Holiday Buyer's Guide: Notebooks
by Dustin Sklavos on November 15, 2010 9:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Laptops
- Guides
- Holiday 2010
Best Gaming Notebook: ASUS G73Jh/G73Jw ($1635/$1700)
The ASUS G73 comes in two flavors: the G73Jw and the G73Jh. Either one of these is awesome. Let us explain.
Prior to the G73, ASUS' gaming notebooks were potent but noisy, hot, and gaudy as hell. With the stealth-inspired G73 design, drastically improved airflow, and near ban on glossy plastic, ASUS was able to address the overwhelming majority of complaints about their previous units while firing a bullet straight into the heart of the gaming notebook market with an irresistable pricetag: buy a G73Jh from Best Buy, and you can walk home with one of the fastest mobile GPUs on the market for just $1,199: the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5870. That model comes with only one HDD, 6GB RAM, and a 900p LCD, so if you can spare the extra $400 the various upgrades sweeten the deal, but either way you're getting a potent gaming laptop for an amazing price.
The design of the G73 fires on all cylinders and produces one of the best deals on the market, so it makes sense that when ASUS went to refresh it, all they really did was pull the Radeon HD 5870 for the generally comparable NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460M and bump the Intel Core i7-720QM to a 740QM. All things considered we'd probably still go for the 5870-equipped G73Jh, but we have a hard time believing any gaming enthusiast would be disappointed with either model. You can find the no-frills G73Jw starting at $1400 online.
Gaming Runner Up: Clevo X7200 (Starting at $3113 with 480M SLI)
If you're not on a budget on the other hand or just have a general distaste for money that isn't on fire, we present to you the Clevo X7200, the most insane, ridiculous notebook you can conceivably buy. Oh we can review machines like the X7200, but realistically they're critic-proof. Why?
Well, what other notebook can pack a hex-core desktop Core i7, three hard drive bays, and a pair of GeForce GTX 480Ms in SLI? Oh, and you can RAID the drives in the system, too. The X7200 weighs more than my cat, boasts a 1080p screen, and somehow still manages to sport that same godawful Clevo keyboard. Even the power brick is appropriately enormous.
As a result, if money is no object and you simply must have as much notebook as humanly possible, there's really no choice: the Clevo X7200 represents the top of the mountain. We would be remiss in not mentioning AVADirect having offered us the review unit, so if you're going to take the plunge and buy a notebook that doubles as a murder weapon and space heater, you couldn't choose a better vendor to get it from.
Gaming Notebook Alternatives
There really aren't that many gaming notebooks out there when you combine all the model renaming. Clevo makes barebones notebooks that are then used by a large number of boutique shops and the like (AVADirect, Eurocom, Sager, and others all use the same basic Clevo designs, though some are more forthcoming about this fact than others), but a rose by any other name would smell as sweet... and weigh as much.
The Clevo W880CU drops to a single GTX 480M GPU with a mobile CPU but checks in with a starting price of nearly $2000 at AVADirect. Perhaps more interesting is the updated W860CU, now with GTX 460M or GTX 470M and quad-core CPUs starting at $1500. The Clevo W870CU has the same chassis as the W880CU but with a smaller power brick and again the 460M or 470M GPU starting at around $1530. We listed AVADirect on all of those links for the simple fact that they're the cheapest place we've found for configuring a Clevo-based notebook, but feel free to shop around at other vendors like Sager and XoticPC.
What about non-Clevo designs? Alienware still has their M-series notebooks, including the M11x R2 that is arguably the smallest laptop to boast reasonable gaming performance, but all three models (M11x, M15x, and M17x) are due for an update. If you want 5870 CrossFire, the M17x is probably the best place to get it, but GeForce parts are all last-generation DX10 for now, and the 400M updates can't be far away. ASUS also has their smaller G53Jw, with similar specs to the G73 but only a single HDD and priced at $1450. Finally, there's MSI notebooks. We really took issue with the GX640's keyboard, but it looks like the GX660 might have fixed this. $1200 for i5-450M and HD 5870 is still a good deal, or there's the larger GX740 starting at $1100 with the same components (and a 1680x1050 display as well!)
For less expensive "gaming" options, we refer back to the alternatives listed at the end of the Mainstream section on the previous page.
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JarredWalton - Monday, November 15, 2010 - link
Fixed, thanks.StrangerGuy - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
For those who are lucky enough to purchase one, 3820TG with 5650m is the undisputed king of ultraportables...Zero contest when talking about the ~$800 price range.satyr451 - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
100% agree! I looked around at a pile of laptops and that system (Acer TimelineX 3820TG) is nothing short of amazing for the price. I just got it a few days ago and I'm all around impressed with it. It looks nice, has great battery life, feels solid and the specs on it are great. Also, I don't mind the keyboard at all.mschira - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
There is one model missing from the list: the Sony Vaio z-series.The light gaming powerhouse!
Having a GT 330 and up to i7 CPUs, a high definition screen in a 1.4 kilo 13" package is simply amazing.
And it not more expensive than similarly speced MacBook Pro 15".
If you recommend the apples, you have to consider the Sony, too.
Worse I hear Anand complaining that all the notebooks are alike that there is no model standing out.
How does the z-series not stand out?
Cheers
M.
Evil_Sheep - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
Anandtech didn't overlook the Z, but they noticed it stood out mostly in the wrong way: price. At $1700-2000 it even makes Apples look like a bargain.It's a nice machine but an overpriced niche product. If Sony dropped some of the bleeding-edge specs and released it at $1000-1200 they might not just be a bit-player in the notebook market.
mschira - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
But claiming that the Sony Z-series is overpriced it simply wrong.Yes they start at a whooping 1800, but then they come with a 128Gb SSD and with fast i5-460, 4 Gb of ram.
Try it yourself, for 1800 you get a Macbook pro 13 with an SSD but a slower CPU.
Yes the Z-series is expesive, but that's because the ONLY come with SSD.
And a fast one!
Now I hear Anand tell us all the time we WANT SSDs in our laptops.
M.
mschira - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
P.S. and whe you max them out the Sony Z series is 2800, but that's with a 8GB ram 256 SSD, i7-640 an Nvidia GT335 and a highdef screen.The mac 15' clocks in at a whooping 3500$ if you try to match this.
M.
JarredWalton - Tuesday, November 16, 2010 - link
Comparing with the MacBook isn't doing your argument any favors, as we've already established that they're fleecing the customer. Two 64GB SSDs will run about $220 at Newegg (and they'd actually be higher performance models than what Sony uses in all likelihood). Plus putting SSDs in RAID0 is stupid unless you're using models with excellent resiliency and garbage collection; I think Sony is using Samsung SSDs, which have neither feature.So start at a basic 13.3" laptop size. Acer gives you that in the 3820T for around $700. Now upgrade the keyboard to something decent with backlighting; that will cost around $50 tops. Put in Optimus 330M for around $100. Make a slick carbon fiber chassis for $100. Upgrade to dual SSDs for $150 (subtracting the standard HDD cost). Fingerprint reader and Bluetooth for $75. Upgrade the CPU to the i5-460M for $100. Toss in a good 900p LCD for $200 (being generous here). Add all of that up and we're looking at a base cost of around $1475, and I figure the above prices already account for the R&D department. So, your "Sony VAIO Z tax" looks to be around 22% -- just like Apple's MacBook tax I guess.
Is it an awesome laptop? By most accounts yes, though now I'd like to see the 420M in there instead of the 330M. But like the MacBook, you need to understand that you're paying significantly more for the "Sony experience". And honestly, dual HDD bays in a 13.1" chassis seems more like a case of proving you CAN do something as opposed to doing something people are clamoring for. I'd rather have a single 128GB SSD with good TRIM support than RAID0 64GB SSDs--or a single 256GB SSD with TRIM instead of RAID0 128GB SSDs. Or a bigger battery, or better cooling, or whatever. Again, not that the VAIO Z is bad, but it's almost an exercise in excess.
mschira - Wednesday, November 17, 2010 - link
Well if only there was 13" laptop with a Gt330. Or any other decent GPU for that matter. Of course I would not say no to an even better GPU (is the 420 better that the 330?).Or any real light 13" with a fast CPU for that matter - heck ANY notebook under 2k with a decent GPU - (maybe the alienware, but 11" is too small).
Nobody said the Sony Zs are cheap, but not more so than MacBook, and everybody seems to thinks it's kinda O.K. for them.
(Evil_Sheep even suggested the Sony prices make Mac look like a bargin - not so. Mac's are in fact more expensive, while weighting more).
Not sure what sort of SSD Sony is using, but I don't think they have really hard drive Bays in a 13" casing. They offer up to 4 SSDs in RAID and they sure don't have 4 bays.
In fact I would prefer a standard drive bay myself, so I can get a decent Sandforce SSD in case the factory build in models fail.
M.
narayanagame - Thursday, November 18, 2010 - link
what non sense are you talking...there is no competition for vaio z for its specs at that price..
i understand sony premium but vaio z is completely reasonable and i am being modest here.
whatever laptop u consider wont match vaio z with its specs for 3lb weight..
vaio z is marvelous.
look, u think 1800$ is premium price and in my country vaio z starts at 2200$ and i still feel its good enough.
in real there is no laptop that has as good specs as vaio z at its weight for that price.compare it with whatever you like nothing ll match atleast till CES 2011
now dont compare with macbook's,they are underpowered with shiny looking casing.
the main thing that goes for apple is good screen and battery life and aesthetics and for these they charge easily 40% extra.
if you think properly battery ability ll wear off within 1 and half yr and you wont be able to replace yourself.