Gaming laptops?

[Bion1985]

I'm looking to purchase a decent gaming laptop for when I travel/on the go. What would you all recommend in the $1000-1400 usd range? Would like a 970m at minimum but 960m might be considered.  Also ssd+1tb 7200 rpm drive is a plus but at least a 7200 1tb and accessibilityto add ssd in future.

[colesdav]

ASUS ROG G752 series would be my recommendation. Not sure if they are in your price range. 

[exercutor5]

https://lpc-digital.com/product/sager-np8657-special-clevo-p650re3/

[Bion1985]

1 hour ago, colesdav said:

ASUS ROG G752 series would be my recommendation. Not sure if they are in your price range. 

It's right on the edge, I've looked at it and seems good.  I also looked at the last year model of this I believe. 

[Bion1985]

Asus ROG G751JT-WH71(WX) 17-Inch FHD G-sync Gaming Laptop (Intel i7 2.60GHz, 16GB, 1TB HDD, Windows 10) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B015QZVAF2/ref=cm_sw_r_other_apa_uFQExbGNHTC82

[Pendragon]

That 17inch isn't quite "mobile" per say. The P650RE that someone linked above is solid.

[colesdav]

OK well I have a 751JL. Best laptop I ever had in terms of build quality, performance, and value for money. Great screen, audio and keyboard. 

The most important thing to look for is the cooling on your gaming laptop. 
The G751JL has separate fans for the GPU and CPU. It vents air to the rear of the machine. If you strip it down, and look inside the internal heatsinks and cooling are really well engineered.  In pulls air in from the keyboard. The G751JL only has a 965M GPU, but is can handle most games I play pretty well.  The laptop is really easy to get into to change hard drives or memory. This is really important if you are in to upgrading. There are dual hard drive bays on the G751JL so you can add an internal Samsung low profile 2TB hard drive as a backup drive.

 

Do I have any gripes with the machine? Practically none. but here they are. 

 

1. Positioning of the one of the 'Gaming' keys above the Esc key in the Macro Function Keys row is a bit annoying. This was fixed on the G752 range if you look. 

 

2. When I ordered the G751JL I thought it had an M.2 pcie slot for an SSD in the primary drive bay. Watch out for that. Some of the G751 models do, some do not. 

On the positive side the model I have came with a 7200rpm hard drive and the machine boots up really fast. 

 

3. The Keyboard lighting is really great. But only one color. RED. Minor niggle. On the positive side the keyboard is really bright if you wish, and adjustable. 

 

4. One other thing I did consider also was the GY750 range. They were pretty nice also. You might get one really cheap somewhere. 

 

Thats it. 

Hope it helps. 

 

 

 

[Bion1985]

20 minutes ago, colesdav said:

OK well I have a 751JL. Best laptop I ever had in terms of build quality, performance, and value for money. Great screen, audio and keyboard. 

The most important thing to look for is the cooling on your gaming laptop. 
The G751JL has separate fans for the GPU and CPU. It vents air to the rear of the machine. If you strip it down, and look inside the internal heatsinks and cooling are really well engineered.  In pulls air in from the keyboard. The G751JL only has a 965M GPU, but is can handle most games I play pretty well.  The laptop is really easy to get into to change hard drives or memory. This is really important if you are in to upgrading. There are dual hard drive bays on the G751JL so you can add an internal Samsung low profile 2TB hard drive as a backup drive.

 

Do I have any gripes with the machine? Practically none. but here they are. 

 

1. Positioning of the one of the 'Gaming' keys above the Esc key in the Macro Function Keys row is a bit annoying. This was fixed on the G752 range if you look. 

 

2. When I ordered the G751JL I thought it had an M.2 pcie slot for an SSD in the primary drive bay. Watch out for that. Some of the G751 models do, some do not. 

On the positive side the model I have came with a 7200rpm hard drive and the machine boots up really fast. 

 

3. The Keyboard lighting is really great. But only one color. RED. Minor niggle. On the positive side the keyboard is really bright if you wish, and adjustable. 

 

4. One other thing I did consider also was the GY750 range. They were pretty nice also. You might get one really cheap somewhere. 

 

Thats it. 

Hope it helps. 

 

 

 

It does, I'm kinda leaning this direction. Just want to go over all the options.

[colesdav]

OK. Well good luck.

 

I did lots of research on this last year and looked at other Gaming Laptop Manufacturer options such as MSI, Alienware, HP Omen, Razer, but ASUS were best for my requirements and available money at the time. 

 

You should obviously have a look at the other options available today from other manufacturers.

 

I looked into egpu options last year but things have moved on lots since then.You might want to consider egpu possibility for your laptop in future. 

 

If this is the case look for a laptop with Thunderbolt 3 or a pair of USB 3.1c ports so you could add an external GPU to your laptop. 

 

ASUS provide GX2. Razer offer the Razer Core. Akitio are soon to release the Thunder3 egpu box (They demoed it at CES 2016). And there is the Dell Alienware Graphics Amplifier.  

 

Bye. 

[Bion1985]

My laptop will not be my primary gaming pc so I don't think external gpus will be the way I go. Basically I travel some and spend 3 days a week in the doctors office for 4 hours at a time for dialysis treatments.  I'm looking for something I can take with me and play games while I do trratments.

[colesdav]

Sorry to hear you are ill. If you will be travelling lots there is one other thing to consider. One other thing about the G751JL I forgot to mention is it is a bit heavy.

It is about 4.3Kg. Maybe you might want to consider a thinner and lighter option from Asus like the G551VW. I seem to remember it was almost 1/2 the weight. However you would loose out on GPU power. 

 

Take care. I hope you get better soon. Bye.

 

 

[Bion1985]

7 hours ago, colesdav said:

Sorry to hear you are ill. If you will be travelling lots there is one other thing to consider. One other thing about the G751JL I forgot to mention is it is a bit heavy.

It is about 4.3Kg. Maybe you might want to consider a thinner and lighter option from Asus like the G551VW. I seem to remember it was almost 1/2 the weight. However you would loose out on GPU power. 

 

Take care. I hope you get better soon. Bye.

 

 

Thanks for the help and support. So I had a question, as far as gpus on laptops how well/long do you think a 960m would perform/stay relevant as far as upcoming games? Know I'm not looking at maxing graphics but if I can get medium to high settings and decent fps that fine.

[colesdav]

Hi, 

 

In terms of future proofing, you should get a notebook with the best GPU and CPU and cooling solution possible within your budget.

 

For GPU, I would try to get a mobile GPU with at least 3GB of DDR5 VRAM and high memory bandwidth, because at higher resolutions and settings, especially if you like using the higher texture settings on your games, you will need it. I think needing more VRAM in general will be a future trend.   

 

This is one problem with my G751JL purchase. The 965M only has 2GB VRAM. It is ok for most games I play, but as an extreme example of this. "Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor" texture pack is something that I tested on my ASUS G751JL. It requires 6GB VRAM and absolutely crippled the frame rate on the 965M with only 2GB of VRAM.  

 

Here are some relative gaming performance numbers for the GTX 960 and above series I had noted down last year as a rough guide.  

 

GTX 960M basline.

GTX 965M  is 15% better FPS. 

GTX 970M is 60% better FPS.

the GTX 980M is more than 100% better FPS.

General Game settings 

"Ultra-preset (1920x1080, maximum detail, anti-aliasing)". 

 

Personally I would try to go for something at 970M or above today, but my focus is always raw performance at lowest cost, ease of upgrading versus thin and light laptop option. 

 

I don't think this forum lets me directly link to other websites, so my advice is that you search for the following in Google and you will see some good reviews of the latest Nvidia Mobile GPU options. "GTX960M 4gb review" for typical Game FPS numbers. 

 

Good cooling solution is really important for future proofing because if your primary purpose is gaming  and your laptop gets hot during gaming, the motherboard will likely fail earlier than you hope for. Hot electronics = less reliable = not future proof. 

I had this happen with my HP Envy 15 gen 1. It got very hot when gaming. The motherboard failed - it was the CPU socket that went, and not the GPU, but I know the cooling on both the CPU and GPU were not up to scratch.  I had to order a replacement motherboard  and I have just rebuilt it. I don't plan to game on it any more after that experience. 

 

Another thing to avoid. Some of the newer 'thin and light' gaming laptops are supplied with soldered RAM. That means you can't upgrade to more RAM later on, or if your RAM is faulty / fails ... which does happen, it cannot be easily swapped out.  I think the original HP Omen 15 is one case of this ... that really, really  put me off. 

 

In addition if the cooling is poor then the CPU and GPU will throttle as the notebook heats up. This means your FPS will drop and the notebook fans will spin up. This is not a problem on my ASUS G751JL at all. 

 

Anyhow I need to get off to work now. 
Let me know what you decide on. 

Good luck. 

 

[Monte_Carlo]

Recently got myself an Asus ROG G752VT.  Solid mid-range option.  A bit above your budget, but I'd still recommend it.  It's basically what the G751 was just with updated hardware.  That includes different keyboard layout, USB C, a more polarizing color scheme, and G-sync. Runs fairly cool, quiet, and actually manages fairly solid settings on GTA V, Overwatch, and a few other games.  

 

Then again, the previous generation seems pretty damn good as well, and falls well within your budget.  Not entirely sure if you'd actually lose out going one generation before. 

[Bion1985]

Alright thanks again guys, think I'm looking between these two.

 

ASUS G751JY-WH71(WX) 17" FHD Gaming Laptop i7 2.6GHz, GTX 980 4GB VRAM, 16GB RAM, 128GB SSD with 1TB HDD, Win10 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B015QZPRW4/ref=cm_sw_r_other_apa_HS5ExbGZKK7W3

 

Asus ROG G751JT-WH71(WX) 17-Inch FHD G-sync Gaming Laptop (Intel i7 2.60GHz, 16GB, 1TB HDD, Windows 10) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B015QZVAF2/ref=cm_sw_r_other_apa_UT5ExbR8SRS14

 

Got a bonus check from work coming sometime this month and how much exactly I get will determine if I can afford the higher priced one.

[colesdav]

3 hours ago, Monte_Carlo said:

Recently got myself an Asus ROG G752VT.  Solid mid-range option.  A bit above your budget, but I'd still recommend it.  It's basically what the G751 was just with updated hardware.  That includes different keyboard layout, USB C, a more polarizing color scheme, and G-sync. Runs fairly cool, quiet, and actually manages fairly solid settings on GTA V, Overwatch, and a few other games.  

 

Then again, the previous generation seems pretty damn good as well, and falls well within your budget.  Not entirely sure if you'd actually lose out going one generation before. 

Hi,

 

If I was going to purchase one for myself/ budget higher I was going to suggest the G752VT as well.
 

Definitely future proof and would give Bion1985 better battery life just in case they cannot access a power point during hospital treatment.  Thunderbolt 3 in case decide to change mind and look to use eGPU in future. Also the weight is a little less at around 4 Kg.  It also has a better keyboard layout to avoid hitting gaming key instead of ESC. 

They have really good reviews. 

 

[colesdav]

25 minutes ago, Bion1985 said:

Alright thanks again guys, think I'm looking between these two.

 

ASUS G751JY-WH71(WX) 17" FHD Gaming Laptop i7 2.6GHz, GTX 980 4GB VRAM, 16GB RAM, 128GB SSD with 1TB HDD, Win10 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B015QZPRW4/ref=cm_sw_r_other_apa_HS5ExbGZKK7W3

 

Asus ROG G751JT-WH71(WX) 17-Inch FHD G-sync Gaming Laptop (Intel i7 2.60GHz, 16GB, 1TB HDD, Windows 10) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B015QZVAF2/ref=cm_sw_r_other_apa_UT5ExbR8SRS14

 

Got a bonus check from work coming sometime this month and how much exactly I get will determine if I can afford the higher priced one.

Nice choices. Yeah hold off to see if you get your check from work and treat yourself to a nice new gaming laptop. Hope it will make your hospital sessions easier on you. 

Got to go.  Get well soon. 

[Bion1985]

Sorry for all the posts, but thought please?

 

http://www.microcenter.com/product/455706/ROG_G752VY-RH71_173_Gaming_Laptop_Computer_-_Copper_Silver

 

Italian open box and missing charger, but falls in at about $1300 + tax.

 

[Pendragon]

2 hours ago, Bion1985 said:

http://www.microcenter.com/product/455706/ROG_G752VY-RH71_173_Gaming_Laptop_Computer_-_Copper_Silver

 

i would snipe u. wow. wtf. 1300 for a 980m. wow. LOL. Now I hate living in Canada, we never get deals like this. Yo, that is like a fucking amazing deal. Make sure you get to test it in the store and run a few benchmarks to see if anything is unstable or screen issues. 

[Bion1985]

31 minutes ago, Pendragon said:

i would snipe u. wow. wtf. 1300 for a 980m. wow. LOL. Now I hate living in Canada, we never get deals like this. Yo, that is like a fucking amazing deal. Make sure you get to test it in the store and run a few benchmarks to see if anything is unstable or screen issues. 

I'd need to get a charger, where could I buy a factory charger?

[Mohit Goyal]

Hey, i was thinking of buying the r510jx(my budget limits my choices)Any views on it? Suggestions are welcome. I also considered the hp-ab521tx. Ditched it in favour of the 950m on this asus.

[Pendragon]

2 hours ago, Bion1985 said:

I'd need to get a charger, where could I buy a factory charger?

buy it straight from asus or a microcenter or ebay or a etc.

[colesdav]

1 hour ago, Pendragon said:

buy it straight from asus or a microcenter or ebay or a etc.

You should be able to get a charger from Asus.. 

 

[colesdav]

7 hours ago, Bion1985 said:

Sorry for all the posts, but thought please?

 

http://www.microcenter.com/product/455706/ROG_G752VY-RH71_173_Gaming_Laptop_Computer_-_Copper_Silver

 

Italian open box and missing charger, but falls in at about $1300 + tax.

 

Hi. 

 

I usually go on the premise of "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is."

 

What does "Italian open box" mean? 

Is the laptop previously owned / used by a customer? 

Is it an ex-demo machine? 

Do you know anything about the history of it? 

Has it been dropped / mishandled? 

 

One other thing you had better check is has the laptop been previously registered with ASUS?

I am not sure that you would be able to transfer manufacturer warranty.  

Even if the store has a 14 day return policy that does not mean you will catch any problems. 

 

Although it sounds like a bargin, it is still lots of money. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Bion1985]

On 7/5/2016 at 3:32 PM, colesdav said:

Hi. 

 

I usually go on the premise of "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is."

 

What does "Italian open box" mean? 

Is the laptop previously owned / used by a customer? 

Is it an ex-demo machine? 

Do you know anything about the history of it? 

Has it been dropped / mishandled? 

 

One other thing you had better check is has the laptop been previously registered with ASUS?

I am not sure that you would be able to transfer manufacturer warranty.  

Even if the store has a 14 day return policy that does not mean you will catch any problems. 

 

Although it sounds like a bargin, it is still lots of money. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yea i talked with the rep at micro center and it was a return accepted without the charger. I also tried to contact asus about a charger and they didn't have the charger for this model for sale. Only chargers I could find online for sale were 3rd party chargers and I'm not a fan of using those. Micro center has the the 970m G752 in stock new so I might just go with that. One other options is the G751 with the 970m, it's maybe 150-200 less but it's got the older cpu ddr3 ram and I've also read that the keyboard on the G752 is much better than the G751.