Which of these custom specs is best value?

Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
4,617
Having difficulty deciding on a gaming orientated spec:

Both would have a 5650 and 500gb 7200rpm.

1. i5-540m / 8gb 1333 (£1010)

2. i7-820qm / 4gb 1333 (£969)

Ideally I'd really like the MSI GX740, but it's proving impossible to get hold of in the UK. If anyone knows where they can be had for a reasonable price, that would be grand.

Cheers :)
 
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ive not much experience in gaming laptops but they sure sound a lot of money for a ati 5650mobile based unit? will that card cut the mustard? sure the cpu and ram are strong but the gfx is going to be a bottleneck surely?
 
If you can get a 720QM and 8Gb it'd be the perfect compromise tbh, but out of the two I'd get the i7

i agree but surely a 5650 is a total waste of time? especially in mobile form? im not sure the op has done enough research into laptop gaming
 
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Brad - You'd be very hard pressed to get anything higher than the 5650 for a grand.

The next jump up for the 5850/5870 is about £200. There are a couple of options - one being the gx740 for a grand, and another being a mesh pc for the same price. The gx740 looks like never turning up, and mesh suck massively as a company. :(

If you have any suggestions that are actually available in the uk, I'd be glad to hear them
 
Getting the G860 would be a lot better for what you're after in honesty, granted it's £200 more than you're looking to spend but hell, would you prefer to be stuck on a HD5650?
 
Well a 5650 GPU works great on a low screen resolution. I have an i3 paired with a 5650 on my 15.6 screen laptop (1366x768 res) imo the performance is superb, cant say how the performance would drop off at a higher resolution.
 
Went for the G860 in the end. Figured if it gives me 4 years of use like my vostro has done, then it's not that much extra in the grand scheme of things.

Really wanted the gx740 - cracking spec at a cracking price. Found one place which sold it... mesh :( No chance would I risk buying a pc from those charlatans again.

On the other hand - G860 YAY!
 
is the 5650 really no good? Sony e-series laptops have them in their 15.5" version and for an OK price of approx £700. their 14" version only has an 5450 (iirc) which I've seen people say is no good at all.

the alternative is a NVIDIA GeForce G 310M but reviews online say the ati card is better
 
5450 on par with 310M.

5650 on par with the GT335M

The M11x has a GT335M for comparison.

These two cards are the go-to cards for switchable graphics notebooks and medium-high gaming settings.

The 310 / 5450 will be for low settings. About 1/2 the performance of the 5650 / GT335M.
 
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