth and nothing short of brilliant. Games, I conclude to be the same. Now to reflect on a large part of the importance of the screen for me, Photos. I read a great deal prior that Photos on LCD’s are not the best, and thought that I may need a CRT for viewing and Modifying photo’s. I loaded up some photos to check out the screen (on 1600x1200). I’ve gotta be honest I was somewhat depressed at the quality, they really seemed “washed out” compared to my CRT, I was not impressed. The following day I went and purchased a device I’d read about a few months ago. The Colorvision Spyder PRO screen calibrator. I came back, loaded this up, and calibrated the screen. OMG, what do we have here, this is amazing. I can’t say enough about this, to be fair, I calibrated my CRT with the same device, used the same resolution on both and loaded the same photo side by side. I would say the LCD wins hands down, which is beyond me. Granted the LCD is brand new and the CRT is a somewhat older Sony Trinitron, but I am happy. At some point I need to set it up next to a newer top of the line CRT and compare. One note to mention. At one point I notice lighter shading around the outside border similar to light leakage on the iXPS that went away when I shut down and let it rest overnight. I think this was due to some heat issues that I will mention next. I’ve not seen it in the last 2 weeks.
Heat:
I originally thought this got fairly hot but a week or so ago I download mobmeter and noticed it was running at around 57-58 c on idle. After browsing around and getting some feedback on the forum, I found my synaptic drivers were using 50% cpu Usage all the time. I reinstalled the drivers to fix the problem. It now Idles between 42-46 C. I can live with that Temp. The heat seems to build around the top corners of the palm rest and between the screen bottom and the buttons and lights. Originally, prior to fixing the heat issue, this would get uncomfortable after 6-8 hours of use. Then again, I really don’t use the keyboard on the laptop very often, only 3-4 times since the first week. Since fixing the heat issue, I tested this out and it is really not that uncomfortable after 6-8 hours, just barely warm. I think the heat up by the screen may have been what caused the leakage the one time??? Compared to the dell, well, this is hard to say. The dell never got warm, but the fans were broken and stuck on, so its hard to say. If I run Max Fan on the 5690, it is fairly cool.
A side note, here is a review on the Antec Cooler. My temps have come down since then, that was the day I found out about the synaptics.
http://notebookforums.com/showthread.php?t=25241
Fans and Noise:
Compared to the iXPS it is silent. Sorry, again, that was why I sent back the iXPS. I really don’t notice them that much, and they don’t come on for a while. I do not get the initial blast that some people have mentioned. I would say on full fans, the 5690 is much quieter than the iXPS. The XPS fans were stuck on high all the time, tech support could hear them over the phone when doing the diagnostics. If I use Max Fan on this, they are about one half the noise of the XPS on full fans, and quieter than the antec Cooler by a good deal. Actually, the antec and the XPS are about the same.
Video:
Nothing but good things to say here, right now I use the 7.97 defaults. I may toy around with the Omegas or Catalyst if I find issues, but no reason yet. I may load the 7.99 drivers on this week, if I get around to it, but no hurry. I’ve played Max Payne 2, Rise of Nation and the expansion, NFS Underground, and Painkiller. I’ve seen no ghosting, artifacts, nothing but good so far.
Keyboard:
I really don’t use the keyboard enough to comment on this. It seems responsive enough.
Sound:
Not bad at all, Sounds a little tinny on Music. Great for gaming. Although I mainly Use the USB Soundcard, the sound is fine for a laptop.
6 in 1 Card Reader (Optional):
I got this mainly because I do a lot of digital picture in a compact flash format. It works great and is very convenient. I’ve also tested the Memory Stick as well as SD. They work great. One downside to the reader is it creates 4 drives in explorer, one for each slot, but that is a minimal trade-off for the time that it saves me for my usage.
Battery Life:
I conditioned my battery when I got it by draining it fully and then charging it 3 times. About what I expected. Originally it was 50 Minutes to 1 Hour normal use. Because I had the issue with the process using 50% of the CPU I tested again today. I got 1:12 I knew going into it that it was low, and its not really important too me. But in short, it bites the Weenie, but is better than I expected now. For me it was really nothing more than an internal UPS System. The XPS gave me about 1:15 to 1:30, but the fans were on all the time so it may have been more
Benchmarks:
AquaMark3
Sager 5690 – 31,358
IXPS – 27,650
3Dmark2001 SE
Sager 5690 – 13,236
IXPS – 11,936
3Dmark2003
Sager 5690 – 3,877
iXPS – 3,362
I realize the Sager is clocked higher than the 9700 in the iXPS, but in considering this, it is tested and covered under the warranty on the higher clock settings.
Other Devices I use with great success:
Western Digital Dual format (USB2/Firewire) 120 mb external HD
Microsoft router and Wireless card
Creative USB Sound Card
Sennheiser HD-497 Headphones
Logitech MX Duo Keyboard and Mouse (Fantastic)
Belkin USB to Serial Adaptor.
Antec Cooler (fans Reversed)
Sony Clie Palm
Things that I’ve noticed that are worth mentioning.
As mentioned the Screen Hinge is tight, and may need to be loosened to avoid the common tension cracks on the screen casing.
The battery life is good for a UPS system, but not much more
I do have an issue where the screen does not come back on out of Standby, as mentioned in other threads.
Using a Sony Clie palm will crash to a BSOD and reboot when installing numerous new applications. I haven’t looked into this a great deal, because it seems to sync fine on standard sync. I also have grown fond of using the IR sync instead, which works great, no problems, but is a little slower than the USB sync. I doubt will go back to the cable sync.
The USB settings on 2 x 4 port Belkin hubs act up every now and then. Maybe once every 2 weeks. I need to uninstall and reboot to fix. I plugged the soundcard into it’s own port and this hasn’t happened since.
Tech Support:
With this forum, I don’t know if I will ever need it, I haven’t yet
Conclusion:
I couldn’t be happier with this machine. Now that the AW has the 9700 card, if I had it to do over again, I would still go with Sager. The AW gets pretty good marks on the 9700 (mid 3400’s on 3Dmark2003), but does not have the dual channel and is clocked to almost the same as the card in the 5690. I couldn’t be happier. Thanks to all for the information that you’ve provided in my search for this laptop. This is truly a desktop replacement, I will never go back to a desktop after this experience.
Here is a brief explanation of my story and how I ended up with the Sager. I originally started looking for a laptop back in January mainly for a business startup venture. To this point I’ve only owned desktops. I found this forum and at the time was very interested in the Alienware. That was pretty much my predetermined choice, no real questions. I started browsing notebook forums doing a little research. I saw the Sager model and determined the 8790 was a little big for my needs, I was uncertain about the screen resolution (it seemed low), and I was really just unfamiliar with the product. After all of the information generated on the 9700, I decided to wait it out. In February the dell came out with the iXPS with the 9700. I had a lot of prior business experience with the dell’s but had never owned one personally. I got my dell and here is what happened.
http://notebookforums.com/showthread.php?t=18088
So back to the drawing board. I went back to looking at the AW, determined to stick it out for 9700, after seeing the performance increase. March passed, April came and almost went. In April I read that the 5690 came out with 9700, I was quite familiar with Sager by this time but still felt the 8790 was to big and heavy for my needs. I thought, well, let me check out the 5690. Hmmm, 9700, Clevo design which I like, Dual channel, $923 cheaper than the AW (with the 9600) and I don’t have to wait any longer. I’m in. I got my 5690 on Cinco De Mayo. Below are my thoughts. I will make a lot of comparisons to the iXPS, simply because I have experience with both, and it is the only other laptop that I had experience with up until now, next to an old Toshiba Libretto 70 which I view as more of a big organizer.
First Impression.
It’s a he!! of a lot nicer than the iXPS, but then again, I’m not buying it for its looks. It just seems sleek. Let’s see what it’s got under the hood.
Opening it up:
I opened it up and check the tension on the hinges. It is tight, I did this because prior to receiving the laptop and read a lot about the tension cracks. I can see that this could be a concern. I got the extended 3 year warranty as well as paid shipping, in large part because of what I read on this issue. At some point I may need to loosen the hinges, but I really got this as a desktop replacement and have only closed the lid maybe 3 times in the last month. So this is something that can wait.
Screen 15” UXGA 1600x1200:
When I owned the iXPS I thought the screen was nice, I thought the resolution was a little high, I had 1 dead sub pixel and light leakage. To be real honest though, I was really happy with the screen. I turned on the 5690, and I am really amazed. No dead pixels, nothing flawed that I can even speak of. It seems quite viewable from up to 70-80 degrees of either side. The resolution is still high, but much less strain on the eyes. To suit my wife, I have since lowered the resolution on Web Browsing and e-mail to 1280x1024. She really didn’t care for the small print. I was Leary to do this, when I did it on the dell, or changed the dpi, the screen seemed a little fuzzy to me, this is not the case on this screen. I am really pleased to have a 4:3 ration, I had every intension of saving the money on the AW for the Wide SXGA. I was annoyed the wide screens still have black bars on the top and bottom, so I saw no real advantage, even on DVD Playback. DVD playback on this screen is smooth and nothing short of brilliant. Games, I conclude to be the same. Now to reflect on a large part of the importance of the screen for me, Photos. I read a great deal prior that Photos on LCD’s are not the best, and thought that I may need a CRT for viewing and Modifying photo’s. I loaded up some photos to check out the screen (on 1600x1200). I’ve gotta be honest I was somewhat depressed at the quality, they really seemed “washed out” compared to my CRT, I was not impressed. The following day I went and purchased a device I’d read about a few months ago. The Colorvision Spyder PRO screen calibrator. I came back, loaded this up, and calibrated the screen. OMG, what do we have here, this is amazing. I can’t say enough about this, to be fair, I calibrated my CRT with the same device, used the same resolution on both and loaded the same photo side by side. I would say the LCD wins hands down, which is beyond me. Granted the LCD is brand new and the CRT is a somewhat older Sony Trinitron, but I am happy. At some point I need to set it up next to a newer top of the line CRT and compare. One note to mention. At one point I notice lighter shading around the outside border similar to light leakage on the iXPS that went away when I shut down and let it rest overnight. I think this was due to some heat issues that I will mention next. I’ve not seen it in the last 2 weeks.
Heat:
I originally thought this got fairly hot but a week or so ago I download mobmeter and noticed it was running at around 57-58 c on idle. After browsing around and getting some feedback on the forum, I found my synaptic drivers were using 50% cpu Usage all the time. I reinstalled the drivers to fix the problem. It now Idles between 42-46 C. I can live with that Temp. The heat seems to build around the top corners of the palm rest and between the screen bottom and the buttons and lights. Originally, prior to fixing the heat issue, this would get uncomfortable after 6-8 hours of use. Then again, I really don’t use the keyboard on the laptop very often, only 3-4 times since the first week. Since fixing the heat issue, I tested this out and it is really not that uncomfortable after 6-8 hours, just barely warm. I think the heat up by the screen may have been what caused the leakage the one time??? Compared to the dell, well, this is hard to say. The dell never got warm, but the fans were broken and stuck on, so its hard to say. If I run Max Fan on the 5690, it is fairly cool.
A side note, here is a review on the Antec Cooler. My temps have come down since then, that was the day I found out about the synaptics.
http://notebookforums.com/showthread.php?t=25241
Fans and Noise:
Compared to the iXPS it is silent. Sorry, again, that was why I sent back the iXPS. I really don’t notice them that much, and they don’t come on for a while. I do not get the initial blast that some people have mentioned. I would say on full fans, the 5690 is much quieter than the iXPS. The XPS fans were stuck on high all the time, tech support could hear them over the phone when doing the diagnostics. If I use Max Fan on this, they are about one half the noise of the XPS on full fans, and quieter than the antec Cooler by a good deal. Actually, the antec and the XPS are about the same.
Video:
Nothing but good things to say here, right now I use the 7.97 defaults. I may toy around with the Omegas or Catalyst if I find issues, but no reason yet. I may load the 7.99 drivers on this week, if I get around to it, but no hurry. I’ve played Max Payne 2, Rise of Nation and the expansion, NFS Underground, and Painkiller. I’ve seen no ghosting, artifacts, nothing but good so far.
Keyboard:
I really don’t use the keyboard enough to comment on this. It seems responsive enough.
Sound:
Not bad at all, Sounds a little tinny on Music. Great for gaming. Although I mainly Use the USB Soundcard, the sound is fine for a laptop.
6 in 1 Card Reader (Optional):
I got this mainly because I do a lot of digital picture in a compact flash format. It works great and is very convenient. I’ve also tested the Memory Stick as well as SD. They work great. One downside to the reader is it creates 4 drives in explorer, one for each slot, but that is a minimal trade-off for the time that it saves me for my usage.
Battery Life:
I conditioned my battery when I got it by draining it fully and then charging it 3 times. About what I expected. Originally it was 50 Minutes to 1 Hour normal use. Because I had the issue with the process using 50% of the CPU I tested again today. I got 1:12 I knew going into it that it was low, and its not really important too me. But in short, it bites the Weenie, but is better than I expected now. For me it was really nothing more than an internal UPS System. The XPS gave me about 1:15 to 1:30, but the fans were on all the time so it may have been more
Benchmarks:
AquaMark3
Sager 5690 – 31,358
IXPS – 27,650
3Dmark2001 SE
Sager 5690 – 13,236
IXPS – 11,936
3Dmark2003
Sager 5690 – 3,877
iXPS – 3,362
I realize the Sager is clocked higher than the 9700 in the iXPS, but in considering this, it is tested and covered under the warranty on the higher clock settings.
Other Devices I use with great success:
Western Digital Dual format (USB2/Firewire) 120 mb external HD
Microsoft router and Wireless card
Creative USB Sound Card
Sennheiser HD-497 Headphones
Logitech MX Duo Keyboard and Mouse (Fantastic)
Belkin USB to Serial Adaptor.
Antec Cooler (fans Reversed)
Sony Clie Palm
Things that I’ve noticed that are worth mentioning.
As mentioned the Screen Hinge is tight, and may need to be loosened to avoid the common tension cracks on the screen casing.
The battery life is good for a UPS system, but not much more
I do have an issue where the screen does not come back on out of Standby, as mentioned in other threads.
Using a Sony Clie palm will crash to a BSOD and reboot when installing numerous new applications. I haven’t looked into this a great deal, because it seems to sync fine on standard sync. I also have grown fond of using the IR sync instead, which works great, no problems, but is a little slower than the USB sync. I doubt will go back to the cable sync.
The USB settings on 2 x 4 port Belkin hubs act up every now and then. Maybe once every 2 weeks. I need to uninstall and reboot to fix. I plugged the soundcard into it’s own port and this hasn’t happened since.
Tech Support:
With this forum, I don’t know if I will ever need it, I haven’t yet
Conclusion:
I couldn’t be happier with this machine. Now that the AW has the 9700 card, if I had it to do over again, I would still go with Sager. The AW gets pretty good marks on the 9700 (mid 3400’s on 3Dmark2003), but does not have the dual channel and is clocked to almost the same as the card in the 5690. I couldn’t be happier. Thanks to all for the information that you’ve provided in my search for this laptop. This is truly a desktop replacement, I will never go back to a desktop after this experience.
