Best Gaming Laptop, period!

[North]

Hi guys,

I am a 35 y.o. lawyer and I LOVE gaming (yep, I admit it, must be the
child in me) Because of my job I must travel almost every week
therefore I don't want to play at home since I want to spend that time
with my wife and kids and that is why I need the ultimate gaming
Laptop.

I know that you guys are asked this question a zillions times a year
and I took the time to read almost all of these answers. However I
will buy my new laptop in the next few weeks and I need the latest
advice as technology seems to change monthly in that field. Also, most
forum questions includes either budget, size or power limitation.

So I want the best Gaming Laptop, period

-Power is not a problem since I will always play in hotel room, I don't
care about battery life;

-Budget is not a problem but still, I would like to stay around
4000,00$

-Size is not a problem since I do hiking and I'm used to haul stuff
around in a backpack but if it's possible I would avoid the 19 inch
laptops because you need ridicule backpack to move them and I travel by
plane and want to keep the laptop with me in the plane;

-I change my computer every 3 or 4 years so it has to be able to last
the longer possible for the upcoming games even if I know it's
impossible, so you have to foresee what these games will demands;

In fact I know that you will tell me to buy an Alienware or so and I've
read all of the description of Alienware, Hypersonic, Sager,
Cyberpower, Eurocom, Widow PC, Ibuypower, Pro Star and Dell, but not
Voodoo as they seems to cost over 10,000$... (See I made my homework
before bothering you guys) Most of these system would respect my budget
limitation but I still don't know which is the best.

-CPU questions; what is the best CPU for Gaming? AMD or Pentium, and if
so, is it the dual-core technologie? the Dell XPS is powered by a Intel
Dual-core

-What is the best Video Card?

-What is the best configuration for video card? Dual SLI Cards or
single more powerfull cards?(is dual 256 MB SLI cards are better than
one powerfull 512MB card?)

Of course I will take two gigs of RAM and a Hard Disk with a speed over
7200RPM (Should I take a RAID configuration?) and the screen choices I
can handle so my more important questions are really about the
different CPU comparaison and the Video card choices

Thank you very much for your collaboration, I appreciate your help a
lot since I don't know a lot about computer and I can't seems to trust
the sellers advice as their products is always the best...


Also, excuse any text errors as my first language is french


Yours Truly


Robert

 

[Jay Johnston]

well i will tell you that a dual core won't run most games the software
hasn't cought up with that technology. The AMD is the best for gaming at
about 35-45% faster in just about everything including and not forgoten the
non gaming software. I wouldn't get a dual core you will have to write batch
files to turn off the 2nd core. I have played with a AMDx2 (dual core) and
found its fast but as far as gaming its not there yet. as for mobility
graphics....ATI isn't it, see if you can find mobility nvidia graphics card
IMHO alienware is good but they have kinda went down in their product line.
If you look up a build it yourself kit newegg has them you can do your own
customizations. I will help you if you will let me know.

Eric

 

[vellu]

Hmm, I haven't found a game yet that wouldn't run with my A6Ja T2300
dual-core laptop (Mobility x1600). True, the games themselves do not
support dual-core, but the performance increase is noticeable when the
necessary background programs (firewall, antivirus, etc.) can run on the
other core which the game is not using.

Ps. I have seen reports of games outright refusing to run on dual-cores,
but haven't come across one that wouldn't myself. Then again my game
library isn't all that magnificent.

Jay Johnston kirjoitti:

 

[Victor]

Hi guys,

I am a 35 y.o. lawyer and I LOVE gaming (yep, I admit it, must be the
child in me) Because of my job I must travel almost every week
therefore I don't want to play at home since I want to spend that time
with my wife and kids and that is why I need the ultimate gaming
Laptop.

I know that you guys are asked this question a zillions times a year
and I took the time to read almost all of these answers. However I
will buy my new laptop in the next few weeks and I need the latest
advice as technology seems to change monthly in that field. Also, most
forum questions includes either budget, size or power limitation.

So I want the best Gaming Laptop, period

-Power is not a problem since I will always play in hotel room, I don't
care about battery life;

-Budget is not a problem but still, I would like to stay around
4000,00$

-Size is not a problem since I do hiking and I'm used to haul stuff
around in a backpack but if it's possible I would avoid the 19 inch
laptops because you need ridicule backpack to move them and I travel by
plane and want to keep the laptop with me in the plane;

-I change my computer every 3 or 4 years so it has to be able to last
the longer possible for the upcoming games even if I know it's
impossible, so you have to foresee what these games will demands;

In fact I know that you will tell me to buy an Alienware or so and I've
read all of the description of Alienware, Hypersonic, Sager,
Cyberpower, Eurocom, Widow PC, Ibuypower, Pro Star and Dell, but not
Voodoo as they seems to cost over 10,000$... (See I made my homework
before bothering you guys) Most of these system would respect my budget
limitation but I still don't know which is the best.

-CPU questions; what is the best CPU for Gaming? AMD or Pentium, and if
so, is it the dual-core technologie? the Dell XPS is powered by a Intel
Dual-core

-What is the best Video Card?

-What is the best configuration for video card? Dual SLI Cards or
single more powerfull cards?(is dual 256 MB SLI cards are better than
one powerfull 512MB card?)

Of course I will take two gigs of RAM and a Hard Disk with a speed over
7200RPM (Should I take a RAID configuration?) and the screen choices I
can handle so my more important questions are really about the
different CPU comparaison and the Video card choices

Thank you very much for your collaboration, I appreciate your help a
lot since I don't know a lot about computer and I can't seems to trust
the sellers advice as their products is always the best...


Also, excuse any text errors as my first language is french


Yours Truly


Robert

I think you would be more than happy with the Dell 1710. 17" wuvga
1900x1200 screen,Core Duo 2500 with 2 gigs,100gig 7200rpm hd,Nvidia
7900gtx 512mb, 4yr warranty will run right around your $4000
target.Have had zero issues with mine.Runs all current games except
maybe Oblivion maxed.-Vic

 

[North]

Victor a écrit :

I think you would be more than happy with the Dell 1710. 17" wuvga
1900x1200 screen,Core Duo 2500 with 2 gigs,100gig 7200rpm hd,Nvidia
7900gtx 512mb, 4yr warranty will run right around your $4000
target.Have had zero issues with mine.Runs all current games except
maybe Oblivion maxed.-Vic

Hi Vic, yes I was interrested in the Dell XPS 1710 but to be honest I
don't understand well how the Core-Duo works for example what is the
speed of the 2500?Is it like a P2.5? I know somebody wrote that the
game did not work with duo-core but the duo-core helped because he
could run background program. Me I shut down almost all background
programs like explorer, virus protection, managing tools and all to
concentrate the power on the game. Therefore would a Core-Duo be
useless for me6

Have you tried hieh-end games like Prey or FEAR and can you play them
at high setting?

Sorry for all the questions but thanks for the answer

 

[vellu]

Check out this Dual Core review at Anandtech.

http://www.anandtech.com/printarticle.aspx?i=2648

It's mostly a comparison between T2500 and the AMD desktop dual
configurations, but a "regular" single-core laptop cpu Pentium M 760 is
also included (which is equivalent to about 3.6GHz P4).

For example "SYSMark 2004 Overall" scores are the following (higher is
better):

AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+ (2.2GHz) 222 points
Intel Core Duo T2500 (2.0GHz) 211 points
AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ (2.0GHz) 207 points
Intel Pentium M760 (2.0GHz) 169 points

There is a lot of different applications tested there, so you can see
what programs benefit the most from dual-core (and which do not).

For gaming there is a test for Fear aswell (1024x768, 7800GTX):

Intel Pentium M760 (2.0GHz) 56 fps
AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ (2.0GHz) 55 fps
Intel Core Duo T2500 (2.0GHz) 55 fps
AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+ (2.2GHz) 55 fps

F.E.A.R. appears to be GPU bound, even at 1024 x 768 with a GeForce 7800
GTX, so the performance of all of the processors is virtually identical.
So for Fear the graphics card is the key factor, not the cpu.

 

[Victor]

Victor a écrit :


Hi Vic, yes I was interrested in the Dell XPS 1710 but to be honest I
don't understand well how the Core-Duo works for example what is the
speed of the 2500?Is it like a P2.5? I know somebody wrote that the
game did not work with duo-core but the duo-core helped because he
could run background program. Me I shut down almost all background
programs like explorer, virus protection, managing tools and all to
concentrate the power on the game. Therefore would a Core-Duo be
useless for me6

Have you tried hieh-end games like Prey or FEAR and can you play them
at high setting?

Sorry for all the questions but thanks for the answer

Hi Robert,I'm currently playing Oblivion (which defaults to ultra high
settings) and I turn grass and shadows down halfway to get smooth
framerates outdoors.Finished Half-life 2 Episode One on max settings.
Prey demo smooth on max settings.Great demo I'll probably buy it.Tried
the Fear demo on my old desktop system with 9800pro but not on the
1710.The old 9800pro played Fear on medium so I'm sure the 7900gtx
will handle it with ease.I read a couple reviews that put the core duo
2500 2ghz up there with the Amd x2 4200+ dual core processors so thats
plenty fast.And i read Dell systems will start shipping in September
with the new Intel Core 2 Duo Merom processors with about a 10% boost
in speed.I just checked Dells site and their still shipping with the
original core duo up to 2700 2.33ghz.I'm know there are other great
gaming laptops out there.Hope this helps you choose the right one for
you.-Vic