WTB: $600 -$800 Skyrim (and online) notebook/laptop.

[kyleis]

Any suggestions??

The breakdown:
Price is the biggest factor ($600 -$800), and of course I want the best for the least.
Main goal: Asus Pref, Play Skyrim and the upcoming online game version on at least medium quality settings, with hopefully higher quality graphics. Other wants: Full keyboard/numeric key pad, glowing keyboard if possible, minimum 3 USB ports, pref 4+. Also, hoping for something not too noisy. Weight is also a factor, not wanting to carry around a brick. Have looked at the Asus. s56cm dh51. Love the weight. Love the metal chassis. Prefer 17 inch screen, but likely can only afford 15". Would hope to have Blue ray. That might not be likely. Prefer ASUS, but with enough recommendations might consider other high contenders. HP, and other ‘built to fail” machines are right out. Dell?? No thanks. Seen too many cracked screen issues.. actually.. on every dell I’ve ever seen over a year old.
WTB: $600 -$800 Skyrim (and online) notebook/laptop. Have looked at: Asus s56cm dh51, want something comparable or better. Waiting for the Boxing Week sales.

1.
2. What is your budget? $600 -$800

2. What is the size of the notebook that you are considering? 15.5 – 17. Price /performance matters most.

3. What screen resolution do you want? As good as possible within pricing point. I"m a so called "beggar here". Can't be too choosey. Might be open to financing.

4. Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop? Need work/gaming laptop.

5. How much battery life do you need? As much as possible, but will mostly have access to power most of the time.

6. Do you want to play games with your laptop? If so then please list the games that you want to with the settings that you want for these games. (Low,Medium or High)? Would love High performance Skyrim, (and similar RPG's) but likely can’t afford it. Also want to play the online version due out next year.

7. What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo/Video editing, Etc.) Occasional photo CS5 editing. Some Lightroom. Mostly Office /surfing use honestly.

8. How much storage (Hard Drive capacity) do you need? 500+. Okay to rely mostly on externals,

9. If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post their links.
3. http/www.canadacomputers.com
4. www.tigerdirect.ca/
open to other suggestions!
5. ***prefer the full company 2year warrant w/out re-buying it through store


10. How long do you want to keep your laptop? Lol forever/Till it can't run the next game I want to play.

11. What kind of Optical drive do you need? DVD ROM/Writer,Bluray ROM/Writer,Etc ? DVD Writer minimum. Shocked to find the Asus s56cm dh51 has no blue ray. WTF? would love BR, but back to $$. May upgrade later.

12. Please tell us about the brands that you prefer to buy from them and the brands that you don't like and explain the reasons. Asus – quality reputation. HP – The opposite. Acer – had as my laptop. After 2 years, simply plugging in a simple USB MP3 player completely, instantly, fried the entire machine. WTF!!!!!!!!!!!

13. What country do you live in? Canada, Ontario, Toronto.

14. Please tell us any additional information if needed. My main decision for buying this, aside from working in libraries on resumes/office skills, is for Skyrim, and the upcoming online version.

I hope this can help people find their ideal notebook. I hope you can too! Thanks!
THANK YOU EVERYONE!!

IF anyone has the s56cm dh51. and plays Skyrim, or otherwise, how do you like it? Any regrets?

 

[KernalPanic]

The 635m in the s56cm dh51 is essentially a rebranded 555m. Thus you'd probably be using medium details for Skyrim at 720p or so.
http/www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GT-635M.66964.0.html
The Asus also sports 2-core U-series processors.

Its a nice laptop, it just sacrifices performance to be thinner and lighter.


if you haven't checked out the Lenovo Y500 yet, its worth a look.
http/shop.lenovo.com/ca/en/products/laptops/ideapad/y-series/y500/index.html

It's at the top of your budget, but sports a full quad-core i7, 650m, and is capable of SLI 650m with the right ultrabay and power supply. (the $800 model I linked will not have either)

A 650m is capable of 40+ fps on default high detail settings,
http/www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GT-650M.71887.0.html

Then again, the Y500 is about a pound heavier.


A reminder that notebookcheck benchmarks are about as slow as the laptop will ever go. If you can handle updating drivers, unloading bloatware, and tweaking settings beyond defaults, you probably can do better.

 

[kyleis]

Thanks KernalPanic (nice handle..)

So.. I`m somewhere between beginner and.. slightly better than beginner at all this stuff.
The crazy thing I`d like to know.. when I was in one of the stores.. the sales guy was trying to tell me that the i7`s had minimal performance improvement over the i5, and compared the notebook version to an i3 on a desktop..

Was it pure slander... ? Perhaps he didn't have the i7 in store? Sounded pretty ridiculous to me...

 

[Pyree]

Yes the laptop i5 performance is similar to a desktop i3 in performance.

Yes i7 had minimal performance gain over i5 for games for desktops.

But for laptop it is different since laptop i5's are 2 core with HT and i7 are true 4 core.

Games that uses all 4 core will be much better on i7 on a laptop.

Don't always trust sales person. I often find them to be just n00bs.

 

[KernalPanic]

Thanks KernalPanic (nice handle..)

So.. I`m somewhere between beginner and.. slightly better than beginner at all this stuff.
The crazy thing I`d like to know.. when I was in one of the stores.. the sales guy was trying to tell me that the i7`s had minimal performance improvement over the i5, and compared the notebook version to an i3 on a desktop..

Was it pure slander... ? Perhaps he didn't have the i7 in store? Sounded pretty ridiculous to me...

Thanks, I like my handle too.

The salesperson was just trying to sell you something.

Pyree is correct the mobile i5 is dual-core.
Most non-U-series i7's are quad-core.

You can look up the stats at Intel if you want.
http/ark.intel.com/products/64895/Intel-Core-i5-3360M-Processor-3M-Cache-up-to-3_50-GHz

As a rule, laptop hardware is a step behind desktop performance due simply to space and heat requirements.

 

[kyleis]

Best answer selected by kyleis.

 

[Pyree]

This topic has been closed by Pyree