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Best Gaming Laptop up to $2,000.00

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Looking to buy a good gaming laptop. Will be using for Farm Simulator 2013 and the new Farm Simulator 2015. I'm a truck driver and I'm out 8 to 10 weeks at a time. Looking for the best bang for the buck.
 
Do you care about the size of the laptop or anything like that? I ask for based off the specs this should be an easy game to play. Any other games do you play?

Farm Simulator

Minimum:
OS: Microsoft Windows Vista, Windows 7 or Windows 8
Processor: 2.0 GHz Intel or equal AMD-Processor
Memory: 2 GB RAM
Graphics: Nvidia Geforce 8600, ATI Radeon X2600 or higher (min. 512 MB VRAM)
Network: Broadband Internet connection
Hard Drive: 2 GB available space
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I ask for a 5 or 6 lb laptop will be easily able to play this game for a 5 or 6 lb laptop with nvidia 860m gtx has a graphic card that is about 9 times faster than the x2600 desktop card. (x2600 is faster than the Geforce 8600). The 860m gtx is the bare minimum I would look for in a gaming laptop with the primary purpose is gaming. Not saying you do not need that much power, but that is such an awesome amount of power, with good thermals, battery life, price, etc that it is the card you compare everything else to with gaming laptops.

Yet a laptop with a nvidia 880m gtx will be about 15 times faster than the x2600 desktop card. But then we are talking a huge laptop something about 9.5 lbs for an alienware 17 and 12 lbs for an alienware 18 and these weights are before the 1 or 2 lb power brick, and you will be wanting to carry around the power brick as well. We are making substantial (such as weight and price) trade offs to get that roughly 60% higher graphic performance

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Also do you care about spending less if you can get a product that is 75% as good or 90% as good but substantially cheaper. $2000 is a lot of money, you can get a really nice laptop with this kind of money. Yet there will be a point where it does not matter how fast of computer you have, for your power is so great that not even the screen can keep up.
 
Size and weight does not matter. The new 2015 I'm sure will need much more horsepower than 13 does. I have been looking at MSI and Asus but it looks like I can get more from MSI for the money and also a better warranty. I also like FSX flight simulator which is a power hungry monster. I want a good machine as this will possibly be my last laptop that I buy. I'm 63 and hope to retire in 4 more years. I can afford it but want a powerful and good solid Laptop. Thanks for your response and any other suggestions would be very appreciated.
 
The requirements I posted are from Steam for 2015. I could not find a recommend requirements but only the minimum requirements. That said an 860m gtx is about 9 times faster than the minimum requirements.

Whatever laptop you get I would recommend making sure it has the following

* 2 or 3 year warranty, either in the original price or added after the fact.
* 1080p screen. Preferably IPS, PLS, VA, etc. Some type of good technology with accurate color and accurate viewing angles.
* Intel core i7 quad core 4th gen. The ghz do not matter that much for the best ones are only marginally faster, so just go with the cheap i7 quad core.
* 860m gtx or faster
* SSD or a serious cache drive (60gbs or higher) preferably a real ssd. Note upgrading it yourself often voids warranties, this is stupid, but this is how most of the time it works.
* 8gbs of ram, anything else is just for ego and not for real performance increase

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I do like ASUS and MSI as well. That said no matter which one I would stress a warranty.

Alienware m17 is the gold standard, but it is also far more expensive for a similar laptop of Asus or MSI.

If I have any time upcomming (I am busy but trying to also find some time to relax) I will try to find you a good deal or two.

This is the type of Laptop I Like. It seems to do the balancing job very well.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/8267/msi-ge60-review-mainstream-mobile-maxwell

Only thing that laptop needs is a ssd.

If this is the same panel as the one in the review then it would be a great deal. I do not know what panel is the one I linked to. I can find out but currently I am busy.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834152567

Note not all MSI GS have pls (aka a nice screen that is a variant of ips). Some have the cheaper screens called twisted nematic (tn), they can have these screens even if they are 1080p. You can easily find this info not on the manufacturer's website but by copying the model number and searching forums, for the people that buys these laptops care very much that they are getting a good screen.

Comes with a 2 year warranty. I would keep the laptop as it is, or maybe an accidental warranty added to the cost.
 
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I'm sure you could find a more recent one like mine for under $2k. I think I paid $1900 or so a year ago. If you don't need that much cpu and gpu, then look at the other MSI models like stated above.
 
HOSED said:
Sager is another viable option - http://www.gentechpc.com/config.asp?config_id=Sager%5FNP8278%2DS Win 7 or 8, a plethora of storage options and very capable base configuration
Personally I would delete the mSATA drive and upgrade the primary storage to at least a 500 GB SSD
Best of luck with whatever you choose.
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Many but not all the sagers are msi models and vice versa. That said they may share the chassis/frame but they will have different screens and different cpu, ram, hard drive options.
 
I always thought Clevo was the base computer from which Sager, system 76, AvaDirect, etc were built on. Thanks!
PS I have seen a few customer service horror stories about buying direct from Clevo so I do not recommend direct purchase from them. GentechPC has great C.S.
 
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HOSED said:
I always thought Clevo was the base computer from which Sager, system 76, AvaDirect, etc were built on. Thanks!
PS I have seen a few customer service horror stories about buying direct from Clevo so I do not recommend direct purchase from them. GentechPC has great C.S.
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I appear to be wrong and misspoke. Sager uses only Clevo designs. It is the dozen other custom boutique dealers (such as avadirect) that sometimes uses MSI designs and sometimes use Clevo designs.

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MSI is both an ODM and an OEM. Clevo is both an ODM and an OEM.

Sager is an ODM not for other companies but for the customer.

OEM means the original company builds a product that they get to dream up, and then you get to sell those devices to other people. If an OEM sells to another company that company may relabel the product and call it whatever name they want.

ODM means you build a product that is based off the design requirements of a customer or company, you may have complete control in the designing (as long as it meets the requirements) and thus use a common design, or you may have to do everything custom to make the customer/company happy.

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Think of it like this, if its in a big box store you are buying from an OEM.

If you are going to a machinists and say I want you to build X from scratch you are talking to an ODM

If you go to a website and custom build a computer you can be talking to an ODM who will make that computer unique for you, or you can be talking to an OEM that has a set number of plus and you are just ordering one of those plus from their stock.
 
Just ordered a Clevo 13.3" with an i7 4710mq with a 1080p screen and 1TB sata III (will use for storage)...the prices on these machines with a full power i7 (not the i7 mobile ones that end with 'u' ) are much better than an alienware 14 or razorblade ($$$). The feedback on the owners forum on notebookreview for this model are very good as well...

I ordered a 256 GB msata drive on Amazon and have two x 8GB 1600 Geil sticks that I will use. This machine should be a decent road warrior beast for me...
 
If you are a fan of Macintosh you could have gotten a Macbook Pro with Parallels, they display graphics very well and generally last for long periods of time with casual to hardcore use.

My next buy will be one of those.
 
I'm in the same boat as you, I've been mostly looking at the Ibuypower.com website, they seem to be the cheapest that I've found and will let you put windows 7 on it and also have raid-0 ssd options. I don't really know what the build quality would be though on their non-MSI Laptop.

Here is the link to the page.

http://www.ibuypower.com/Site/Gaming-Laptop
 
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