Gaming laptop for under/around 500 quid

[davek22]

Davek22, what was the delivery date on yours?

They have given me the 3rd June as delivery date. I think the demand is very high for this offer

[Daragon]

Ignore me. If the laptop is plugged into an external display you should be able to up the res in the Win7 display control panel to match it.

I blame years of Dreamcast VGA woes for that lack of thought.

You will of course notice a decrease in performance when you boost the resolution, not sure by how much like. Going from 1366x768 to 1920x1080 will be fine for Starcraft I imagine, for Crysis and beyond though it's going to dip. Just take off AA and all that jazz, innit.

How would blu-ray movies fare on it at the increased resolution? Thinking if I buy that external blu-ray drive from thehut it would save me needing to replace my PS3 straight away as i pretty much only used it for movies up until it croaked.

[davek22]

You can up the resolution to match the display like Datadave said so Blu Rays will look great. My other laptop has HDMI out and when I hook it up to my 1080p tv I set it to extended desktop. This gives me separate screens on my laptop and tv. The tv screen automatically adjusts to 1080p resolution so I run my films on the extended tv screen and can still use the laptop screen for net browsing ( if the film is dull!)
That blu ray drive is also a DVD writer so it really is worth the extra cash. You can also use that for blu ray 3D output so if you ever pick up a 3D Telly in future you just need to get hold of some 3D Blu ray playback software like Powerdvd

[dataDave]

This laptop idea sounds like the nads with all the hairs. I need to convince my GF ASAP.

[Daragon]

God I still don't know what to do.

Why have Alienware paired such an outdated CPU with a much more recent GPU?

Just discovered that alot of these M11x r1 video reviews I've watched are using i7 processors rather than whatever it is Dell are packaging into it. I don't want 12 fps on medium-low settings just because of that CPU

[davek22]

Daragon, when you google M11x review all the reviews that appear are for the C2D version that Dell have on offer. Read the IGN review, they said Mass Effect 2 runs buttery smooth at 720p with all settings maxed

http://m.uk.ign.com/articles/1065816

[Daragon]

Hmm, guess a slight overreaction on my part then. A lot of youtubers are claiming they're getting very low fps on certain games though, such as starcraft and the like.

Was quite impressed by a supposedly maxed out New vegas running on a supposedly C2D version R1 (which this is)

Any idea when you get billed by Dell? Is on dispatch or when the order's placed?

[davek22]

I did read on one review they had low FPS on World At War as it was very dependent on the processor. The C2D can be overclocked as standard to 1.6-1.7 ghz. Alienware have software onboard for that.
As always with tech like this I would love an I5 or I7 in there but with the same spec as the rest of the machine it goes up to ?900 odd. The C2D is more than enough I would say but if you are buying it specifically for Starcraft then I would do some digging how the C2D version handles it.
I think Dell take cash on order

Edit: a C2D M11x owner states he is running Starcraft 2 at ultra smoothly:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/what-notebook-should-i-buy/464603-will-alienware-m11x-handle-starcraft-2-a.html

[Daragon]

I don't get the inconsistency with one review to another. I've just read this one:

http://pcformat.techradar.com/review/alienware-m11x-review-10-06-10

Claiming 2 games which presumably aren't going to knock any socks off with their specs achieving average to pathetic FPS, whereas IGN claim very smooth gameplay on max settings for ME2.

I'm at a loss

[davek22]

I know what you mean. From notebookcheck:
"Colin McRae Dirt 2

A similar, even if significantly more consistent picture is indicated by the integrated benchmark test of Colin McRae Dirt 2. High graphic pre-settings stifle the system's performance to a bit more than 30 fps. However, the breaks observed in the benchmark test of CoD didn't turn up and the game even ran in high settings adequately smooth"

http://www.notebookcheck.net/Test-Preview-Alienware-M11x-Performance-Check.25840.0.html

This is at odds to the 24fps from that review you posted. I must say I would trust notebookcheck on graphics performance a lot more than that other site!!

[Daragon]

Ok, not a laptop granted - but is this http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...odid=FS-265-OK (with the graphics card upgrade added) effectively a desktop version of the AW or is it more powerful?

I guess it isn't VITAL that I buy a laptop/netbook for gaming...

Edit:

Something else I've been wondering about the AW, how is it able to load, never mind play reasonably well games like Borderlands which require a 2.4ghz processor as a minimum CPU?

[dataDave]

Ok, not a laptop granted - but is this http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...odid=FS-265-OK (with the graphics card upgrade added) effectively a desktop version of the AW or is it more powerful?

I saw "AMD Athlon II" and stopped reading there.

[abigsmurf]

Ok, not a laptop granted - but is this http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...odid=FS-265-OK (with the graphics card upgrade added) effectively a desktop version of the AW or is it more powerful?

I guess it isn't VITAL that I buy a laptop/netbook for gaming...

Edit:

Something else I've been wondering about the AW, how is it able to load, never mind play reasonably well games like Borderlands which require a 2.4ghz processor as a minimum CPU?

The SU ones are ultra low voltage CPUs optimised for low clock speeds. That is a weedy CPU that bottlenecks the system (incredibly unusual for a laptop where the GPUs are nearly always the bottleneck) but the 2.4ghz is probably using an Athlon 64 as a reference point and it should be fine.

As for that desktop system, it's designed to be as cheap as possible. The (upgraded) graphics card can game, but only just. 20fps on Crysis on high settings Could probably expect 30fps+ on medium. It's actually a pretty good value system but it's very low end

[FelixofMars]

Its not going to be any better than the laptop, my old gaming laptop is an Asus G1S it is okay for running UT3,UDK and TF2. It just about was fine for BFBC2 I wouldn't recommend Crysis is on it but it did have a similar spec to the Dell/AW one. I fitted some extra ram sticks to it as well to make it 4G. So weird that the processor is of a poor spec though. What WHERE they thinking.

Maybe you can hunt around for a end of line one of these.

Intel Core 2 Duo T7500, 2.2 GHz 4MB L2 Cache 800MHz FSB
4 GB RAM 667MHz (was 2G originally)
Nvidia GeForce 8600M GT, 256 MB onboard, 512 MB Turbo Cache DX 10

[Daragon]

I've been drawn more to this over the past couple of hours, there was a code for 100 quid off taking it down to 529 which I would probably go for if the code works again this evening. http://www.dell.com/uk/p/xps-l502x/p...l_id=xps-l502x

There's also this Acer being sold by Kikatek, which looks better than both but sadly comes from a retailer I've never heard of before so I'm very wary of trusting them with my money http://www.kikatek.com/product_info....ucts_id=184797