Laptop suggestions

[Ron]

So recent changes have caused me to need to be more mobile, going to be selling off my desktop soon and purchasing a laptop.

I need it primarily for work, but also would love to be able to game at decent settings when I'm home. 17"+ at 1920x1080 resolution. I don't care much about size/weight.

I was looking at getting a new M17x, but for the price of the HD screen I might as well go with a M18x instead. Minimum 16gb RAM (yes I actually need it) with a 256gb+ SSD.

Any thoughts? Alienware are the only builds I can find that meet what I'm looking for but of course they're very expensive.

[MentaL]

[Lewis]

What's your price range?

[WarKeyGFX]

better get ASUS Gaming laptop or MSI.

[Rishwin]

If going Alienware -ALWAYS- get the base model with the CPU & GPU you want, and upgrade the RAM & drives yourself. In the M17/18x you can swap literally EVERY component under warranty, they are all user upgradeable. You'll save hundreds. Find coupon codes & offers, place your order over the phone preferably to a US sales rep who have more control over discounts, and if you couldn't find any they can skim their catalog & find deals FOR you.

Once you got it, you always have the option of calling them back within 30 days of order to "cancel" your laptop stating it's not what you expected or you found a cheaper lappy with same specs, they'll offer you a 5% rebate to keep it. Push a little harder, they can go to 10% which bundled with your purchase deals can leave you with a very well priced Alienware.

There ARE slightly cheaper options in other brands, but if you need in-home repairs within 2 working days then nothing beats Dell's warranty.

[Ron]

Sorry for the late reply, budget is limitless. It will be my new dedicated workstation for everything I do so I don't care about price.

If going Alienware -ALWAYS- get the base model with the CPU & GPU you want, and upgrade the RAM & drives yourself. In the M17/18x you can swap literally EVERY component under warranty, they are all user upgradeable. You'll save hundreds. Find coupon codes & offers, place your order over the phone preferably to a US sales rep who have more control over discounts, and if you couldn't find any they can skim their catalog & find deals FOR you.

Once you got it, you always have the option of calling them back within 30 days of order to "cancel" your laptop stating it's not what you expected or you found a cheaper lappy with same specs, they'll offer you a 5% rebate to keep it. Push a little harder, they can go to 10% which bundled with your purchase deals can leave you with a very well priced Alienware.

There ARE slightly cheaper options in other brands, but if you need in-home repairs within 2 working days then nothing beats Dell's warranty.

Thanks for the tips, so upgrading with your own parts doesn't void their warranty?

[Rishwin]

Sorry for the late reply, budget is limitless. It will be my new dedicated workstation for everything I do so I don't care about price.



Thanks for the tips, so upgrading with your own parts doesn't void their warranty?

Yup. You can even upgrade the CPU & GPU on these things. Just means Dell's warranty won't extend to those 3rd party components, but it still covers everything else from the original config which most importantly is the mobo & chassis.

[Manova]

I recently got the new Series 7 Chronos. It's comparable to the Alienware machines, and it's a lot more. Full HD 15 IPS screen, 8 GB Ram upgradeable to 12 GB and a 256GB SSD. I don't know if this could be something for you, but give it a read.

[.Yoss.]

Just stumbled on a similar site to alienware that lets you customize the components. I configured the most expensive config on the site and I got:

Display	17.3" Full HD LED-Backlit Display featuring 90% NTSC Color Gamut in Super Glossy Surface (1920 x 1080)
Video & Graphics Card	Dual Nvidia GeForce GTX 780M GPU with 4GB GDDR5 Video Memory + Additional AC Adapter & Power Converter Box [$1,100.00]
CPU Processor	2nd Generation Intel® Core™ i7-3970X Processor Extreme Edition ( 15MB L3 Cache, 3.50GHz / 4.0GHz in Turbo Mode, 6 Cores ) [$795.00]
Thermal Compound	IC Diamond Thermal Compound - CPU + GPU [$35.00]
Operating System	Genuine MS Windows® 8 Professional 64-Bit Edition [$60.00]
Memory	32GB Quad Channel DDR3 SDRAM at 1600MHz - 4 X 8GB [$220.00]
RAID Storage Options	Non-RAID Storage
Hard Disk Drive 1	480GB Intel S3500 Series SATA3 Solid State Disk Drive [$555.00]
Hard Disk Drive 2	480GB Intel S3500 Series SATA3 Solid State Secondary Disk Drive [$620.00]
Hard Disk Drive 3	480GB Intel S3500 Series SATA3 Solid State 3rd Disk Drive [$620.00]
Optical Drive Bay — Optical Drive or Hard Disk Drive in Optical Drive Bay with Caddy case	480GB Intel S3500 Series SATA3 SSD + Caddy Case [$620.00]
Wireless Network Card	Killer™ Wireless-N 1103 - 802.11A/B/G/N Wireless LAN Module [$65.00]
Primary Battery	Smart Li-ION Battery Pack
Integrated Security Device	Fingerprint Reader
Microsoft Office	Microsoft Office 2013 Trial - Included in Price
Warranty	Sager 3 Year Limited Parts and Labor Warranty [$249.00]

Total: $7,038.00

from custom gaming laptops - Welcome to Sager Notebooks


I guess it is more expensive than alienware and certainly the thermal compound and suspicious rise in SSD prices feels like they are ripping you off but maybe you can find some config over there that's worth it.

[Rishwin]

Yes Sager is another good gaming company, with similar specs though they should be slightly cheaper than Alienware. With ALL of these types of configs though, you always want to get the base config with the CPU & GPU that you want, and upgrade the RAM & HDD aftermarket for a fraction of the cost. These RAM & HDD upgrades are where they make most of the profit on the unit, as their prices are highly inflated yet their warranty still allows you to upgrade themselves without voiding the rest of it.

$500+ for a 256GB SSD & $1000+ for 32GB RAM is the usual price for the manufacturer upgrades, aftermarket you're looking at $200 each. It's worth upgrading the GPU, but don't go the extreme of getting GTX780's or 7990's because the heat they give off is simply too much for those small enclosures not to mention the power they use. They start running into issues very early on & never last as long as their "inferior" counterparts. Keep in mind the resolution you're be playing at, you don't need flagship chips to max out 1080p anymore.

[Ron]

Yeah, I run a 650 at the moment and it maxes everything out @ 1080p, really underestimated card tbh.

Going with a base 18" from alienware for the large screen, thanks for the tips.

[Patrick2607]

You don't have to buy Alienware only when it comes to playing decent games. You can look at the MSI Gaming Series too for example. They have decent specs and usually aren't that expensive compared to alienware laptops. But yeah, it's a con to buy alienware if you want to choose your own specs. What you also can do is buy a laptop + upgrade it yourself. Add more RAM and a SSD.

[Ron]

Already made the purchase, thanks though.