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Looking at new laptop


General J

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So, I am looking at a new laptop. I will be using it as a semi-replacement for an aging desktop, school, and some gaming. I understand technology changes every day, and anything I buy will be immediately outdated.

 

With that said, anyone have any opinions between AMD and Intel's mobile processors? I have an AMD Athlon XP 2600+ in the desktop running at 1.9 ghz and, from my prospective, is considerably faster than the Pentium 4's made around the same time.

 

I am looking at:

 

This one,

 

or

 

This one.

 

I am looking for something that will handle most anything thrown at it today, and keep up with future requests for a while. Any opinions?

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In my opinion, there is no question you will be better off with the Intel setup. That T9400 is a great higher-end processor. The vid card is the same for both, and it ought to be able to handle most anything you throw at it (at lowered settings for newer games, of course).

 

I applaud your choice of Asus as well.

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You DEFINITELY want a core2duo setup over anything AMD has available in laptops. Also, ASUS is a fantastic brand.

 

I have an AMD Turion chip in my laptop, and my wife's core2duo blows it out of the water (I bought mine right before core2duo's came out)...I mean, it's not even close. I'd go with that nice ASUS if I were you. They make fantastic computers. (wife has an ASUS as well)

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I have been out of touch as far as keeping up with new hardware. Is the core2 duo 32 or 64 bit? And it is dual core, not quad core, right? The only major difference, aside from processor, that I noticed with the intel setup was that the video card is supposed to be a dedicated 1 gig card, vs the 512 of the amd setup. How much of a difference will that extra 512mb on the video card make?

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I'm just sayin.

 

The extra $300 gets you your very own Apple Brand of an apple on the buttcheek of your choice.

You're kidding, right? $300 more for a refurbished computer that isn't as fast as the one we are recommending? Have fun when that 8600M card craps out turning your expensive white box into an expensive white turd.

 

Just ignore him, the Intel Asus is a solid choice.

 

 

As far as the video cards are concerned, at that native resolution the extra 512MB probably wouldn't make that much of a difference. I'm surprised that they are listing the Intel one as 1028MB dedicated, as it usually is 512MB dedicated plus 512MB shared. I'm not quite as "up" on the new ATI cards though, although I can tell you that the 3650 is a pretty decent laptop card. You won't be running Crysis on High or anything, but you should be able to play most anything.

 

All modern processors are 64-bit these days. Some big-box manufacturers are starting to sell pre-configured systems with 64-bit operating systems these days as well. That isn't the case with the one you are looking at, but it would easily be able to do 64-bit if you wanted to install your own copy. The biggest issue with going 64-bit previously (lack of drivers) is not nearly as much of a concern anymore.

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My in-laws swear by mac. BUT... I will not pay for the over-hyped, over-priced mid grade mac. You can get 2x the specs for half the money. And I have seen plenty of problems with the macs. For goodness sakes, my in laws had to dump safari, in similar fashion to what most people do with IE, for firefox. It was crashing constantly. Same thing goes for a lot of their mac software. It will simply quit out randomly in the middle of running with no explanation. And what the heck is with only having one mouse button. No, I do not want to have to push a separate key on the keyboard, even if it is a "cute" little apple, to get the right-side mouse button function. That must be where the extra cost comes from!

 

So, in short, NO MACS! I will not do it!

 

I guess my question is this: Is that ATI 3650 really a fully dedicated, stand alone 1 gig. Or is it 512mb dedicated, with 512mb additional shared? I know there are 1+ gig desktop cards. But even those confuse me. They say 1gb memory, but show memory interface as 512 or 256 bit. Can anyone share some info on this?

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My in-laws swear by mac. BUT... I will not pay for the over-hyped, over-priced mid grade mac. You can get 2x the specs for half the money. And I have seen plenty of problems with the macs. For goodness sakes, my in laws had to dump safari, in similar fashion to what most people do with IE, for firefox. It was crashing constantly. Same thing goes for a lot of their mac software. It will simply quit out randomly in the middle of running with no explanation. And what the heck is with only having one mouse button. No, I do not want to have to push a separate key on the keyboard, even if it is a "cute" little apple, to get the right-side mouse button function. That must be where the extra cost comes from!

 

So, in short, NO MACS! I will not do it!

 

I guess my question is this: Is that ATI 3650 really a fully dedicated, stand alone 1 gig. Or is it 512mb dedicated, with 512mb additional shared? I know there are 1+ gig desktop cards. But even those confuse me. They say 1gb memory, but show memory interface as 512 or 256 bit. Can anyone share some info on this?

The specs listed on Newegg for that Asus Intel laptop you linked above SAY it is 1GB dedicated. I personally think it is actually 512MB dedicated + 512MB shared. Either way, it's a good card and 512MB of dedicated graphics memory ought to be plenty for the resolution of the screen. I wouldn't worry about it.

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(edited)

Boiler - Newegg has quite a few laptops that have that same ATI HD 3650 card setup. Some are listed as 512mb dedicated, and some are listed as 1024mb dedicated. I have also seen cards (none of which were the ATI 3650 setups) on newegg that were listed as being 512mb dedicated with up to 1024 or 2048 available through sharing. I don't know how efficient the additional shared memory is. And I do not know whether the cards listed as having 1024 Dedicated fall in the same boat. I guess I may have to give newegg a call, or try to get in touch with ASUS or ATI support.

 

I know the Asus machines (whether it is the Intel or AMD setup) will handle any everyday program thrown at it, no problem. But, will it handle decent graphical settings in CS:S,TF2, Farcry, BF2, and some of the newer games such as crysis? I am not looking for uber super graphics, although that would be nice. I am thinking, at the least, 1024X768 with all the goodies turned on high in, say, HL2/CS:S. My desktop has a 128mb ATI Radeon 9600XT, and it ran HL2, CS:S at decent settings, and FarCry and BF2 at low/mid settings. I would like the laptop to top that performance.

 

To get right down to it, I guess I am trying to justify spending the extra $$ for the dedicated card and such, as opposed to one of the new integrated ATI setups. I know the mobile vid cards are far less potent than the desktop models though. I would assume the dedicated card is going to fare much better than the integrated ones. But just how much better, and if it is worth it, is another thing.

Edited by General J
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It will destroy CS:S/HL2, and FarCry. Crush them into submission, even. I'm guessing BF2 will be able to be played on high settings as well. It will definitely be able to play Crysis, but my guess would be it will be on Medium settings (I haven't personally played Crysis yet).

 

My only PC at the moment is my Inspiron 9400 with 17" screen (1920x1200 resolution, equiv of 24" LCD), Core 2 Duo T7200 (2.0 GHz), 2GB of RAM, and nvidia 7900gs graphics (256MB dedicated, 1GB total w/ shared). All of this running Vista Business. I can run CS:S at full resolution everything on high (except AA, driver issue) and never drop below 70fps in heavy action (averages around 120fps). Similar story with FarCry on max detail. My laptop is 1.5 years old, so the one you are looking at will obviously be able to do much much better than this.

 

You will not be at all disappointed with it. Just guessing, but you ought to be able to run Crysis at native resolution on Medium detail. I'm hoping someone can confirm this.

 

That processor makes a HUGE difference in performance, especially with games running the Source engine.

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The ATI 3xxx Series are not as good as the Nvidia 8x00 series. Even better are the newer 9x00 series from Nvidia in regards to Laptops. I would consider this model due to the better video card. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16834220378

 

This one is even better when you factor in the cost of the machine: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16834220343

 

Heck, all of these Asus laptops are great for the cost. I would avoid ATI hardware in the laptops unless they are the new 48xx chipsets for mobile. The 8x00 from Nvidia may be plagued with hardware faults. The 97xx should be free of those issues. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16834220346

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I thought I had read something about a lot of problems with the mobile NVidia cards. I have only owned ATI, so I have no experience with NVidia. I know that from past experience, ATI's driver upgrades have been problematic for me. Also, I have only really had experience with desktops, as far as the performance side goes. I have never used a higher end laptop. $1300-1400 is a stretch for me, but if it means a machine that will hold up to the test of "tech" time for a while, I think I can convince the wife to let me splurge. $1500+ probably isn't going to go in my favor. Either that or I would go for the ASUS with the dual NVidia card setup! :spin2: Anyone have anything as far as side by side test results for the ATI and NVidia mobile cards? I haven't searched Tom's hardware yet, but if anyone has anything that would show real performance specs it would be much appreciated.

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you want to avoid the 8400 and 8600 series cards from nvidia. afaik, the 9 series is fine. that 9700 one looks badass but reminds me so much of an old laptop a friend had which came with an ati 9700m... lol.

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Yeah...don't buy a Mac, unless you feel like getting hosed on price

 

 

Anyway, ASUS makes a solid laptop, and ALL of them have dedicated memory for their video cards. That's one of the reasons I like their company so much. You buy a mid-line anything else and it's typically shared memory, but with ASUS, you get dedicated.

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I have an SLi laptop from Alienware and heat is definitely not an issue.

 

That laptop is awesome, especially with a back-lit keyboard, BUT I don't think SLi is necessary in a laptop. From what I've seen with mine, the laptop cards get out-dated so quickly that it's not worth the extra expense. Mine has two 7900 GS's in it, and at the time that was the best you could possibly do. Sure, it still holds its own fairly well in games, but I dunno--if I had it to do again, I'd buy an ASUS.

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Keep in mind with the 17" screens though - many of them have the same resolution as 24" monitors (1920x1200), so extra graphical power is definitely needed to run native res with most of the eye candy turned on.

 

My laptop has a 17" screen with that resolution, and its sweeeeeeeeeeeet :D

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So I have narrowed it down to two.

 

THIS ONE,

 

or

 

THIS ONE.

 

The first is a 15.4" and the second is a 17"

 

I don't know how crazy I am about carrying a 17" laptop between classes and such. The 15.4 seems awfully big on its own. I also do not know how much of a difference I would notice between the screen sizes, unless I was playing a game or watching a movie.

 

Most of the specs are pretty similar. Same processor, ram, super-multi drive. One cool thing is that they both have a full num pad.

 

The first one has 2X250 gig HD's, that can apparently be set up for RAID 0. But I am lacking in the knowledge department as far as RAID setups go. It also has the 512mb GeForce 9700M GT. And it comes with Vista 64-bit, which I am not sure if that is a plus or minus... Some say 64-bit is the only one that will recognize all 4 gigs of RAM. Some say that the regular version of Vista will now recognize all as well. The only true down sides I see here are the price at $1700 (which is still a bargain for the specs compared to the more widely known manufacturers) and not having the 1 gig video card like some of the others that I have seen (although I never could figure out whether they were truly 1 gig, or 512 dedicated with 512 shared available).

 

The second one has the larger screen which, as I said above, I can't decide if that is a plus or minus for me. It has a single 320 gig HD. And it comes with the 512mb 9600M GS. I am pretty sure that the vid card would be more than sufficient, but with that large of a screen, I would have liked the better card. But, it is $200 less than the first one. Same thing as the first one with the video card. I would have liked to see the 1 gig card in this one, but oh well.

 

I think I know which one I am going to order. Which one would you guys go for, and why? How much better is the 9700M GT vs the 9600M GS? And why is NVidia using recycled ATI numbering schemes? :shrug03:

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17" isn't a laptop it's a mobile desktop. They're too bulky and impractical for everyday on the go type usage. If you use it only at home or the office they're pretty nice but if you want to carry the thing everywhere you go you will notice right away how heavy and bulky it is.

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17" isn't a laptop it's a mobile desktop. They're too bulky and impractical for everyday on the go type usage. If you use it only at home or the office they're pretty nice but if you want to carry the thing everywhere you go you will notice right away how heavy and bulky it is.

 

 

True Dat.

 

I regret my 17-inch laptop once I started to carry it around. If I knew then what I knew now, I would have gotten a Mac Book pro.

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