I want to buy a new laptop

Quote
Lex
I've found this other laptop (clicky), and what bugs me about this one is the weight: 20.1 pounds?! Can a notebook even weigh so much?

It is heavy, but then it has 2 hard drives and will have at least twice the copper of most laptops... and I'd imagine as a result it would need a rather sturdier (thus heavier) chassis too. It's got a bigger than normal battery too (though it needs to be with that power... under load it might even last 30 minutes!)

You don't buy laptops like that to take anywhere. It's a desktop replacement - you'll take it somewhere and leave it for months at a time. Think university or something. It's not one you'd take to do some work on a train.

Quote
Lex
EDIT: About external hard drives, is there anything special that I should pay attention to, or storage capacity + price will do?

The make matters just as much as it does with internal drives (ie avoid Hitachi and Seagate) as they're just a standard 2.5" or 3.5" drives in a caddy. 3.5" drives need a spare power socket, while many 2.5" drives can be powered through a single USB cable alone. Other than that, you can get USB, SATA (which will normally need additional power) or network (usually wired). USB and SATA are fine, while network drives are normally a bit restrictive in terms of security and features.

I find the best option is to buy a separate enclosure and drive (both UK sites, but you should be able to source them in the US) and that way you can customise exactly what you want. It is more expensive, but it does mean you can just chop and change drives at will, or just upgrade the drive when you need to.

gav schrieb:
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> It is heavy, but then it has 2 hard drives and
> will have at least twice the copper of most
> laptops... and I'd imagine as a result it would
> need a rather sturdier (thus heavier) chassis too.
> It's got a bigger than normal battery too (though
> it needs to be with that power... under load it
> might even last 30 minutes!)
>
> You don't buy laptops like that to take anywhere.
> It's a desktop replacement - you'll take it
> somewhere and leave it for months at a time. Think
> university or something. It's not one you'd take
> to do some work on a train.

I see. I had thought it was a typo, because I had never seen a notebook so heavy. But then again, I don't even know how heavy my desktop is, so meh.


gav schrieb:
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> The make matters just as much as it does with
> internal drives (ie avoid Hitachi and Seagate) as
> they're just a standard 2.5" or 3.5" drives in a
> caddy. 3.5" drives need a spare power socket,
> while many 2.5" drives can be powered through a
> single USB cable alone. Other than that, you can
> get USB, SATA (which will normally need additional
> power) or network (usually wired). USB and SATA
> are fine, while network drives are normally a bit
> restrictive in terms of security and features.
>
> I find the best option is to buy a separate
> enclosure and drive (both UK sites, but you should
> be able to source them in the US) and that way you
> can customise exactly what you want. It is more
> expensive, but it does mean you can just chop and
> change drives at will, or just upgrade the drive
> when you need to.

I intend to use it just for backup / general storage. For example... store all my songs in the external HD, and when I feel like listening to them, I copy them to the internal HD, and then erase when I'm done (not actually a plan, this just came across my mind). I guess USB is better for this, isn't it?

I don't think I'm going to buy a notebook with SSD right away - they're still too expensive, and since I don't know how long it'll take until they reach reasonable prices, I guess it's better to change the HDD for a SSD later. So, it'll be good to have a nice, big external HD to help the small SSD that I'll (maybe) have.

I remember that you told me a long time ago that Western Digital Greens were great for storage; is that still true?

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Quote
Lex
I intend to use it just for backup / general storage. For example... store all my songs in the external HD, and when I feel like listening to them, I copy them to the internal HD, and then erase when I'm done (not actually a plan, this just came across my mind). I guess USB is better for this, isn't it?

USB is the easiest. One cable (if you're using a 2.5" drive) and you're away instantly. eSATA would be faster at transferring files but USB is so universal that you'd probably find yourself using the USB cable all the time.

Quote
Lex
I guess it's better to change the HDD for a SSD later

Which is why it probably make sense to get yourself an empty 2.5" enclosure and buy your own hard drive. When you do come to replace the hard drives in your laptop, you can then shove them in one of that enclosure every now and then and use them for extra backups or whatever.

Like I said, you pay a touch extra originally, but it pays you back further down the line.

Quote
Lex
I remember that you told me a long time ago that Western Digital Greens were great for storage; is that still true?

They're not better than the higher speed drives, but you save quite a bit on them so they make sense. Given that the USB connection would be the speed limit, rather than the hard drive, it makes no difference that they're a bit slower. Given what most people use backup drives for, they're the perfect choice. I'm happy to use them for all my storage, not just my backups (quick drive(s) for the OS and programs of course though).



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/2010 08:46AM by gav.

2.5" drives don't go beyond 500GB storage capacity? Not that I need like 350TB, you see, but I'm not finding anything larger than half a terabyte.

About notebooks' weights, I've found something that makes even less sense for me than that 20.1 pound laptop. Compare this:

Model: G73JW-A1
Product Features
Intel Core i7-740QM (1.73GHz Quad-Core with Turbo Boost up to 2.93GHz)
8GB DDR3 1333MHz, 4 SODIMM Sockets, up to 8GB
1TB (500G 7200RPM x2) HDD; Blue-Ray Disk Combo Drive; 802.11 b/g/n
Nvidia GTX 460M Graphics with 1.5GB GDDR5; Windows Home Premium 64-bit Operating System
17.3-Inch Full HD (1920x1080) LED Display; 2.0M Webcam; Gaming Backpack and Mouse

Size (LWH): 16.6 inches, 12.8 inches, 2.3 inches
Weight: 8 pounds

To this:

Model: G73JH-X5
Product Features
Intel i7-720QM (1.60 GHz Quad-Core with Turbo Boost up to 2.8GHz)
8GB DDR3 1066MHz , 4 SODIMM Sockets, up to 8GB
640GB (320GB x 2) 7200RPM HDD; Blue-Ray Disk Combo Drive; 802.11 b/g/n
ATI 5870 Graphics with 1G GDDR5; Windows Home Premium 64-bit Operating System
17.3-Inch Full HD (1920 x 1080) LED Display; 2.0M Webcam; 1 YR Accidental Damage Warranty Included

Size (LWH): 19.7 inches, 11.4 inches, 16.5 inches
Weight: 20.1 pounds

They're both 17.3" laptops, they have almost the same specs, yet the one with less storage capacity is more than twice as heavy as the one with 1TB HDD? I mean, wtf?

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I don't work in pounds (as in weight), but the ASUS product page says it's 3.85kg, which is apparently 8.49 pounds. I guess someone used the wrong formula for the conversion.

As for drives - there are 750GB drives appearing in the standard 9.5mm height, though there are 1TB drives, but they're higher than normal (12.5mm), so won't fit in most laptops. However, just like the desktop drives (where the highest standard capacity has just moved up to 3TB), the 2.5" drives are getting bigger and bigger as the technology improves.

This one (clicky) seems nice, and for a reasonable price:

Intel Core i5-460M Processor 2.53GHz with turbo boost up to 2.8GHz
4GB of DDR3 1066MHz SDRAM, 2 slots, 8GB Max; Nvidia GT425M graphics with 1GB DDR3 VRAM
500GB Hard Drive (7200 RPM); Blu-Ray Combo Drive; Wi-Fi 802.11 bgn
HDMI Port; USB 3.0 port; 2.0MP Webcam; eSATA; 5-in-1 card reader
15.6-Inch Full HD (1920x1080) LED Display; Windows 7 Home Premium (64 bit) Operating System

What do you say?

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Um dois três quatro cinco seis sete oito nove dez
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I think you need to decide whether you want a desktop replacement or a portable gaming machine.

Check some reviews out of the systems you're looking at. See what people say, especially with regards to build quality, noise and head - in that order.

Yeah, I know, I'm totally lost. I'm trying to calm down the gamer in me and buy a more reasonable thing.

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Um dois três quatro cinco seis sete oito nove dez
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I'm surprised that Gav didn't bark at the resolution .

I like to check cnet and tom's hardware (I think that's it) for reviews, how good they are for the PC I can't say with confidence, like someone like Gav could.

Quote
Guimengo
I'm surprised that Gav didn't bark at the resolution

Hmm. I hate 16:9 generally, and 1920x1080 would be useless for me personally, but I don't think it would be so bad for a laptop for most. The laptop resolution I hate is 1366x768 (also 16:9). That's a truly horrific resolution. 1280x800 is bad, but 768 vertical pixels is like going back to the dark ages... still 1080 pixels high isn't too bad.

Still, I fancy a rant, so here goes; I don't see how 16:9 is in anyway good for any laptop. If anything we needed more vertical pixels, not less. As I keep saying, you don't gain width with 16:9, you only lose height, and height is infinitely more useful for everything in computers, save watching full screen videos (which is a tiny part of anyone's computing experience).

Gui, I'm as lost as most when it comes to individual laptops. They're fashion items, and as such there's a new one every month. Even the components are difficult to compare - take the Nvidia chips - no-one seems to know how good the 425M above is. It has no relevance to any product before it, and the chips before that were all renames of the series before it. You look at benchmarks, but don't know how much to base the numbers on, as the benchmarks will have been done with different CPUs and RAM.

It's not like the desktop chips, where you benchmark a graphics card against it's brothers and rivals and all on the same system with the same CPU, RAM, motherboard, etc.

From experience with nVidia laptop chips, take "2" numbers down from whatever card they list. Like 8600M is equivalent to 8400, 9800M to 9600, and I'd imagine it's still the same.

Yeah, the problem is there are very little in the way of the 400 series of desktop chips, and complicating the issue somewhat is that the 500M series is just being introduced... which is just a tweaked 400M series.

I'd venture a guess and feel confident in saying it's like the nVidia 200 series which is the weakest of the new re-badged stuff, correct?
Either way, Lex won't be able to build a laptop for cheap and with a better 3D card more suitable to games so he should give up and accept defeat .

Quote
Guimengo
I'd venture a guess and feel confident in saying it's like the nVidia 200 series which is the weakest of the new re-badged stuff, correct?

* Shrugs *

Like I say, it's a bit of an unknown. There's only one site that I know of (Notebookcheck) which has got a decent number of graphics chips to compare numbers for, but you can tell from the almost random difference in different benchmarks that there is a wide-range of performance inconsistencies, so all you can do is look at the numbers and take a bit of a stab in the dark.

It won't be bad... but will it be worthy of an expensive laptop? Even the benchmarks we do have are inconclusive.

As I suggested to Lex in a PM, if I had a gaming PC or console, and were happy with that, I'd stick with it and spend less money on the laptop, which should buy a very good non-gaming laptop, rather than spending a lot on a mid range gaming laptop.

gav schrieb:
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> I'd certainly not say (<lex>the last notebook I posted</lex>) was awesome, as the
> graphics don't appear to be stunning (see my last
> posts in the thread, where I say laptop graphics
> are notoriously difficult to compare), but
> otherwise, from the specs alone, it looks to be an
> excellent laptop (keep in mind the specs don't say
> what it's built like for instance, so you'd best
> be looking at some reviews when you do choose
> one).

Do you think it's good enough for "the games I have", Gui?

Seriously though, I'm not that into the lastest games. Doom 3 is one of the most hardware-intensive games that I enjoy as far as I remember. I'll play Doom 4 for sure, but it's not going to be released soon anyway.


Guimengo schrieb:
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> Either way, Lex won't be able to build a laptop
> for cheap and with a better 3D card more suitable
> to games so he should give up and accept defeat
> .

STFU

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Um dois três quatro cinco seis sete oito nove dez
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One two three four five six seven eight nine ten
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So... I've finally decided what I want:

ASUS N53JF-XE1
- Intel Core i5-460M Processor 2.53GHz with turbo boost up to 2.8GHz
- 4GB of DDR3 1066MHz SDRAM, 2 slots, 8GB Max; Nvidia GT425M graphics with 1GB DDR3 VRAM
- 500GB Hard Drive (7200 RPM); Blu-Ray Combo Drive; Wi-Fi 802.11 bgn
- HDMI Port; USB 3.0 port; 2.0MP Webcam; eSATA; 5-in-1 card reader
- 15.6-Inch Full HD (1920x1080) LED Display; Windows 7 Home Premium (64 bit) Operating System

[www.amazon.com]

And this mouse:

[www.amazon.com]

I should be getting those around January 8th or 9th. As soon as I've had enough time with it, I'll write a short review here.

Thanks for your help and your patience. Not Gui, though.

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