Need New Laptop Recommendations

[Durvelle27]

1. What YOUR PC will be used for: College, gaming, light rendering, multitasking, and HD Video Playback

2. What YOUR budget is: Less Than $1,000 but the cheaper the better

3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from: US

4. N/A

5. IF YOU have a brand preference: Doesn't matter

6. N/A

7. N/A

8. What resolution: Most likely 1920x1080

9. N/A

The most important thing is the pc will be for school so it has to be portable



Was looking at this for $919

XPLORER X7-7600 GAMING NOTEBOOK

CPU: Intel® Core™ i7-3630QM Mobile Processor 2.40 GHz 6M Smart Cache, Max Turbo Freq. 3.40 GHz
HDD: 750GB 7200RPM SATA300 Hard Drive
MEMORY: 8GB (8GBx1) DDR3-1333 SODIMM Memory (Corsair or Major Brand)
MOTHERBOARD: Mobile Intel HM77 Express Chipset Mainboard
SOUND: Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-Fi Go! Pro External Sound Card w/ THX TruStudio & EAX 5.0 [+0]
VIDEO: NVIDIA GTX 660M 2GB PCIe Video (NB-376-101)

 

[frozentundra123456]

1. What YOUR PC will be used for: College, gaming, light rendering, multitasking, and HD Video Playback

2. What YOUR budget is: Less Than $1,000 but the cheaper the better

3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from: US

4. N/A

5. IF YOU have a brand preference: Doesn't matter

6. N/A

7. N/A

8. What resolution: Most likely 1920x1080

9. N/A

The most important thing is the pc will be for school so it has to be portable



Was looking at this for $919

XPLORER X7-7600 GAMING NOTEBOOK

CPU: Intel® Core™ i7-3630QM Mobile Processor 2.40 GHz 6M Smart Cache, Max Turbo Freq. 3.40 GHz
HDD: 750GB 7200RPM SATA300 Hard Drive
MEMORY: 8GB (8GBx1) DDR3-1333 SODIMM Memory (Corsair or Major Brand)
MOTHERBOARD: Mobile Intel HM77 Express Chipset Mainboard
SOUND: Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-Fi Go! Pro External Sound Card w/ THX TruStudio & EAX 5.0 [+0]
VIDEO: NVIDIA GTX 660M 2GB PCIe Video (NB-376-101)

That looks like a nice notebook for moderate gaming, and the price is right. Is it a 15 inch?

I dont know what you consider as "portable", but 15 in or larger is borderline IMO if you mean something you would carry around all day from class to class. I have a 15in laptop for my work, and it is "portable" in the sense that I carry it home to work there or to another lab, but it would be very unwieldy to carry around all day in a backpack from class to class.

 

[Sleepingforest]

Are you sure you can't upgrade your desktop with part of that budget and get a dedicated not-for-gaming-just-for-notes notebook? Gaming's not something that becomes portable well.

 

[It's Not Lupus]

Retina Macbook 15"

 

[Durvelle27]

That looks like a nice notebook for moderate gaming, and the price is right. Is it a 15 inch?

I dont know what you consider as "portable", but 15 in or larger is borderline IMO if you mean something you would carry around all day from class to class. I have a 15in laptop for my work, and it is "portable" in the sense that I carry it home to work there or to another lab, but it would be very unwieldy to carry around all day in a backpack from class to class.

its 17.6" 1920x1080 and i would think its portable as it can be carried around

 

[Durvelle27]

Are you sure you can't upgrade your desktop with part of that budget and get a dedicated not-for-gaming-just-for-notes notebook? Gaming's not something that becomes portable well.

i could any recommendations i found a

Dell Inspiron 15R for $499

SYSTEM: Inspiron 15R Notebook (Inspiron 5521)
OPERATING SYSTEM: Windows 8, 64-bit, English
PROCESSOR : 3rd Generation Intel® Core™ i5-3337U processor (3M Cache, up to 2.7 GHz)
MEMORY: 6GB Dual Channel DDR3 1600MHz
HARD DRIVE : 500GB 5400 RPM Hard Drive
VIDEO CARD: Intel® HD Graphics
INTERNAL OPTICAL DRIVE: 8X CD / DVD Burner (Dual Layer DVD+/-R Drive)
TOUCH DISPLAY: 15.6 HD (720p) WLED with Truelife (1366x768)
WIRELESS CARDS: Intel® Centrino® Wireless 2230, 2x2 bgn + Bluetooth
SOUND: Waves MaxxAudio 4
KEYBOARD: Dell Chiclet Keyboard with Multi-touch Touchpad, US English
POWER CORD: Power Cord, 125V, 1M, US
ADOBE & ENTERTAINMENT: Digital Delivery Enablement
WIRELESS DRIVE: Intel Wireless SRV SW, 2230
Primary Battery: 6-Cell, 65WHR, Primary Battery
SYSTEM COLOR: Moon Silver
Packaging Shipping Material, Direct
Optical Drive Software Cyberlink Media Suite Essentials DVD
CFI Included CFI Not Included
WiDi Wireless Display Application
Non-Microsoft Application Software NB & DT w/Webcam
ADDITIONAL SETTINGS PocketCloud Companion, Standard, Digital Delivery

 

[Durvelle27]

another for $388


HP Sparkling Black 17.3" Pavilion G7-2269wm


Platform: PC
Condition: New
Primary Color: Black
Processor Brand: AMD
Processor Type: AMD Quad-Core A8-4500M Accelerated Processor
Processor Speed: 1.90 GHz, with a Max Turbo Speed of 2.80 GHz
System Ram: 6 GB
Hard Drive Size: 500 GB
Laptop Screen Size: 17.3 inch
Screen Type: LED Backlight, HD+ BrightView Display
Resolution: 1600 x 900
Graphics Card: AMD Radeon HD 7640G with 3053MB
Multi Media Drive: SuperMulti DVD Burner
Card Reader Type: 2-in-1 card reader 1 x (SD Memory Card), 1 x (MultiMediaCard)
Battery Life: 4 hours 30 minutes
Battery Type: Lithium Ion
Network Connection: 10/100 Fast Ethernet & 802.11b/g/n Wireless LAN
Connector Type: 1 x DC-in, 1 x Ethernet, 1 x HDMI, 1 x Headphone, 1 x Microphone, 1 x USB 2.0, 2 x USB 3.0, 1 x VGA
Operating System: Windows 8
Accessories Included: Power Cord,Battery
Model No.: g7-2269wm

 

[mfenn]

its 17.6" 1920x1080 and i would think its portable as it can be carried around

There's portable and then there's transportable. A 17" laptop is transportable, i.e. you can move it around without having to disassemble it. It is not portable in the sense that you can actually use it on the go.

 

[Sleepingforest]

In my opinion: Spring for a Vizio Thin+Light 14". It comes with a touchscreen and Win8 (which is not too bad; remember to disable the touchpad in the drivers though), as well as a 128GB SSD for $670. This is the option I would personally go for if you're looking for portable.

Alternatively, if you really need portable gaming, you could get a 15" IdeaPad Y400 with a GT 750M (it'll play pretty much everything on high and maybe even get some AA in 2010ish or older games). Grab an extra battery, since a single one probably won't last the whole day. As you can see, this is much less portable just to accommodate some "mobile" gaming.

Then use the roughly $200 you have left to sell your 7870 and get a 7970.

That's just about the best of both worlds.

 

[Durvelle27]

In my opinion: Spring for a Vizio Thin+Light 14". It comes with a touchscreen and Win8 (which is not too bad; remember to disable the touchpad in the drivers though), as well as a 128GB SSD for $670. This is the option I would personally go for if you're looking for portable.

Alternatively, if you really need portable gaming, you could get a 15" IdeaPad Y400 with a GT 750M (it'll play pretty much everything on high and maybe even get some AA in 2010ish or older games). Grab an extra battery, since a single one probably won't last the whole day. As you can see, this is much less portable just to accommodate some "mobile" gaming.

Then use the roughly $200 you have left to sell your 7870 and get a 7970.

That's just about the best of both worlds.

Did you see my last post

 

[Sleepingforest]

Did you see my last post

You won't need nearly so much to upgrade your PC, so you might as well get a $600-700 laptop. You get significantly more for the upgrade (either a WAY stronger GPU or a very good screen, battery life, and an SSD).

 

[Durvelle27]

You won't need nearly so much to upgrade your PC, so you might as well get a $600-700 laptop. You get significantly more for the upgrade (either a WAY stronger GPU or a very good screen, battery life, and an SSD).

the laptop i posted for $388 has a SSD+HDD. Good GPU (HD 7640G), and HD screen

Edit: Looked up the Vizio laptop and it has only 128GB storage, 4GB Ram, and Intel HD 4000 which isn't that much over the AMD Laptop i posted on

 

[Sleepingforest]

the laptop i posted for $388 has a SSD+HDD. Good GPU (HD 7640G), and HD screen

Edit: Looked up the Vizio laptop and it has only 128GB storage, 4GB Ram, and Intel HD 4000 which isn't that much over the AMD Laptop i posted on

That GPU isn't nearly as good as the 750M; for gaming purposes, it's as bad as the HD 4000 (because both are basically unplayable). 1600x900 is not even close to 1080p, especially when compared at 14" vs 17". It's also got much lower battery life.

I mean, the battery life and weight are going to be the biggest factors in a note-taking laptop. I'd much rather take the Thin+Light, or even the Dell laptop you posted, simply because they does that better.

Check out Anandtech's recommended thin and light laptops. The Dell is mentioned at the low end. The Vizio Thin+Light is Anandtechs' budget ultrabook recommendation.

 

[Durvelle27]

OK thx portability is the number one thing


ok so lets try going cheaper than like sub $500 and the rest of the cash will go on my desktop

 

[Durvelle27]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834230975

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834131275

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834230909

 

[Durvelle27]

Will add this if it doesn't already have one

Crucial M4 CT064M4SSD3 mSATA 64GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820148611

 

[Sleepingforest]

Unfortunately, you can't just throw parts into a laptop; you either have to replace the old HDD completely, or you have to get an optical-to-drive-sled converter. The SSD also needs to be a certain thickness (7mm I believe.)

 

[Durvelle27]

Just came across these at Bestbuy

HP Pavilion 17.3" G7-2251dx $149.99

Product Number D0M25UA
Microprocessor 1.9GHz up to 2.8GHz AMD Quad-Core A8-4500M Accelerated Processor
Microprocessor Cache 4MB L2 Cache
Memory 4GB DDR3 SDRAM (1 DIMM)
Memory Slots 2 user accessible
Video Graphics AMD Radeon HD 7640G Discrete-Class graphics and up to 2029MB total graphics memory
Display 17.3-inch diagonal HD+ BrightView LED-backlit display (1600 x 900)
Hard Drive 500GB 5400RPM hard drive with HP ProtectSmart Hard Drive Protection
Multimedia Drive SuperMulti DVD burner
Network Card 10/100BASE-T Ethernet LAN (RJ-45 connector)
Wireless Connectivity 1x1 802.11b/g/n WLAN
Sound Altec Lansing dual speakers with Dolby Advanced Audio
Keyboard Full-size island-style keyboard with numeric keypad
Pointing Device Touchpad supporting multi-touch gestures with on/off button
External Ports Multi-Format Digital Media Card Reader for Secure Digital cards & Multimedia cards
Dimensions 1.22 in (min H)/1.45 in (max H) x 16.22 in (W) x 10.53 in (D)
Weight 6.57 lb
Power 65W AC adapter

6-cell 47WHr 2.2 Ah lithium-ion battery
ID Mech Description HP TrueVision HD Webcam with integrated dual array digital microphone




ASUS K55NRF-BA8 $159.99

Product Number K55NRF-BA8
Microprocessor 1.9GHz up to 2.8GHz AMD Quad-Core A8-4500M Accelerated Processor
Microprocessor Cache 4MB L2 Cache
Memory 4GB DDR3 SDRAM (1 DIMM)
Memory Slots 2 user accessible
Video Graphics AMD Radeon HD 7640G Discrete-Class graphics and up to 2029MB total graphics memory
Display 15.6-inch diagonal HD+ BrightView LED-backlit display (1366x768)
Hard Drive 500GB 5400RPM hard drive
Multimedia Drive SuperMulti DVD burner
Network Card 10/100BASE-T Ethernet LAN (RJ-45 connector)
Wireless Connectivity 1x1 802.11b/g/n WLAN
Sound Altec Lansing dual speakers with Dolby Advanced Audio
Keyboard Full-size island-style keyboard with numeric keypad
Pointing Device Touchpad supporting multi-touch gestures with on/off button
External Ports Multi-Format Digital Media Card Reader for Secure Digital cards & Multimedia cards
Weight 5.5 lbs
TrueVision HD Webcam with integrated dual array digital microphone



Edit: @sleepingforest Yes i know

 

[mfenn]

Holy crap, $150? Might as well for that price!

 

[Durvelle27]

Holy crap, $150? Might as well for that price!

That's what i thought as that price can't be beaten which also gives me money to add a SSD, another 4GB of RAM, and get my Desktop a new graphics card