Sager NP9262 - Thoughts and Summary
While we are running a slightly older version of the current NP9262, we can still get it good idea of what the platform offers and what areas might cause potential problems. Besides the size, weight, and heat output - the back of this laptop gets very hot during a gaming session and is definitely not something you would want sitting on your lap - one of our biggest concerns continues to be the state of NVIDIA's SLI drivers for notebooks. Things have certainly improved since we first looked at an SLI notebook, and we even see improvements relative to Dell's XPS M1730 in terms of game compatibility. Considering we are running updated drivers, that makes sense. In fact, when you look at the performance results you will see that SLI improved every gaming benchmark that we ran - and we ran other benchmarks that aren't shown and also saw good scaling with SLI. The problem isn't that SLI notebooks don't offer better performance; the real concern is that getting updated drivers is extremely hit or miss.
If you purchase any laptop that runs a single graphics card, finding up-to-date drivers from the manufacturer can be difficult. We have seen "gaming" notebooks that never updated the drivers after the initial launch. Needless to say, after a year there are certainly a lot of games that don't function properly with the original drivers, but thankfully we have websites like LaptopVideo2Go.com that give users the option to run "hacked" drivers. Sometimes the hacked drivers don't work properly, or performance will be slower in some games. When the official drivers simply fail outright, however, unoptimized performance is better than nothing. And that's where we run into difficulties with SLI notebooks: the hacked drivers almost never work properly with SLI, so you are stuck waiting on the manufacturer/NVIDIA to release new drivers.
We just stated that we didn't notice any problems with SLI performance scaling during our testing, but perhaps part of the reason for that is that we are testing during the slow season of the year. The number of major titles that have been launched in the past six months is relatively small compared to what we expect to see during the fall season, and it remains to be seen whether NVIDIA and their partners can stay on top of mobile driver updates. That's also not to say that we didn't experience a few anomalies, the biggest being that every time the system switches between 2D and 3D graphics (i.e. when you start a game) the LCD flickers on and off for about five seconds. Whether that's because of the changing clock speeds or some other aspect of SLI we don't know; all we know is that we find the delay annoying and it's not something we see on non-SLI notebooks - or SLI desktops for that matter.
Honestly, what we really need is the ability to run reference drivers on SLI laptops - even more so than regular laptops, although that would also be great. We've been told that there are BIOS hooks and other features that notebook manufacturers use that get broken without vendor specific drivers; that may be true, but if so we have to ask why there's any need to use such programming. As far as we're concerned, a top-end gaming notebook needs to be as seamless as a desktop when it comes to updating drivers and running games. Until that happens, we would think very carefully before spending a lot of money on SLI notebook.
The thing is, if you want maximum gaming performance in a notebook, single GPU solutions simply aren't fast enough to run many titles at high resolutions and detail settings. Look at the performance difference between the Alienware m15x and the Sager NP9262 and it's clear that when SLI works properly it can make a world of difference. Moreover, keep in mind that even the fastest notebook graphics chips are still a solid generation behind desktop offerings. The 9800M GTX isn't even the performance equivalent of a desktop 8800 GT 512MB - a card that's almost a year old - never mind the 9800M GTX/GTX+, GTX 260, or GTX 280. If you want to be able to run most upcoming games at 1920x1200 on a notebook without having to turn down detail settings, SLI is currently necessary.
Looking to the future, the NP9262 is about due for an overhaul. Sure, it can run dual-core and quad-core desktop Penryn processors, but Intel is now shipping quad-core chips that are specifically designed for the mobile sector. The current Q9100 and QX9300 might be a bit slower than the desktop parts, and they cost more as well, but they have lower power and thermal requirements. That could allow for smaller designs that still offer lots of performance. Then again, if you like the idea of running three hard drives and SLI in a notebook, smaller notebooks aren't really an option.
As it stands, the NP9262 is the fastest notebook solution you can purchase right now. Sager is one of several companies offering this sort of notebook, with prices that match or beat many of their competitors. For the price, you can get almost twice the performance of the Alienware m15x - and less than half the battery life if you use the m15x's IGP mode. If you want a mobile workstation or a notebook that will turn others green with envy at LAN parties, the NP9262 has what it takes. Just don't be surprised if you get frustrated on occasion with the frequency of graphics driver updates. Even if you don't want to pay $2500 or more for a top-end gaming laptop, Sager is still worth a look, as they have several other laptops catering to the less extreme markets.
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Th3G4mbl3r - Saturday, August 30, 2008 - link
can you also laptop from killernotebook.com into the review as well? they are similar to the sager systems in the sense that they are also custom built based on ODM chassis by Mark from killernotebook. I am keen on looking at some head on comparisons for those with the rest of the field.JarredWalton - Sunday, August 31, 2008 - link
It's difficult to properly evaluate service and support, but since all three companies offer the same Clevo D901C notebook seen in this review, consider this configuration:1920x1200
Q9550
2x9800M GT
2x2GB RAM
3x320GB HDD in RAID 5
Blu-ray Recorder
3-year Warranty
Sager NP9262: $4538.00
AVADirect D901C: $4659
Killer Notebooks Odachi: $5174
There's no ability to select a warranty at KillerNotebooks.com (it's 1-year according to the "About Us" page), and the site layout does not instill confidence. The support section doesn't even list 8800M or 9800M drivers for the Odachi (apparently misspelled "Odach" in various locations). I'm definitely not going to recommend spending $500 or $600 more to get the same notebook with a lesser warranty.
SpacePope - Saturday, August 30, 2008 - link
Thanks for the review, this is a good start. I've been researching gaming laptops myself lately because I plan on buying one soon. From what I've seen so far, the Asus G50V-A2 seems to have the most bang for the buck. Can you add this laptop to the review?Core 2 Duo T9400 2.53Ghz
15.4" WSXGA+ (1680 x 1050)
4GB DDR2
2 x 7200rpm 200GB HD in raid
Blu-ray drive
NVIDIA GeForce 9700M GT (512MB VRAM DDR3)
All for only $1899 on newegg (and I'm sure you can find it on sale somewhere).
Personally, I think alienware is VERY over priced and a horrible value. They even use slower 667Mhz ram and last generation video cards. I've never heard anything good about their customer service. You can easily spend $1000 more on the alienware and get a worse laptop than the Asus. The gateway's are a good deal (and tempting) but I want a 15.4" screen, not 17". Finally, I don't know or trust Sager yet.
JarredWalton - Saturday, August 30, 2008 - link
I've requested a couple ASUS laptops, so we'll see. Outside of the 15.4" part, I'd rate the Gateway higher in every area. However, form factor is a pretty major consideration. I expect the 9700M GT will be around 65-75% of the performance of the P-7811, so with a lower maximum resolution it should run pretty well.As for Sager, they have been selling laptops (with a moderate focus on enthusiast models) for over 20 years - since 1985. I would have no problem recommending them as a company. As such, the NP2096 is one option (15.4" 1680x1050, 9600M GT, P9500 CPU, 4GB RAM, and 320GB HDD for ~$1550). For more gaming performance, check out the NP8660. It's more expensive than the ASUS, the the 9800M GT is about twice as fast as the 9700M GT I'd guess. It actually looks quite similar to the m15x in terms of specs, for a lot less money. $2300 for a nearly top-end config. Too bad there's no Smart Bay battery, and I don't know if you can disable the discrete GPU.
Voldenuit - Friday, August 29, 2008 - link
" this is the first laptop we've tested that includes the option to shut off the discrete graphics and use integrated graphics."Cough. A bit behind the times on laptops, are we? Several Asus and Sony models have featured this already, going back as far as 2 years ago.
The Montevina refresh to the thinkpad T series (T400, T500) allow you to switch between integrated and discrete (Radeon 36xx) graphics on-the-fly in Vista. Now we're talkin'!
JarredWalton - Friday, August 29, 2008 - link
"first laptop we've tested" says it all. I know perfectly well that others have done it, and I mention (repeatedly) that the Centrino 2 offerings are supposed to improve that functionality. Now I just need to get the appropriate companies to send laptops for review, which is always the difficult part. Still, the feature is far more useful IMO when you're using it with high-end GPUs. Switching between 8400M and IGP isn't as critical as switching between 8800M/9800M and IGP.Jumpman23 - Friday, August 29, 2008 - link
Another great "budget" gaming laptop would be the Asus G50V. The specs show the price to performance ratio is very good and comes equipped with 9700M GT. I would love to see a review on it.yyrkoon - Friday, August 29, 2008 - link
I would like to mention that the Sager seems to use close to what A 'medium power' Desktop would use for power consumption(minus the monitor). That is *if* these figures you're showing are accurate compared to my readings (or vice versa).Let me define a 'medium power' desktop system:
ABIT IP35-E
Intel E6550 @ 2.8Ghz
2x2GB A-DATA 1.8v DDR2-800
eVGA 9600GT 512MB
1x DVD/CD burner(Liteon if applicable)
4x HDDs (all Seagate if applicable)
Antec Earthwatts 500
Again, to be fair, what I measured was just the hardware in the case, so there are no LCD/CRT monitor figures counted in. At idle the above system uses 124-125W. while web surfing and doing other non intensive tasks the system above uses 128W-135W. With a full load on the CPU using orthos for an hour with 2 threads running(100% CPU load), this system uses 171-174W. In World of conflict, using the in game benchmark with everything maxed(no AA or AF) this machine has peaked up to 215W. Running the same benchmark with the game output limited to 30FPS uses only 195W peak, but mostly between 185-190W.
World in conflict I have noticed so far can use by far the most power while gaming. Games such as Hellgate: London, and FEAR use around 180-195W(everything maxed).
As a kind of interesting side comparison I checked the older card I used before the 9600 GT (eVGA 7600 GT KO edition) peak idle was 106w, while peak gaming was 168W. Much lower than I had anticipated. Granted the 9600GT is also lower in power usage than I had originally thought based on reviews, and about twice as fast as the 7600 GT in most games.
Now I am very interested in how much power the new Intel mini ITX board, with x4500HD graphics and a reasonably powered desktop CPU would use. You hearing me Jarred? Derrick ? Anand ?! Would be nice if you guys could find out for all of us ; ) Something tells me that it'll only be marginally lower in power consumption though . . .
yyrkoon - Friday, August 29, 2008 - link
Monitor I use is a 19" widescreen LCD. Native resolution of 1440x900, so that is the resolution I tend to play games in. All of my figures are based on a 1440x900 resolution(for what it is worth).JarredWalton - Friday, August 29, 2008 - link
I think Gary will have an X4500 article up next week. Don't quote me on that, as I know Gary and Anand have run into quite a few issues with the G45 testing, but it's not for lack of trying.As for power requirements, I figure the LCD is using between 10W and 20W of power, and while it might be using as much power as your midrange desktop, it also happens to be faster. You'd need 9600 GT SLI at the very least (~equal performance), or 8800 GT SLI (faster performance).
The other item that we don't know is power supply/power brick efficiency. If they're both 80% efficient, that's one thing, but if the laptop is 70% efficient and your desktop is 80% efficient, that could account for another 20W or so. Anyway, since this *is* a desktop replacement, it's not too surprising that the power requirements extend into desktop territory.