46 replies to this topic

[Neil the Scorpion]

Vulpesveritas, on 18 July 2012 - 07:23 AM, said:

I have a old early 2010 model DV6 with a Phenom II X4 on board. Without playing games on a flat surface it heats up to around 85-95* C. lifting up the vent by one inch brings the tempratures down to 55-65*C.
In comparison to a late model 2011 DV6 with an A8 a friend has which on a flat surface gets 40-50*C. Which is quite decent for a laptop. Given there were people overclocking their Llano chips by up to 50% or more, while keeping temps under 60*C without a cooling pad, HP really stepped up their game.

Looking at the spec on the suggested HP:
• Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
• AMD Dual-Core A6-4400M (3.0GHz/2.6GHz, 1MB L2 Cache)
• AMD Radeon™ HD 7600 Series Discrete-Class Graphics
• FREE Upgrade to 6GB 1600MHz DDR3 System Memory (2 Dimm)

The system specs I mentioned above perform better in both the CPU benchmarks (signficantly) and the graphics (slightly). I can't imagine that 2GB of RAM and slightly better customer support (which I won't likely use anyway) is worth it. Thoughts?

ACER has a model that is exactly the same as the one I linked above but with a 2nd generation i5 instead. I may just go with that one.

Edited by Neil the Scorpion, 18 July 2012 - 08:31 AM.

[Vulpesveritas]

But that i5 doesn't have dual graphics. If you look at that HP page, you see that you have the option to add a graphics card and upgrade the CPU, giving you a crossfire solution a good deal more powerful than that 630m.

[Alopex]

Unless I'm mistaken, I didn't see any option for a crossfireX solution, nor should you expect one for anything under $1K in the laptop market.

Simplest way to look at this; You get what you pay for. If you want to have a good time playing MWO and you're stuck with a budget of $600, then a laptop simply won't cut it.. unless a laser rave slideshow is alright with you.

Some of the options that Vulpes has mentioned aught to get you by with the video settings and resolution set low, but don't expect any miracles.

[Catamount]

It's hybrid crossfire, which basically uses the llano chip and the discrete card together, but I'm not sure whether or not that would be supported.

That said, you can fit Vulpes' suggested laptop with a 7730, which is about half again as fast as the 630M, and the price is only $625

[Neil the Scorpion]

Catamount, on 18 July 2012 - 09:45 AM, said:

It's hybrid crossfire, which basically uses the llano chip and the discrete card together, but I'm not sure whether or not that would be supported.

That said, you can fit Vulpes' suggested laptop with a 7730, which is about half again as fast as the 630M, and the price is only $625

After reading Vulpes' articles about hardware, it's apparent that his opinion tends to slant towards the AMD + Radeon combos that fill the lower end of the price range. I have no specific brand loyalty to processor and graphics manufacturers, and in past computers (I've had somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 or so, not counting netbooks) I've used all possible combinations of nvidia, radeon, intel and AMD.

I've reviewed the specs for that HP he suggested, and while the radeon 7730 is significantly more powerful than the GT 630M the best processor that can be had in that system is barely on par with the acer i3 in my spec and does not perfom as well as the i5 that is still within my budget. The system is also significantly more expensive with the A10/7730 combo ($724) than the amount I have budgeted ($600).

Vulpes,

I've reviewed the specs for the toshiba system you recommended as well. It was one of the ones I considered prior to settling on the acer i3. That system is exactly the same price as the acer i3 system, it has a slower processor than the acer i3 and has a radeon G integrated graphics. I can't see this being a good choice at all. However, since it is firmly within my budget, perhaps you could give me some idea as to why you recommended it over my initial pick?

I greatly appreciate your assistance and look forward to you reply.

Alopex, on 18 July 2012 - 09:27 AM, said:

Unless I'm mistaken, I didn't see any option for a crossfireX solution, nor should you expect one for anything under $1K in the laptop market.

Simplest way to look at this; You get what you pay for. If you want to have a good time playing MWO and you're stuck with a budget of $600, then a laptop simply won't cut it.. unless a laser rave slideshow is alright with you.

Some of the options that Vulpes has mentioned aught to get you by with the video settings and resolution set low, but don't expect any miracles.

I wasn't expecting to find any systems using crossfire for under $1k either. Is there HP provided documentation on this? It'd be great to know if it works, if they recommend setting it up that way, and if it stays within normal operating temperatures when you use it like that. None of the charts I've looked at have any performance numbers on this combo beyond estimates.

[Catamount]

OP, are you going to be doing tasks that are CPU heavy, but GPU light?

If not, having a more powerful GPU is vastly more important than a more powerful CPU. You can't have both, as you don't have the budget for it, but if this is for general school use (mobile web browsing and office suite use) and gaming, then the $625 configuration I ended up with for that HP machine with the 7730 (you don't have to spent $700+ as long as you keep the upgrade(s) limited to the GPU) will be tangibly superior for your purposes.


The 630M won't be terrible, not as far as budget laptops go (though it won't be good for MWO), but unless you're going to be doing something you haven't mentioned, stepping that up to a much more powerful GPU in exchange for sacrificing some of the purely extraneous CPU power on your machine is a more-than-worthwhile tradeoff, I think.

Edited by Catamount, 18 July 2012 - 11:41 AM.

[Neil the Scorpion]

Catamount, on 18 July 2012 - 11:40 AM, said:

OP, are you going to be doing tasks that are CPU heavy, but GPU light?

If not, having a more powerful GPU is vastly more important than a more powerful CPU. You can't have both, as you don't have the budget for it, but if this is for general school use (mobile web browsing and office suite use) and gaming, then the $625 configuration I ended up with for that HP machine with the 7730 (you don't have to spent $700+ as long as you keep the upgrade(s) limited to the GPU) will be tangibly superior for your purposes.


The 630M won't be terrible, not as far as budget laptops go (though it won't be good for MWO), but unless you're going to be doing something you haven't mentioned, stepping that up to a much more powerful GPU in exchange for sacrificing some of the purely extraneous CPU power on your machine is a more-than-worthwhile tradeoff, I think.

Aside from the gaming the GPU is a complete waste, really.

And CPU is always relevant as my current employment is that of a software developer. So i'd say yes, the CPU is probably more important. Granted this is a cheap mobile computer, it's not the system I'll be doing development work on on a regular basis. That said, I would like it to not totally suck at it if needed in an emergency.

However, I'll take that into consideration prior to making my final selection. I do still want to hear the answer to question regarding the Toshiba Vulpes recommended.

Thanks again.

(I should add, I am reasonably well versed in hardware, just not quite current enough on all of the newest naming schemes to quickly make sense of all of it. This is my reason for asking for the advice.)

Edited by Neil the Scorpion, 18 July 2012 - 12:04 PM.

[Vulpesveritas]

Neil the Scorpion, on 18 July 2012 - 12:03 PM, said:

Aside from the gaming the GPU is a complete waste, really.

And CPU is always relevant as my current employment is that of a software developer. So i'd say yes, the CPU is probably more important. Granted this is a cheap mobile computer, it's not the system I'll be doing development work on on a regular basis. That said, I would like it to not totally suck at it if needed in an emergency.

However, I'll take that into consideration prior to making my final selection. I do still want to hear the answer to question regarding the Toshiba Vulpes recommended.

Thanks again.

(I should add, I am reasonably well versed in hardware, just not quite current enough on all of the newest naming schemes to quickly make sense of all of it. This is my reason for asking for the advice.)

I recommended it because I thought you had said the Acer had a Geforce GTX 620m, not a 630m. Outside of that, the Toshiba will still have better battery life, given the lower total TDP of CPU + GPU, should that matter to your purposes at all. Furthermore, the CPU isn't bad versus an i3, especially in multithread. CPU wise, it is only 200mhz slower than the A10 reviewed here and matched against a mobile i5, for example;
http://www.tomshardw...river,3202.html

[Neil the Scorpion]

Vulpesveritas, on 18 July 2012 - 04:41 PM, said:

I recommended it because I thought you had said the Acer had a Geforce GTX 620m, not a 630m. Outside of that, the Toshiba will still have better battery life, given the lower total TDP of CPU + GPU, should that matter to your purposes at all. Furthermore, the CPU isn't bad versus an i3, especially in multithread. CPU wise, it is only 200mhz slower than the A10 reviewed here and matched against a mobile i5, for example;
http://www.tomshardw...river,3202.html

Gotcha. I realize that the Radeon 6620G + the AMD processor in that toshiba isn't a horrible combo. Thanks for the answer!

[Nuclear Xmas]

Vulpesveritas, on 18 July 2012 - 04:41 PM, said:

I recommended it because I thought you had said the Acer had a Geforce GTX 620m, not a 630m. Outside of that, the Toshiba will still have better battery life, given the lower total TDP of CPU + GPU, should that matter to your purposes at all. Furthermore, the CPU isn't bad versus an i3, especially in multithread. CPU wise, it is only 200mhz slower than the A10 reviewed here and matched against a mobile i5, for example;
http://www.tomshardw...river,3202.html

Given that the framerate on games for gaming laptops drops substantially when you take it off the charger battery life shouldn't really matter. As you'll probably never use it off the charger anyways.

[Vulpesveritas]

Nuclear Xmas, on 20 July 2012 - 09:06 PM, said:

Given that the framerate on games for gaming laptops drops substantially when you take it off the charger battery life shouldn't really matter. As you'll probably never use it off the charger anyways.

This is only true if you use a power savings setting in your control panel. You can disable that feature fairly easy.

[Aniquilator6]

If you have the budget for it, take Vulpesveritas's suggestion and up the config to a A10-4600m and a HD7730m.

If not, stick to the A8 with a HD7730m. Be aware that the HD7730 does not pair with the integrated graphics.

The CrossfireX is also an idea but some games don't support it correctly yet.

Edited by Aniquilator6, 21 July 2012 - 04:17 PM.

[Gremlich Johns]

Heck with all that wondering, just go get a Sager - under $1000 or over $1000

[Neil the Scorpion]

As for the Sager, it's 799 for the same sort of spec I can get on that acer for 599. Granted, with the sager the screen is alot better and there's a ton more RAM, but alas, it's beyond the budget. Besides for that sort of money I'd probably go with something even more portable, in the ultrabook realm.

Also, power consumption isn't relevant to me. Only the portability is. Most of the use this machine will see for gaming will be within 3 feet of an electrical outlet.

My current plan is to get this one:

http://www.newegg.co...N82E16834215417

I belive the above choice will run mechwarrior online at low to medium settings without issue, and it is also cheap and adaquate for my primary purpose. I believe this is the best mix of portability and performance for the money spent.

I do greatly appreciate everyone's assistance.

I'm taking every suggestion Vulpes makes with a grain of salt. On one hand, he states he's not a fanboy, but then all of his suggestions seem to be for an AMD+Radeon combo. The cost to performance ratio does seem to favor the AMD processors for desktop systems. All of the reading I've done seem to indicate they aren't optimal choices for mobile compared to the newest intel. I don't have any particular loyalties, having owned about an even split of intel and AMD and radeon and nvida over the last 15 years.

The toshiba that was offered as a suggestion early on is primary proof of this. Every component of it performs poorer than the spec I originally posted (except the screen, possibly, as acers have ****** screens. Toshibas aren't rated all that much higher though, and I've not done this as a direct comparison) and it's exactly the same price.

The HP that was suggested might perform better in regards to the GPU combo, but it does have a slower processor. As for buying an HP, I don't think there's any chance I'll do that. My personal experience has turned me away from their hardware and I've not seen anything yet that can earn it back. Perhaps personal experience with an HP laptop that doesn't suck would change my mind, but I'm not experimenting with 600 bucks to find out. The AMD processor in it is not faster than an i5 and I'm not a big fan of all the extra heat the AMDs seem to generate in laptops. The video on it is only marginally better; as in, i might be able to run MWO slightly better on medium. It's not going to allow me to run MWO on high settings, regardless. I don't have any specific loyalty to Nvida or Radeon cards, but having to deal with crossfire isn't something that excites me much.

I may stil do a bit more investigation, but at this point I'm 99% sure I'm going to purchase the one I linked above.

Edited by Neil the Scorpion, 21 July 2012 - 10:35 AM.

[Aniquilator6]

The AMD + hd7730m combo would bring better gaming performance while costing a bit in the CPU departement. However, the A8 / A10 have good CPU performance.

Surely the i5 will bring you better CPU performance.

Gaming? The A8+HD7730m will bring you better performance than the i5+gt630m mainly because the HD7730m has a good performance leap over the gt630m.
Mainly work/productivity and light gaming? The i5+gt630m is the better choice since the i5 has a good performance leap over the A8.

It really depends on the objectives you have for your computer.
Since both of them are good laptops (with different purposes) it all comes down to your own choice.

Cheers

[bikerbass77]

The main thing is to get the best graphics chip you can afford. Remember though, memory is cheap and looking at that will not tell you if the chip is any good. A way around it is to look at the model numbers. For AMD anything under x770 is too cut down for gaming. The same works on Nvidia from the GTXx60.

Often an older gpu will be better than a new one dependant on it's place in its range. An ATI (now AMD) 6870 is a fair bit more powerful than an AMD 7750.

[Neil the Scorpion]

Hans Davion, on 21 July 2012 - 05:34 PM, said:

The main thing is to get the best graphics chip you can afford. Remember though, memory is cheap and looking at that will not tell you if the chip is any good. A way around it is to look at the model numbers. For AMD anything under x770 is too cut down for gaming. The same works on Nvidia from the GTXx60.

Often an older gpu will be better than a new one dependant on it's place in its range. An ATI (now AMD) 6870 is a fair bit more powerful than an AMD 7750.

Yeah, I agree.

None of this would even be an issue if I wasn't in the market for a laptop. I'd much rather just get a desktop. But just won't work in this case.

That Toshiba has the AMD A-Series A8-4500M(1.90GHz) and AMD Radeon HD 7640G.

The processor might be OK, but I don't think the 7640G is gonna be better than the GT 630M that's in the Acer.

The newest mobile GPUs for both Radeon and Nvidia are rebranded (and sometimes slightly modified) versions of their previous generation GPUs. the GT 630M is somewhere between the GT 540M and GT 555M. It performs in most benchmarks twice as good as the 7640G that's in the Toshiba.

As for the HP, singly neither card is as good, and there is little benchmark data to compare to for the crossfire combo.
The HP might be a better performing combo, and I freely admit that, but, read up. I'm not doing an HP either way. :-)

So, Toshiba is out at that price point. Gateway, Lenovo and Dell don't have anything that match the performance for the price either. Dell, Sager and Alienware have similar models but they are all quite a bit nicer than the acer and also alot more expensive.

Am I missing any brands?

Thanks!

[Catamount]

Neil the Scorpion, on 21 July 2012 - 08:27 PM, said:

As for the HP, singly neither card is as good, and there is little benchmark data to compare to for the crossfire combo.
The HP might be a better performing combo, and I freely admit that, but, read up. I'm not doing an HP either way. :-)

Not true; the 7730 is vastly more powerful than the 630, by itself. No, 50% better won't mean paying on medium vs low, but 50% faster does mean the difference between getting 25fps at given settings, and getting almost 40fps.

Yes, practically speaking it's very likely you'd make far better use of that than a faster CPU on a regular basis (few people do anything that really stresses out even a modest CPU), but if you just don't want an HP, then I guess the machine you picked is the next best thing, if a distant second


On the upside, Acer may not artificially disable driver updates, which at least puts it ahead of many brands, if so.

[Neil the Scorpion]

Catamount, on 21 July 2012 - 09:00 PM, said:

On the upside, Acer may not artificially disable driver updates, which at least puts it ahead of many brands, if so.

What do you mean?

[Gremlich Johns]

Any stats on whether an ultrabook can even run higher end games?