New Laptop

[Demon Cleaner]

I was considering buying a new laptop, and my choice fell on the Schenker XMG P705. It will basically for gaming.

The P705 model got very good reviews, and the little brother, the P505, which is basically the same, only in 15", ranks 1st on Notebookcheck's lightweight mobile gaming list of May 2015, which is updated everytime they review a new laptop.

I'm following their laptops since some years now, and I like the fact that you can configure them to your liking. I never was really a big fan of their Clevo based chassis, but I have to say that I like the new model of the PRO versions. It's ligther and lower compared to other gaming laptops, 3,2kg and only 30mm in height. But because of that, the configuration is a bit limited, the motherboard doesn't have a socket for the CPU, therefore you have to go with the only CPU available (the HQ model), which is soldered to the mobo.

The only CPU you can get for it is the Intel Core i7-4720HQ (2,60 - 3,60GHz 6MB 47W), it's the 4th generation of their CPUs called Haswell.

For the GPU you can chose between the newest NVIDIA GeForce GTX (965M, 970M, 980M), where I would put the 970M, price is only 135€ more than the 965M, but already about 30% more power. Plus it comes with a code to download The Witcher 3, which is a nice addition anyway. The price for the 980M is 417€, which is definitely too much.

As HDD I would put a 250GB SSD, and they have a special offer, if you buy an SDD from Crucial, you get a discount of 100€, but only until tomorrow evening, thus I have to decide fast. As second HDD I will just put a WD Blue slim (5.400RPM). Btw, this laptop can hold 2 SDD plus 2 HDD, but I don't need that, using an external drive with my stuff anyway, so it's not needed.

The screen seems to be good, it's a non glare 17.3" Full HD (1920×1080) CHIMEI N173HGE-L11, although not an IPS, but apperently this exact screen is used by a lot of companies. They have an option for the LG LP173WF4-SPD1, which is an IPS, has better color, but less good contrast and black level, plus it's 125€ more expensive. The CHIMEI has also a matte surface, which is less affected by reflections.

For Wi-Fi you can have dual band plus bluetooth, but again because of the slimmer case, there is no place for a DVD/BD drive, which I don't need anyway.

Which is nice for me, you get to chose the layout of the keyboard, and as we use swiss/french layouts in Luxembourg, it's way more comfortable than having a german one.

With RAM I'm bit puzzled, whether to get 16GB, or just stick with 8GB, which will probably be enough for gaming. Although the price difference is only 90€. RAM is also from Crucial.

With that configuration it would cost me around 1.850€ (with 8GB RAM), which is in my opinion a good price for these specs, I checked, like always, Alienware, and they are still far more expensive, and other brands are not configurable at all. Shipping will be almost 60€, which is quite steep, but I also will get the 100€ off, so at the moment it would cost 1.810€ (8GB version), and I don't want to spent more than 2.000€.

Bigger SSD (500GB) is f.ex. 122€ more, do I need it? IPS screen? 8GB or 16GB? There's not so much to change anyway.

So what do you think? Any opinions?

[Tiago]

Hi Demon, my laptop was around 1000 euros (Toshiba Satellite P50-A-12Z) here in Portugal, last year. I prefer laptops over standard dektop PC. To work, even for games. I usually can't play games at full specs, but 1366x768 graphics are nice. My screen is 15.6" and it display 1980x1080 but for games is a bit hard to do it.... to work, is fine!

8GB is good for everyday work. I use photoshop, a bit of video editing, and i have no problems. My i7 is fast, not the fastest sure, but quite good.
the 17.3" monitor should be good for 1980x1080, but if a game is to heavy and you need to go to lower resolutions, will the image be good?
I guess it is optimized for fullhd, so how is handles in lower ones?

But that one looks a good computer.



But i wounder but PC (desktop) would you buy with that amount... you could get a better game machine... but ok, i understand, i also don't like desktops.

Don't forget to see witch side the air flow goes out. It you are right handle with mouse and the air get's out that side, can be a pain in summer...
Mine is in right side, same as mouse, and i tend to run away from it. Less then 25cm playing a high specs game almost burn my hand...

[Harrison]

Indeed it is. Doesn't time fly!

[Demon Cleaner]

So is the GTX980 worth the 300€ more over the GTX970?

So far I read it's about 28% faster.

[Teho]

Is there a point to getting the most expensive high-end cards these days unless you have 4k screen and insist on +100Hz? Would think they're overkill on anything else.

[Demon Cleaner]

Thought the same.

[Kin Hell]

Indeed it is. Doesn't time fly!

Heck fella, indeed it does.

Is there a point to getting the most expensive high-end cards these days unless you have 4k screen and insist on +100Hz? Would think they're overkill on anything else.

I sort of understand where you are, but I feel I have to express my feelings about this too, so please bear with me.

I upgraded from 3 x GTX670's to 2 x GTX780Ti's. @ the time I did this, GTX980 was just out by approx 8 weeks & the 780Ti prices fell through the floor. I got two of them for £600 instead of £1300 when they were in their prime. However, I also ended up with 2880 Stream processors on one card over the 2304 on the GTX780, compared to 1344 Stream processors on each of the 3 x GTX670's.
WOW!! - what a difference on my 120Hz LG W2363D Monitor. 5760 Stream processors on SLI instead of 4032 on Tr-SLI & a 384 Bit Memory bus instead of a 256 Bit bus on the 670's. It meant that Far Cry 4 could be put in ULTRA settings & holds 120FPS @ 1920 x 1080 no matter how busy it all gets. Simply put, it's "Buttery Smooth" & 384 Bit Memory bus is a huge help over 256 Bit, coupled with even more Stream processors.

Quite breathtaking in so many ways, but as far as I am concerned, no way would I want to kill my rig by putting a 4k monitor on it.
For those who might be concerned at this statement, a 4k monitor has a resolution of 3840 x 2160 (exactly 4 x 1920 x 1080 screens) so if I said my average FPS on one resolution of 1920 x 1080 was 120, I'd be in the realms of 30fps per monitor, less any overheads the cards have to deal with by outputting such a high res.
However, if you had a 4k G-Sync monitor in place, the G-Sync would help keep things smooth. This is a technology I have had no personal experience with yet, but the reviews are quite promising. I beleive Acer are now doing a 27" IPS Panel with G-Sync, though it's G2G is still a poor 4ms. Not sure how G-Sync will cope with that & @ nearlly £700, I'm almost tempted to have one if the 4ms G2G is un-noticeable. *cough*

It's perhaps a little unfortunate, but we all have different perspectives and perceptions of what really does look & feel good. In my books, 2 x GTX980's will struggle to run 4k screens because of the lack VRAM & number of Stream processors. You really need to be in the realms of "Titan X" & 12GB of Ram for those screens & then throw at least two of them in SLI for a half decent experience @ this res.

Graphics in Laptop's are no where near as powerful as their Bigger sisters on the PC platform & bang per buck, Laptops are grossly overpriced, but.....

It really depends how much spare money you have in your wallet & can you justify it by seeing & feeling a difference.

[Demon Cleaner]

Graphics in Laptop's are no where near as powerful as their Bigger sisters on the PC platform & bang per buck, Laptops are grossly overpriced, but.....

Also because of the power supply, which in my case would be 180W (150W if you get the GTX965M).

Anyway, the screen is definitely no 4k, it's just a normal Full HD.