Laptop advice, any help appreciated.

[alexp999]

Hi I am looking at getting a laptop.
I want it for running AutoCAD 2008, Adobe photoshop 3, Serif DrawPlus 8 and some gaming. Just like EVE online and games of that graphical caliber really. (freelancer, etc...)

Now I m primarily looking at this:
HP Compaq 6715b Business Notebook PC (GB835ET)
http://h10010.www1.hp.com/wwpc/uk/e...283229-283229-12434650-13123922-80291406.html

But for another £70 ($140) I can get this:
Asus F3Ke-AP094C
http://uk.asus.com/products.aspx?modelmenu=2&model=1827&l1=5&l2=26&l3=316&l4=0

Has anybody had any experience with either of these, would it be worth me spending the extra downgrading the cpu and batt life but upgrading the gpu?

Any help greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

 

[alexp999]

Otherwise, has anybody had any experience with the ATI X1270 chip?

Cheers.

 

[theonetruewill]

An X1270 will be absolutely appalling at gaming.
It would be worse than my X600se mobility- and that is poor.

For even light gaming X1600/7600 minimum.

Try zepto.com

Mobility gfx card gaming performance in descending order. I will include all the chips I have personally tried.

7950GTX - Just awesome
7900GTX
7950GT
7900GS - good performance/price ratio
X1800 - overpriced rubbish
8600M GT - over-hyped rubbish, but it's ok
7600 - solid cheap performance
X1600 - no longer as popular as it was
X1400 - ask user: kwchang007
X600 (128bit) - Higher clocked 9600
X600se (64bit) - X2300
X1300
9600 - lower clocked version of X600
X1270 - no, just no
X300 - worse than a blind kid playing darts

Join us

 

[alexp999]

But I have heard of people running hl2 and css on a x1270. I can run eve online on my laptop with a Xpress 1100 but at lowest settings and i think it is held back by the cpu. (2ghz single core turion)

Just wondered if the hp would run eve online okay, cus in terms of specs it is better for the office and cad apps i want to use.

Cheers.

 

[pt]

you forgot the hd2600

 

[WhiteLotus]

tried MESH? http://www.meshcomputers.com/Default.aspx?PAGE=PRODUCTVIEWPAGE&USG=PRODUCT&ENT=PRODUCT&KEY=241508

 

[kwchang007]

I'm going to have to say....if you can get more money try and get a better laptop. Otherwise the Asus is much better than the hp because it's an Asus and the graphics is dedicated and probably will preform at the level of a x1400 maybe a little better.

 

[theonetruewill]

you forgot the hd2600

It's not that I forgot - there's more than a few missing on my list, it's that I haven't tried them or know anyone with them so I can't vouch for it.

Also, the CPU isn't bottlenecking EVE anywhere near as much as your integrated graphics chipset is.

 

[kwchang007]

I forgot to ask this last time....what's your budget?

 

[XGas]

Yep, what is your budget and do you mind about the laptop's weight? Are you going to lug it around nearly everyday and/or move it around on your shoulder and/or carry by hand in a day? (I have my Dell XPS M1210 with 9 cell battery and quite a good amount of papers in my backpack, and it cuts into my shoulders after one afternoon of moving around, three days a week)

On the GPU side, anything less than a GeForce 8800m isn't really going to cut it for "new" games coming out(if you are going to play them, DX10 titles for example, but some DX9 titles are still reeaaally hefty), since you play EVE Online and games along the that line, a 8600m GT should do fine, but "may" need to tune the visual detail/quality settings down a little.

 

[pt]

my friend could play moh airborne at MAX on his hd2600 mobile with a c2d

 

[daehxxiD]

In regards of the GFX-Card I can stand in and advice you the HD2600 Mobility. A very good chip in my opinion, as long as you don't mind playing in sub-native resolutions. It performs around the same as a GF8600M GT, sometimes a little better, runs less hot, has great overclocking potential (but no Tools except AMDGPUClocktool at disposal) and consumes little power (65nm be praised).

The only factors that really limit this card are the rops (4) and the crappy bandwidth in most Notebooks (not only 128bit, but often only GDDR 2 which runs at 400mhz standard). I managed to complete Crysis with this card on Medium/High settings @1024x600 and DX9 (all high but Shadows, Textures and Shaders on Medium). It runs at around 20-40fps in most of the game, except the Ice-level which sometimes falls below even the 20 fps...

As for a laptop, I'm pretty happy with my Toshiba A200-17O, but the T7100 and the 1280x800 Display wouldn't really cut it for you I guess (Edit: Silly me, I just saw you actually proposed a very similiar set-up). Just be sure not to focus only on Nvidia as the HD2600 Mobility is a really underestimated chip. (Of course, if you want High-End you oughta go for the 8800M GT; for a hefty price of cours [cheapest I've found up until now is 2500€]). Just for the record, the HD2600 in 3DMark 06 has 4100 points overclocked and 3200 @ stock clocks. (8600M GT 3300 in DDR 2 and 3800 with DDR 3, 8700M GT around 4500 and the 7950GTX around 5000; the 8800M GTX goes with an incredible 9000 points... >_< *me wants one*)

Edit: Just saw that you proposed the Asus F3K, afaik that one should exist with a HD2600 aswell, you might wanna get that one. Toshiba also has a model called A210-14s/Satellite A210-16Y or something like that, feauturing more or less the same statistics as the F3K. Obviously also my Toshiba A200-17O would pretty much be what you are looking and definatly gives you quite a bang for the buck feauturing an intel Core 2 Duo and the Robson Module (solid state disk, to help chaching and readyboosting).

 

[pt]

Edit: Just saw that you proposed the Asus F3K, afaik that one should exist with a HD2600 aswell, you might wanna get that one. Toshiba also has a model called A210-14s/Satellite A210-16Y or something like that, feauturing more or less the same statistics as the F3K. Obviously also my Toshiba A200-17O would pretty much be what you are looking and definatly gives you quite a bang for the buck feauturing an intel Core 2 Duo and the Robson Module (solid state disk, to help chaching and readyboosting).

Asus F3KA-AP006C
AMD Turion 64 X2 TL-60 at 2ghz
AMD M690G
Memória 2Gb DDRII (667MHz)
TFT 15,4" WXGA Color Shine
ATI HD2600 256MB DDR3
160GB HDD SATA
DVD-RW Supermulti

and i'm going to get one monday

 

[alexp999]

Cheers, everyone and I dont mean to be rude,thanks for all your advice, I know I asked for it, but To a certain extent I think some of you missed the point. I want to use the laptop for primarily CAD programs, I just wanted to see what people thought of the X1270 Gfx chipset, and whether the HP would be capable of running eve cus that really is as graphicalyy advanced as I will go on it, and I'm also not bothered about the new trinity engine running on it. I have my PC rig for regular gaming.

Hope this clears a few things up,

Cheers.