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Laptop purchase advice
That time has finally come in my life, as it comes to us all, when we must lay down the bones for a new rig.
Now, I'm stuck (for a lot of reasons) between three different machines, the builds of which I've worked out are all pretty similar in terms of cost. I'm torn between the Dell XPS 15, Alienware M14x, and the MSI GT683DXR-634US.
I know two of those are dedicated gaming laptops and one is, well, not, but all things considered it doesn't look so bad and I'm a little bugged by the M14x's lack of blu ray.
All of you, please have at it. I would really love and appreciate your advice (let's just not let this degenerate into any sort of petty techie throwdown (keep it civil)). Thanks everyone!
Comments
The Alienware Mx is actually what I would like for my next laptop. Something else I like to look at, is Bestbuy - actually. Horrible prices, however, their sales can be amAZing. The laptop i got from there (years ago) was easily worth $700+ and I found it on sale for $400. No idea why, but im best purchase ever.
Just a point of caution, look at these laptops in person so you can get a feel for them. Many laptops have some annoying problems which can detract from the experience. My new laptop for example has a very glossy screen which annoys the hell out of me. For MSI, try getting a feel of it's size because they arep retty hefty.
I count one gaming laptop there, not two. The two Dell/Alienware models you mention will be able to run nearly any game, but you'll often have to turn settings way down. They're really not faster than integrated graphics by a large enough margin to justify getting a discrete card in the first place.
The MSI, on the other hand, is a very capable gaming laptop. So that's one gaming laptop out of three models that you list.
All three share the same other problem, however: imminent obsolescence. AMD's Cape Verde GPU chip is already out for desktops. Once it arrives in laptops, every single discrete video card on the market today won't make a bit of sense to buy new for any reason other than clearance pricing. Cape Verde is just too much better and in too many ways.
It's probable that AMD's Pitcairn GPU that could arrive for desktops any day now will make more sense than Cape Verde in higher end gaming laptops, and come to laptops at the same time as Cape Verde. Various GPUs in Nvidia's upcoming Kepler lineup will be available in laptops months later, and might be roughly competitive with Cape Verde and Pitcairn. But that doesn't change the conclusion that all of the discrete video cards available in laptops today are just about obsolete.
So why can't you get Cape Verde in laptops just yet? Laptop vendors hate updating their lineup, and then having to do it again a month later. Intel's Ivy Bridge processors are coming soon, too. Once that happens, anything still using Sandy Bridge (the processors you're looking at now) is obsolete. So they'd rather switch the CPU and GPU at the same time. Ivy Bridge is rumored to launch in April.
Thus, unless you absolutely need something right now, I'd recommend against buying any gaming laptop other than a Llano-based system. And Llano is for budget gaming laptops, generally in the $500-$800 range.
I have an ASUS G73JH... from my understanding they are updating the line again in April to something like a 560 or the like. You may want to investigate. I found the Asus line VERY good at what they do (playing games and keeping cool).
Here's a link: http://rog.asus.com/notebook/17-inch/g74sx/
Upgrading to a GTX 560M? I think you have that backwards. It should be upgrading from a GTX 560M. Because if there are more than a few GeForce GTX 560M laptops still on the market come the end of April, it will mean that someone goofed and ordered way more of them than they could sell.
They're upgrading it from 560 to SOMETHING newer.. I read it somewhere and can't find it. That was the latest beast I could find though for the man.
Thanks Quiz for punching a man in the face for silly mistakes ;-)
Please sir may I have another?
The Cape Verde and Pitcairn GPUs mentioned above will probably the the "something newer" available. I'm not expecting Nvidia to have Kepler-based laptop video cards ready by then.
All great information, guys. Thanks a million. As for MSIs, I've had a Vaio and I know that for any repairs I was supposed to ship it all the way back to Japan, and it wasn't terribly sturdy. MSI being Taiwanese, is there a similar policy that we know of? And is it a relatively sturdy make?
Also, the incoming obsoleting factors: how soon are we talking? Cause I can't say for certain that my machine isn't circling the drain, so even a wait of a few months is probably a stretch.
Lastly, I am certainly open to building my own rig (although I've not done so up to this point) if the price for comparable parts is significantly lower than in the pre-made models I've been browsing.
And finally, at the risk of greatly expanding (rather than narrowing down) my search, does anyone have any suggestions that I may not have thought of?
Again, thanks to you all. I appreciate the help.
Let's back up a bit. Why do you need a gaming laptop in the first place? If you're going to use it like a desktop, then you'd be far better off with a gaming desktop.
If you need a gaming machine for some purposes, and also a laptop for other purposes, then there's no need to get both in the same machine. You could get both a gaming desktop and a cheap laptop. As compared to a single gaming laptop, the gaming desktop will run games better, be more reliable, be much easier to fix if something does break, and offer a much better future upgrade path, among other advantages. Meanwhile, the cheap laptop will be much more portable (smaller, lighter, cooler) than the gaming laptop and either get you much better battery life or much more reliable drivers (depending on whether you use some sort of discrete switchable graphics). And the gaming desktop plus a cheap laptop added together will cost less than a single gaming laptop.
Gaming laptops really only make sense for people who need to take the laptop somewhere and play games on it away from home. If you're a business traveler and live out of a hotel a few months per year, then a gaming laptop makes perfect sense for you. But they really don't make much sense for most people.
As for when, the Cape Verde GPU is already available for desktops:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007709%20600286767%20600298539&IsNodeId=1&name=Radeon%20HD%207770%20GHz%20Edition
The Ivy Bridge processors are rumored to launch in April. I'd expect AMD to give the go-ahead to OEMs to use the new video card in the first laptops that use Intel's new processors.
I think they should rename the hardware forum to "Ask Quizzical - other opinions need not apply"
For at least the next few years I'll be moving around a lot (around the country and in other countries), so I figured a desktop might be a little much to keep having to pack up and fly with.
I appreciate his advice. He seems knowledgeable and helpful, but I'm happy to get as many opinions as are given.
How often are you going to move around? There's quite a difference between moving around the country every few days and doing so every few months.
If you're moving between countries, then you may also have to worry about differing voltages and power connectors.
This may or may not make sense for your needs, but have you considered getting a relatively portable desktop? For example, you could get a small case like this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811163169
Note the dimensions: 8.74" x 7.48" x 13.78"
You could carry that in a backpack. You do pay a price premium for the smaller form factor, but it offers you the advantages of a real desktop, rather than being stuck with a laptop.
Another thing that you may or may not want to consider is something like this:
http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/computer_can_series.do?storeName=computer_store&category=notebooks&a1=Processor&v1=AMD&series_name=dv6zqe_series&jumpid=in_R329_prodexp/hhoslp/psg/notebooks/AMD/dv6zqe_series
Upgrade to an A8-3550MX processor and a Radeon HD 7690M video card (really just a renamed Radeon HD 6770M) and you'll have better gaming performance than either the Dell or Alienware laptops you mentioned above, and for under $700.
That will also get you long battery life because the discrete video card will shut down when you're not playing games and use the integrated graphics instead. And it will do so without the driver headaches of the other laptops you mention, because all AMD graphics means that unified AMD drivers can control everything, rather than having to switch back and forth between Intel and Nvidia graphics. Nvidia graphics aren't a problem, but Intel graphics are.
If you want a Blu-Ray player, HP offers that (+$75). If you're inclined to spend more, they also offer a better monitor (1080p for +$150), a 7200 RPM hard drive (+$60), or a 160 GB SSD (+$290) instead of the hard drive.
If you're capable of modifying things yourself, then you'd probably want to do something about the memory. For example, get the 6 GB default configuration, buy your own 4 GB module elsewhere ($20), then pull out the 2 GB module when the laptop arrives and replace it by your own 4 GB module. That gets you 8 GB with properly matched channels for an added cost of $20, as compared to the $60 that HP will charge.
If you've got a Windows 7 DVD available, you could also pull out the hard drive when it comes, add your own SSD, and do a clean install of Windows 7, and then re-use the Windows 7 license that comes with the laptop. That will get rid of bloatware, too. And you can do that a lot cheaper than getting an SSD from HP, too:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148448
That's $170 for 128 GB.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820226237
That's $274 for 240 GB.
HP will charge you $290 for 160 GB, and it's probably an Intel SSD 320, so quite a bit slower than either of those, too.
Solid state drives are very nice in laptops for a variety of reasons. One is that they're very, very fast, so that you don't constantly have to sit and wait for the laptop to do something when you tell it to. Another is that they use virtually no power, which extends the battery life. SSDs are also completely silent, so you can be free of the annoying hum of a hard drive.
Additionally, SSDs have no moving parts, and hence no moving parts that can break. That makes SSDs nearly indestructible. Shaking the laptop while it is in use or setting it on a vibrating surface could kill a hard drive, but won't bother an SSD at all.
So why do hard drives even exist at all, if SSDs are so great? Well, you've probably noticed the drawback of SSDs: the price tag.
Building your own laptop isn't terribly practical. But it's typically not difficult to replace the memory or hard drive in a laptop.
A Llano-based system won't get you gaming performance anywhere near the MSI laptop you linked above, so a lot depends on what class of product you're looking for. But I'd sooner get the HP laptop I linked than the Dell or Alienware ones that you mentioned earlier.