Ok..Ok

[Dravis85]

Ok, so ya'll finally convinced me to go with a pen-m rather than a desktop p4.

Now that thats outta the way, what brands do yall recommend.

I preferably want one that I can customize (like dell) rather than a pre-configured.

Also what is a good GPU for a laptop. I want good 3d-Gaming. The top four seem to be ATI's x600 and x700, and nvidia's is the 6800 Ultra and 7800.

[mynameis]

X600 < X700 < 6800 < 7800

If you want the best get 7800, if you want one that is decent get X700. I wouldn't go X600 though since you really seem to be into gaming.

[Johnmcl7]

The X700/6600 are generally the best of the midrange cards - they offer performance around the level of a 9800 pro. However, the topend graphics cards such as the new 7800GTX are far, far more powerful - the 7800go features 24 pipelines, eight vertex shaders like its desktop brother but clocked slightly lower at 400/1.1Ghz.

If you want this card with a pentium-m, you basically have two choices - the Dell XPS M170 or the Sager 5720, the latter is a Clevo chassis and will probably be sold under different companies in the US. The Dell offers better batterylife (7200mah battery as opposed to 4400Mah on the Sager) as well as a quieter cooling system which runs better on a lap. However, the Sager will offer much more performance for the money - this is the same as the Rock XtremeCT in my sig, the performance is superb.

John

[Dravis85]

is it really worth the extra money and hassle (weight/size) to get a 17" with a 6800 rather than a 15.4" with the x700....in other words is the 6800 better than the x700 and by how much better

basically the x700 will run any top-end game (d3/hl2/fc) at good or better settings right?

[mynameis]

You need to consider what screen resolution that you are going to want to run, most of the 17in laptops are 1440x900 or 1920x1200, while the 15s are maybe 1280x800 or 1680x1050. You'll want to run games at the LCDs native resolution or they will look all fuzzy.

The higher the resolution the better the video card you'll need to run it at its native resolution.

Are you buying this to be your primary system?

[Dravis85]

Yes this will probly become my primary system. I currently have a A1800+ with an R8500. I want to get into the mainstream gaming and I want something that will perfrom for a good while.

So I guess the 6600 is equivalent to a x700, and since I can only get either one of those on a 15.4 then I'll probly have to go with that. I'm going to stick with the alienware brand since I know it is tried and tested (friends experiences). It also happens to be cheaper than the ASUS W2V pre-config I found on Newegg.

(they also gave me financing options)

I wish someone had a 15.4" with a 6800 or 7800 graphics card...then I would have no reason to worry about any gaming hiccups

[mynameis]

If you are considering the X700, check out HP and Compaq, they both offer 15in laptops with the option of X700 and they are very reasonably priced.

[Dravis85]

I did...the V4000T compaq and the DV4000 were both looking very interesting until I found out I couldn't get financing with HP to get one custom built...

And I've thought of getting one locally, but that won't work either because none of the ones pre-configured have what I want on them

[Johnmcl7]

is it really worth the extra money and hassle (weight/size) to get a 17" with a 6800 rather than a 15.4" with the x700....in other words is the 6800 better than the x700 and by how much better

basically the x700 will run any top-end game (d3/hl2/fc) at good or better settings right?

A 6800 Ultra at 1024x768 with no AA/AF is around double the performance of an X700, the higher the resolution and AA/AF is applied, the bigger that difference will get, if you have a look here:

http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graphic/20051202/vga_charts_viii-15.html

Bear in mind the laptop X700 is about 25% slower than the X700 pro which is getting 14 frames per second whereas a 6800go Ultra should be above the 64 fps of the 6800GT. The 7800go has twice the pipelines of the 6800go Ultra, offering a reasonable performance again. 17 inch machines are far from ideal, I would rather a 15 inch machine but if you're wanting gaming performance, 15 inch machines are simply too far away from the 17 inch machines for graphical performance.

John

[ImaNihilist]

Clevo based notebooks for performance.
hp business-grade notebooks for everything else under the sun. They are rock solid, and can actually take a good beating. Good battery life, great warranty and you don't pay that much more for it.

Dell XPS notebooks feel really "cheap" to me, eventhough they have the best overall performance/stats per dollar. I guess anything with lights feels really cheap to me.

IMO, there is a HUGE gap in the x86 Windows notebook market. I have yet to see a lightweight, high performance notebook with a high-end non-workstation graphics card using a mobile chip that comes in an attractive, sturdy chassis. ASUS is about as close as you can get to that, but still falls short. Imagine if you will something that comes in an ASUS V6V like shell, but has a 7800 mobile chip, and is a little thicker to accomidate that chip and it's cooling, Maybe even in a 14" screen, or 12-15" widescreen. Maybe even something with a Turion chip, that would bring the overall price down to a nice level, and still maintain respectable battery life. It's physically possible, but doesn't exist yet. Someone make me one.

Just my 2¢.

[Ashpool]

Clevo based notebooks for performance.
hp business-grade notebooks for everything else under the sun. They are rock solid, and can actually take a good beating. Good battery life, great warranty and you don't pay that much more for it.

Dell XPS notebooks feel really "cheap" to me, eventhough they have the best overall performance/stats per dollar. I guess anything with lights feels really cheap to me.

IMO, there is a HUGE gap in the x86 Windows notebook market. I have yet to see a lightweight, high performance notebook with a high-end non-workstation graphics card using a mobile chip that comes in an attractive, sturdy chassis. ASUS is about as close as you can get to that, but still falls short. Imagine if you will something that comes in an ASUS V6V like shell, but has a 7800 mobile chip, and is a little thicker to accomidate that chip and it's cooling, Maybe even in a 14" screen, or 12-15" widescreen. Maybe even something with a Turion chip, that would bring the overall price down to a nice level, and still maintain respectable battery life. It's physically possible, but doesn't exist yet. Someone make me one.

Just my 2¢.

Never gonna happen.

Everyone will immediately think it sucks because it isn't at least a 17" widescreen and has enough heat belching out of it to burn right through your pants :p

[ImaNihilist]

Never gonna happen.

Everyone will immediately think it sucks because it isn't at least a 17" widescreen and has enough heat belching out of it to burn right through your pants :p

Hell, I'd LOVE to see a 12" notebook with a 7800 mobile chip. That would rock SO HARD. Think about it, at the native 1024x768 resolution it would look AWESOME, you could play everything with details maxed and even crank up AA and AF. Battery life would rock your socks off, and it be the size of a text book.

Imagine something that's 12" and can play BF2 just as good as your desktop, although at a lower resolution. It would be so portable too. Because the screen is physically so small, it would look sharp as hell.

I say "boo" on 17" notebooks. You need a suitcase just to carry it around.

[Dravis85]

thanks for all the posts and replies.

I will have to think on what I have learned. It seems that ImaNihilist has hit my problem right on the nose. It looks like I'm trying to find too much power in a small bundle and no one makes it. I've pretty much decided to avoid the 7800 just because it cost to darn much :mad: (much as I'd love to have it). From what ya'll keep saying though a 17" with a 6800 GT or ultra will out-perform a 15" with an x700 or 6600 (the smaller res doesn't make up for the card being less powerful).

Anyway so now basically I have to make the final decisions on what to do...go with a giant, or with a smaller less powerful laptop.

And just to be absolutely clear....there is no such thing as a pentium mobile that is above 2.26Ghz...

I found thins thing on www.nextag.com that seems to say it has a 3.4 pentium-m (the 650). If I'm not mistaken, thats a desktop chip not a mobile

[Ashpool]

Hell, I'd LOVE to see a 12" notebook with a 7800 mobile chip. That would rock SO HARD. Think about it, at the native 1024x768 resolution it would look AWESOME, you could play everything with details maxed and even crank up AA and AF. Battery life would rock your socks off, and it be the size of a text book.

Imagine something that's 12" and can play BF2 just as good as your desktop, although at a lower resolution. It would be so portable too. Because the screen is physically so small, it would look sharp as hell.

I say "boo" on 17" notebooks. You need a suitcase just to carry it around.

Indeed.

It would be so intimidating at a LAN party where everyone's got massive tricked-out laptops and then some dude with a tiny little laptop quietly pwns everyone.

...

*pets 14" IBM lappy*

[Dravis85]

And just to be absolutely clear....there is no such thing as a pentium mobile that is above 2.26Ghz...

I found thins thing on www.nextag.com that seems to say it has a 3.4 pentium-m (the 650). If I'm not mistaken, thats a desktop chip not a mobile

[Johnmcl7]

Clevo based notebooks for performance.
hp business-grade notebooks for everything else under the sun. They are rock solid, and can actually take a good beating. Good battery life, great warranty and you don't pay that much more for it.

Dell XPS notebooks feel really "cheap" to me, eventhough they have the best overall performance/stats per dollar. I guess anything with lights feels really cheap to me.

IMO, there is a HUGE gap in the x86 Windows notebook market. I have yet to see a lightweight, high performance notebook with a high-end non-workstation graphics card using a mobile chip that comes in an attractive, sturdy chassis. ASUS is about as close as you can get to that, but still falls short. Imagine if you will something that comes in an ASUS V6V like shell, but has a 7800 mobile chip, and is a little thicker to accomidate that chip and it's cooling, Maybe even in a 14" screen, or 12-15" widescreen. Maybe even something with a Turion chip, that would bring the overall price down to a nice level, and still maintain respectable battery life. It's physically possible, but doesn't exist yet. Someone make me one.

Just my 2¢.

You've not referred to which XPS you feel is 'cheap' but the XPS 2 definitely feels better than its Clevo equivalent, less plasticky with a more solid chassis. Furthermore, the XPS 2/M170 is a lot more expensive than its Clevo equivalent, although it does feel the better machine, especially with the cooling.

John

[Johnmcl7]

Hell, I'd LOVE to see a 12" notebook with a 7800 mobile chip. That would rock SO HARD. Think about it, at the native 1024x768 resolution it would look AWESOME, you could play everything with details maxed and even crank up AA and AF. Battery life would rock your socks off, and it be the size of a text book.

Imagine something that's 12" and can play BF2 just as good as your desktop, although at a lower resolution. It would be so portable too. Because the screen is physically so small, it would look sharp as hell.

I say "boo" on 17" notebooks. You need a suitcase just to carry it around.

A 7800 and 1024x768 is a complete waste of time.

Clearly you've never used any of the more mobile 17 inch machines, I use my ones exactly the same way as my 15 inch machines, comes everyday in with me to work, I use it on the bus/train, just wherever I need it.

John