17-18 inch gaming laptop recommendations

R

ruthless-

Gawd
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Oct 18, 2002
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I'm in the market for a new gaming laptop. I'm considering the msi gt70, alienware m17x or m18x, and the asus g75. And I must buy by early July.

My questions are:
1. which one has the picture display.
2. which one has the best build quality.
3. which one has the least problems.
 
I personally have a G75VW and it a solid and awesome choice. Have not had any problems whatsoever with it and the cooling system is excellent. Currently have the GTX 660m unlocked and and a slight bump in voltage and can run games beautifully @1300 core / 3000 men without issue.

I've been contemplating selling it at a reasonable price to start a new project, so if you're interested, please feel free to PM me for full details/pics. The notebook is in mint condition. I haven't posted it in the marketplace sincey post count doesn't qualify to post there yet, because I rarely post unless I can post something meaningful or helpful. I'm not the type to post for the sake of raising my post count. If this violates any forum rules (which I think it doesn't but I could always be wrong), then the mods may please delete this.
 
ZeroBarrier said:
I personally have a G75VW and it a solid and awesome choice. Have not had any problems whatsoever with it and the cooling system is excellent. Currently have the GTX 660m unlocked and and a slight bump in voltage and can run games beautifully @1300 core / 3000 men without issue.

I've been contemplating selling it at a reasonable price to start a new project, so if you're interested, please feel free to PM me for full details/pics. The notebook is in mint condition. I haven't posted it in the marketplace sincey post count doesn't qualify to post there yet, because I rarely post unless I can post something meaningful or helpful. I'm not the type to post for the sake of raising my post count. If this violates any forum rules (which I think it doesn't but I could always be wrong), then the mods may please delete this.
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thanks for the offer but I need to buy new due to insurance reasons.
 
anyone else have any input? I'm leaning towards the alienware. I love the retina display on macbooks, which of these laptops have the closest picture quality to that of the macbook?
 
GT70 would be my choice, alhtough i would wait for the Haswell iteration... probably close to June, but might go to july.
 
M18x. Has manual graphics switch between integrated and dedicated cards. I get 4 hours of battery life on integrated watching movies. M17x and others are all auto switch. The M18x is built quite beastly as well.. Aluminum chassis where as the m17x is plastic. Not sure on the MSI. Love my M18x.. Upgrading to 680m gpus here soon. The upgradability of the M18x is unmatched for a laptop.
 
V10Ace said:
M18x. Has manual graphics switch between integrated and dedicated cards. I get 4 hours of battery life on integrated watching movies. M17x and others are all auto switch. The M18x is built quite beastly as well.. Aluminum chassis where as the m17x is plastic. Not sure on the MSI. Love my M18x.. Upgrading to 680m gpus here soon. The upgradability of the M18x is unmatched for a laptop.
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where would i get the best deal on an m18x?
 
M17X has the manual switch too ;)

M18X if you need dual cards, M17X if you need it a little lighter with just one card, 17" MSI if you want to save some cash.
 
Meaker said:
M17X has the manual switch too ;)

M18X if you need dual cards, M17X if you need it a little lighter with just one card, 17" MSI if you want to save some cash.
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From what I've read the M17x has Enduro and Optimus and there is no 100% hard switch between dedicated and integrated unlike the M18x. I've only owned the M17x r2 and M18x
 
ruthless- said:
where would i get the best deal on an m18x?
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Outside of the Dell outlet and random clearance sales the best way is to work with a Dell sales rep.. Check out the Alienware sub forum at Notebookreview. My Note 2 won't let me link the thread for some reason. You just missed a 30% off clearance sell at the Dell outlet on all laptops.
 
V10Ace said:
M18x. Has manual graphics switch between integrated and dedicated cards. I get 4 hours of battery life on integrated watching movies. M17x and others are all auto switch. The M18x is built quite beastly as well.. Aluminum chassis where as the m17x is plastic. Not sure on the MSI. Love my M18x.. Upgrading to 680m gpus here soon. The upgradability of the M18x is unmatched for a laptop.
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I'd say m18x as well, if your u have the money to burn. I've used or owned pretty much all of the 17-18" high-end laptops at some point, and while you may get near-equal performance, nothing comes quite close enough to match the build of the m18x.

Now if you're considering the m17x, I'd say go with a similar, cheaper model from MSI or sager since the build quality is about the same. My vote would actually be a p170em from Xoticpc due to the array of config options and great service.
 
Another vote for an alienware, though for me the reason to is for their warranty. Dell's complete care warranty is hard to beat, they'll repair or replace almost any problem that you can think of and if they can't or if your problem is chronic, they'll just give you a new laptop which may be a newer/better model.

Gaming laptops are notorious for nuking the video cards and other heat related issues, so having a good warranty is a must in my opinion. So that way you can have the high end laptop and not have to baby it for fear of it breaking it or wearing it down.
 
I did a lot of research back in October and went with the G75. Its got 12gb of ram and the 670M. Temps never go above 70C, backlight is good, and the screen can be seen outside (work on the tan and play at the same time haha).

Got mine from newegg for under 1300
 
thanks guys, i now have my heart set on a m18x. is there any major differences between the m18x and the m17x besides size and the dual cards in the m18x?
 
ruthless- said:
thanks guys, i now have my heart set on a m18x. is there any major differences between the m18x and the m17x besides size and the dual cards in the m18x?
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Wait for a M18x/Haswell refresh...
 
ruthless- said:
thanks guys, i now have my heart set on a m18x. is there any major differences between the m18x and the m17x besides size and the dual cards in the m18x?
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The M18x has the capacity to handle an mSATA card plus 2 x 9mm HDD/SSD and 1 x 7mm HDD/SSD. I don't think the M17x has that capacity.
 
For specifically the M17X and M18X the performance differences are likely not to be much.
 
Yes, major difference in exterior build quality and robustness of cooling. M18x really carries the torch of the m17x r1/2 with an aluminum and magnesium exterior. M17x r3/4 is Aliemware's attempt to compete with the Asus and MSI gaming lines.
 
I don't think you would be sad getting the M17X, it is a lot lighter than the M18X along with the slim power brick makes it a lot more portable.

Like with all notebooks it comes down to choosing what is right for you.
 
V10Ace said:
From what I've read the M17x has Enduro and Optimus and there is no 100% hard switch between dedicated and integrated unlike the M18x. I've only owned the M17x r2 and M18x
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I can confirm that the m17x R4 has a dedicated "switch" that will allow you to disable the enduro function and operate solely on the dedicated card. I do not believe the R2 has this though.

Hasn't really been as big of an issue as it previously was with newer drivers.
 
i'd be waiting for the haswells/new gpu's to come out before buying an alienware. I really want the M18x and don't mind the bigger size and weight. But is it worth the extra ~$500 that I would be spending is the real question.
 
Pylor said:
I can confirm that the m17x R4 has a dedicated "switch" that will allow you to disable the enduro function and operate solely on the dedicated card. I do not believe the R2 has this though.

Hasn't really been as big of an issue as it previously was with newer drivers.
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That's definitely good to know. Thanks for the update on that prior "issue".

ruthless- said:
i'd be waiting for the haswells/new gpu's to come out before buying an alienware. I really want the M18x and don't mind the bigger size and weight. But is it worth the extra ~$500 that I would be spending is the real question.
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I would say it would NOT be worth it if you only end up with mediocre gpu's with no plan on upgrading in the future. Some people do pay that extra just for the extra inch of display size and build quality.
 
the extra inch and the build quality are actually quite important to me. I don't plan on upgrading this machine for a long while.
 
ruthless- said:
the extra inch and the build quality are actually quite important to me. I don't plan on upgrading this machine for a long while.
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I looked through the thread and didn't see anywhere that indicated your budget. What are you going to be doing with your laptop? Buying through the outlet and/or with coupons would be the only way I'd personally recommend purchasing an Alienware at this time. I seen an M18x R2 on the outlet this morning for $2300 that had a single 7970m, 3840qm, 16gb memory, and 1TB x2 5400rpm drives in it.
 
For reference to the above listed laptop, I got my m17x R4 with a 7970m, 3630qm, 6 gigs of memory, and a single 750GB 7200 drive for somewhere around $1600. I threw in different ram and an SSD and it brought it up ~250 dollars or so.

The 18 inch laptops always seem to be quite a bit extra on top of the 17 inch ones for whatever reason.

Just a warning, this thing will be heavy. I went from a 6831FX (old gateway laptop) to the new alienware and definitely noticed an increase in heft. There's a lot of copper piping inside these things. I love my laptop to death but I wouldn't want to use it over the dell 5530 I was given at work for travelling extensively.

It's still a super fun laptop though and for my own usage I wouldn't give it up for any others.
 
my budget would be to try to keep it close to $2000 usd as possible. Definitely gonna upgrade to a SSD drive and at least have 8gb of ram.
 
1. Alienware: Expensive; great build quality/cooling (generally, their recent models have had GPU throttling issues); amazing warranty.

2. Sager/Clevo: Same performance as Alienware; best bang for the buck; warranty policy is lackluster; decent build quality/great cooling; relatively unknown to most consumers; designs are simle.

3. Asus: Performance is generally not top of the line; price is decent; good warranty; build quality/cooling bad-decent depending on model.
 
lawlz_xd said:
1. Alienware: Expensive; great build quality/cooling (generally, their recent models have had GPU throttling issues); amazing warranty.

2. Sager/Clevo: Same performance as Alienware; best bang for the buck; warranty policy is lackluster; decent build quality/great cooling; relatively unknown to most consumers; designs are simle.

3. Asus: Performance is generally not top of the line; price is decent; good warranty; build quality/cooling bad-decent depending on model.
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Going to disagree with this slightly.

The GPU throttling issue has been a problem for awhile now (for everyone, assuming you're reffering to the enduro problem), and it's actually not as bad for alienware as you can turn off enduro.

The other manufacturers that don't have switchable graphics allowing you to use the AMD graphics card exclusively were the ones that have/had problems, the alienware one was fine. Also, the warranty is ok, kind of short in my opinion but if you have a problem within that warranty, you get dell support which is second only to lenovo business support (in my limited opinion and experience). You pay a pittance more for awesome features like HDMI in and a decent sound system with a creative chip for a sound card built in.

Sagers and clevos aren't unknown by those doing their research, though I'd agree that the general populace wouldn't know them. Note that these machines (last I checked) do not have switchable graphics options, so you'd be stuck with enduro if you went with them and an AMD card (which I strongly recommend, much more price for performance with AMD), or stuck without it as I'm fairly certain some of them have the internal disabled, which means less battery life if you take it somewhere.

They're both generally nice and have a lot of cooling. Most sager/clevos I've seen have been pretty business looking compared to the "gaming" look of the alienware.

I'm not sure about asus, though I think they're a little bit skimpier on the cooling (I could be wrong), and you'll still have the enduro issues, albeit they're not as bad as they once were.
 
Actually IMO the MSI barebones offer the best bang for the buck....
 
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