Sager 5680 - one year later review.

I agree the ni-cad batteries are a little too consumable. The newer Sagers have lithium ion batteries, which I am hopeful will be much better. the cracks in the hinges are a bummer, which I have somehow avoided in my 5660 for more than 2 years, but I have heard many other people complain about on 56xx Sagers. the HDD problem is one I have had with other brands too, so I don't think it should sour your opinion of Sager. After all the HDD was a Hitachi, not a Sager, and can be found in other brand laptops I am sure. what brand will you favor now?

I love mine

still looks brand new, and i use it all the time

the only thing that i had that, went out on me, is the AC brick(replaced free do to warrenty) tho i bought an 2nd one

Well...

The cracked hinges seem to be a flaw in that line of notebooks. Unlucky to be sure, but it's known.

The HDD failure really has nothing to do with the brand of computer. I've seen HDDs go bad in all sorts of laptops. Dells, HPs, Acers, Sonys etc. I can think of at least one time in the case of each of those brands where I've had to send in for a new HDD (and in the case of the HP and Acer notebooks, I've witnessed MANY HDD failures).

The battery type chosen wasn't really a good idea either. Of course, once again, that's not really some brand exclusive defect.

My screen is going out on mine. . i've had it 8 months or so.
I'm actually just sitting here at home waiting for Sager to call back so I can get a RMA for it.

On a down note. . this will be my second RMA in two months. Last month my dvd/cd-rw drive went bad (toshiba).

The 5680 is good though

I try to buy laptops in the $1600 to $1800 range. few people have serious needs that cannot be fulfilled in that range, and that tends to be the sweet spot in my experience (though the sweet spot seems to be getting lower) for price vs. features. I don't imagine I could spend over $2000 on a lappy without somehow winding up regretting it. The only reason I spend so much is that I find in the lower price ranges the machines may not take me 3 years before they start to have not enough of something important. although the upgradeability of the newer vid cards is nice, the lcds still don't tend to last more than 3 years before they start going bad. still have to look at laptops as basically a 3 year consumable and can't see paying more than $2 grand for such a short-lived consumable.

just sold my sager 5670 (bought apr '03)
perfect working condition, still fast as hell - but i needed the new gfx card for my gaming

its possible the build quality has gone down as the demand and popularity of the brand increases - i see the same in dell/compaq too

but i'll give sager a shot again - coz it does get the max. bang for the buck (dell is running it close now, this wasnt the case at the time of my purchase)

5680

I've had my 5680 2.6Ghz for 1 1/4 years now and purchased it with the expectation that it would suit my gaming needs for approximately 1 1/2 years. Not sure it's going to hit the mark.

With the exception of Half Life 2 (sound stutter issue) and now World of Warcraft (bad frame rate and hard drive caching madness) all other games have worked just fine (City of Heroes, Splinter Cell, Call of Duty, Medal of Honor, KOTOR, Unreal, etc.)

A few recent tweaks have improved the performance in WoW, but it still isn't great and I'm still experiencing problems with using Omega video drivers and video playback (which I thought was supposed to be fixed by the BIOS updates).

In short, I'm still uncertain about whether or not I will buy another Sager or another Notebook, for that matter, as a replacement to a desktop. Although, I've gotten very used to the mobility......hmmmmm

I'm fairly certain my next machine won't be a sager either.
the materials and workmanship leave a lot to be desired and the warranty is not up to snuff.
the machine is certainly fast, but you get what you pay for.
the price was right but was it worth it?
I don't believe so.

Yeah i wish my 5680 had an upgradable GFX card like the alienwares. Do you think there is any way for me to upgrade it? or do you think any pci e mobos will fit in the chassis?

I wish I had a better laptop period. I have a Dell 650J thats about 5 years old , bought refurbished 2 or 3 years ago. Sadly I'm almost 13 and have no good source of income so can't get much as far as laptops. But I do have a fine desktop, dual P3s(933mhz) nVIDIA 5500 256mb and DVD burner but nothin special. If you could buy a good $2500-3000 machine that is completely upgradable then every year or so you could upgrade everything cheaper than buying a new one
Matt

i bought a 5680 from someone on the forums about a month ago... after using it a while, i couldnt stand it any longer. i had to get rid of it. noisy, heavy, slow, unreliable, creeky, hot, and bad casing...

so i went with the cl56 and i am much happier!!! everythign about it is better.

dont buy a clunky DTR.

I think a post like this is wonderfully useful. Few people are willing to admit they bought a stinker right after they purchased it, and except in extreme cases, most people don't have anything critical (critical meaning useful to others, not bad).

I am so tired of reading "This laptop ROOOOCCCKKKKKKSSSS" reviews. Makes me want to belch.

A year later gives you a better feel for the real value of something, so thanks Warrick for bringing it up.

My year and 1/4 later review is as follows (5680):

Performance: I am pretty much right where I expected to be about now performance wise. I've been around computers long enough to Moore's Law reveal itself several cycles over. The breathtaking leaps in performance for laptops was not unexpected, and the performance vaccuum that software developers try to fill as new hardware becomes available probably predicted the need for more "ooomph." For me, the sweet spot for a laptop is still going to be in the $2000 to $2500 range, and I expect it to carry me for a two years. I am not a heavy gamer, but play a few and have not had any problems. Here it is a year later and I am basically at the bottom of what I would consider the "I would buy a laptop this powerful" curve. I know others who cannot say the same thing.

Construction: The hinge cracks.....arghh. It does not matter how little notebooks are opened or closed. This was an engineering defect and it should have been resolved long before the 5680. It is the sole blemish on an otherwise superior product. Keyboard remains tactilely responsive, screen is bright and clear (no dead pixels), harddrive is humming, CPU is...er cpuing, graphics are still very nice.

Sager / PC Torque Customer Service: Superior. I admit I have had little use, but when I did need something, the Sager folks were very responsive. They sent out an LCD lid to replace the cracked one very quickly with no grief. The BIOS issue with video lockup was resolved in adequate fashion (and believe me, I have seen MANY computer makers quit support of a product like this much more quickly, basically saying, hey stick with the supplied drivers." PC Torque got me my laptop in a week which was important since I was going out of town.

Intangibles: Noise. I've had laptops that were noisier. The fans are not nearly as noticeable as some people had me fearing. Heat: Again, not an issue. It gets warm, but not nearly as warm as some people led me to believe. Sound: What do you expect from two little one inch speakers? I remain fairly impressed with the sound.

gerryf, that pretty much sums it up it up for me. I've had mine since Nov. 2003 and I love it. The only problem is the cracking case. But, what the hell. Some creative JB Weld techniques and an embedded metal strip and all's well. I'm waiting on the 7620. This is my 4th laptop in the last 5 years or so and i didn't really expect it to last me more than a year and a half. It's about made it that far. It still has enough life left in it for my wife so she'll take it from here. The 7620 will get me the next year and a half I expect. I'm sure when i get it I'll have it fully loaded with every available option and it will cost just over $4K. I make a living with these things so $4K is not a lot of money for tools of the trade. I love the speed. I don't care about battery life and the heat and noise I've gotten use to. I hope the 7620 has an improved latch so it won't crack but that's about it. I like the numbers I've seen and it appears to be improved over the 5680. But, I will never know until I have it in my hands...

I pulled a Toshiba T4800 CT out of my closet about a month ago. It was a heavily used Pentium 75Mhz, 24 MB RAM Ram with a 700Mb HD. It got retired about 6 years ago and chucked into a draw.

I tried to boot it but it was having none of it. The Hard Drive had died. I replaced it with an old 6GB one I had lying around, and would you believe it, it came back to life. It was pretty difficult finding an operating system for it that worked, plus loading anything up as the floppy drive was very flakey (and no CD Rom).

Anyway it is making an excellent games machine for my 20 month old son, and takes the punishment that he gives it without missing a step. I don't know whether I would expect many of the current laptops to be functioning in 10 years time.

I'll add my .02..

I also have a 5680 but have owned it for well over 1 1/2 years. I previously owned a 8887(I think). I bought the 5680 while I still have the previous machine.

Reliability: Very good, considering that I use it for work and open/close pack/unpack it at least 2-3 times a day all week long. Although, it has recently developed the hinge cracks, which is very frustrating. I though I built a mean machine that was built to last?

Performance: As expected - it runs great, like it did the day I bought it.

Service: Sad... The first Sager (8887) which I still owned when I bought my 5680 had a faulty battery. I sent it back well within the warranty period but got the run around at sager. It had a small scratch on the bottom surface of the batter, and I MEAN SCRATCH and they were telling me that they could not warranty it... Then they said they would pro-rate it, but they had to send it to the manufacturer. Weeks went by and nothing. I called and left messages numerous times. Guess what, I never got the battery back and I had to buy another one aftermarket.

Would I buy again?: I don't think so. Great performing machine but the semi-lack of quality and the HORRIBLE service experience that I had has likely driven me to Dell in the future. Unless Sager decides to send me a replacement battery for my 8887. If that would have happened before I purchased my 5680, I would have never bought it.

All in all, the machine performs well and came as advertised. It has some noted flaws, but it was still the best bang for the buck. If sager wants to build/retain any kind of brand loyalty, they are going to have to step it up in the service department.

Jeff

I think my biggest issue is that, for a gaming machine, why can't we push more than 2-3 keys down at a time when playing a game before the last key is "locked" in. This is a horrible problem for BF2 which you don't see on Dell's XPS Gen 2.....

sagers just cant hold up

i have the most beat up and sad looking computer ever
the thing still runs like a tank on the inside, but every day it looks more and more like a tank on the outside
i dont exactly pamper it, but laptops are expected to hold up to a little beating, right?
it all started with the power cord tearing, so i had to buy a new brick
then on the new cord it ripped completely in half. i wasnt about to blow another 50 bucks so i soldered it and covered it in electrical tape and reinforced it with 8 toothpicks.
then the screen started cracking, and got to the point where it wouldnt close. its now reinforced with some homemade steel brackets and duck tape.
today i tried to fix the loose headphone jack, and with a small piece of metal and some duck tape, did the job. only problem is that when i opened the case i made the screen stop working. if anyone knows why please respond. sager wants me to pay to ship it to them and pay 40 bucks for diag, then 40+ for labor. i dont think so.
my brother recently named the computer fort lapton, like some kind of military installation.
and the best part - it looks so sick now that when i went through security at the cincinnati airport they did a bomb test on it. yes, a laptop.
moral of the story: dont buy sagers
-ap and the 5660 sager tank