Laptop advice

Dino105 · 11 May 2012 at 13:31

Hi, I'm currently looking for a laptop for around £800 (can stretch to £900 but would prefer not too). It's main uses would be:

- Maya - modelling and rendering
- Photoshop & Illustrator
- World of Warcraft (not as important)

Will be taking it into uni so it needs to be a reasonable weight.

Here are the laptops i have seen so far which i think fit the bill:

MSI GE620DX - £874

Screen size - 15.6 in - 1920 x 1080
Processor - Intel Core i7 2670QM - 2.2 GHz
RAM - 8 GB
Hard Drive - 750 GB
OS - Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit)
Graphics - NVIDIA GeForce GTX 635M (2gb dedicated memory)

MSI GT683-694UK - £849

Screen - 15.6" HD
Processor - Intel® Core™ i5-2430M Dual Core (2.4GHz, Intel Sandy Bridge Architecture, 3MB Cache, Intel Turbo Boost up to 3GHz)
OS - Windows 7 Home Premium Edition 64-bit
RAM - 8GB
Hard Drive - 750GB
Graphics - NVIDIA Geforce GTX 560 (1.5gb dedicated memory)

MSI GE620DX-691UK (open box) £699

Screen - 15.6" HD
Processor - Intel® Core™ i7-2670QM Quad Core (2.2 GHz, Intel Sandy Bridge Architecture, 6 MB L3 cache, Features Intel Turbo Boost up to 3.1GHz)
OS - Windows 7 Home Premium Edition 64-bit
RAM - 8GB
Hard Drive - 750GB
Graphics - NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 635M (2GB dedicated memory)

Asus N55SL-S2019V - £799

Screen - 15.6" - 1366 x 768
Processor - Intel Core i7 2670QM 2.2GHz
OS - Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
RAM - 6GB
Hard Drive - 750GB
Graphics - Nvidia GT635M (2gb dedicated memory)

Toshiba Satellite P775-10K - £750

Processor - Intel® Core™ i7-2630QM Quad Core
Screen - 17.3" HD+
OS - Windows 7 Home Premium Edition 64-bit
RAM - 8GB
Hard Drive - 750GB
Graphics - NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 540M (2GB dedicated memory)

I don't know a great deal about laptops so any advice and suggestions would be much appreciated, thanks

Scuzzy · 11 May 2012 at 20:45

General rule I'd say for buying a laptop is get the best CPU you can afford, as most of the other parts can be upgraded.... Then look at screen res.... Gfx etc etc... Ram and hd sizes wouldn't worry me to much at this point.

Dino105 · 11 May 2012 at 20:51

thanks for the advice, i'll keep that in mind

Smoogels · 13 May 2012 at 21:24

I would have to agree with Scuzzy on that.

Although I would consider buying a laptop not just based on there specs - but build quality as well. The last thing you want is a laptop which is packed out with high tech stuff but is flimsy. And since you are taking it to uni it would be pretty important to make sure its durable enough.

CEUOTC · 13 May 2012 at 22:21

Dino105 said:
MSI GE620DX - £874

Screen size - 15.6 in - 1920 x 1080
Processor - Intel Core i7 2670QM - 2.2 GHz
RAM - 8 GB
Hard Drive - 750 GB
OS - Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit)
Graphics - NVIDIA GeForce GTX 635M (2gb dedicated memory)

MSI GT683-694UK - £849

Screen - 15.6" HD
Processor - Intel® Core™ i5-2430M Dual Core (2.4GHz, Intel Sandy Bridge Architecture, 3MB Cache, Intel Turbo Boost up to 3GHz)
OS - Windows 7 Home Premium Edition 64-bit
RAM - 8GB
Hard Drive - 750GB
Graphics - NVIDIA Geforce GTX 560 (1.5gb dedicated memory)

imo these are your best bets.

The GTX 560m is the stronger of the GPU's ( WoW ).
The GT 635m is a rebadged GT 555m ( Can overclock easily ).
The i7's best for programming? Photoshop.
And Obviously the 1080p screen is great for the real estate.

So MSI GE620DX for screen size and i7 power.
And MSI GT683-694UK for GPU power, i5 processor, ram upgrade upto 32Gb depending on OS.

Regards.

C.