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Hi everyone,
because of my less than ideal living situation (moving around between rural Ireland, Dublin, Dresden and rural Germany) a lot, I can't afford the luxury of a desktop computer.
I mean, I do have one at my parents' place, but I only get to use it for like 3 weeks a year, so I figured I might sell it.
Gaming isn't a high priority, but I do enjoy playing some titles from my steam library, notably Dark Souls 1+2.
At any rate, now I'm in the market for a laptop that has a GPU.
There are loads of gaming laptops out there, but they all seem to be gaming first and laptop second.
Most of them are enormous machines at around 3 kilos,
made out of cheap plastic and grossly designed with batteries that won't last for an episode of Seinfeld.
There's the Razer Blade, but that's complete overkill.
Here's what I'm looking for:
i5 Broadwell or Skylake
GTX 950m or 960m max
SSD (256, or 128 GB and second drive)
matte, full HD (not higher than that, please no touch)
good battery life and great keyboard
light and sturdy and well designed
So essentially I'm looking for something like a Macbook Pro with a GPU or a Razer Blade with way lesser specs.
Rant:
Who needs 4k on a 14" screen?
Does something like that exist in the real world?
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I think the 940m is a bit on the weak side.
Dell, for instance, offer a 960 and an i7 for just 30 € more.
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finding a second HDD in laptops is very rare.
Your specifications would be really similar to mine when searching for a laptop, however it all depends on the price range you're willing to go. I've found out that when you want a bit of everything, you will search endlessly, since every laptop somehow manages to reduce something else.
I.E. you find a laptop with 950m + i7, it will have 1 HDD only, etc..
Dell has the power, but not the comfort (your dell probably is 3+ KG right?)
Apple has the comfort, but not the prize
Acer has a bit of power and then a bit of comfort
Asus has a bit of comfort and then a bit of power
Lenovo has the power, but not the comfort.
I think you are looking for a needle in a haystack. Not an impossible one though, but one which requires to scroll through tens of laptops. With that I wish you very good luck 
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Dell has the XPS series which are more expensive then regular Dells, but they come close to macbook-level design and weight while offering all your specs:
http://www.dell.com/nl/p/xps-15-9550-laptop/pd?oc=cnx5501&model_id=xps-15-9550-laptop
Also, check out some of the "Frankenlaptop"sites, where you can combine all the components of your liking in a default body, no questions asked: http://www.laptopplus.nl, http://www.bto.eu, http://www.pcspecialist.co.uk. I'm not fond of the concept, but since you're looking for a niche device, it might be the way to go.
glgl!
Edit: I tried entering your specs in the uk site above, and they actually come up with quite a nice laptop for 900,- or so. Has a gtx 940m, but considering your low priority for gaming and your high priority for portability, the 940 seems the way to go.
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Those frankenlaptops look awful. My brother has one of those and it weighs about as much as my car.
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On November 30 2015 23:29 DickMcFanny wrote:
Those frankenlaptops look awful. My brother has one of those and it weighs about as much as my car.
Some of them are (I usually get those ) but they have sleek bodies too, less then 2kg, comparable to the slim Dells. Do check m out, I actually configured your specs (as edited in above) and it's really quite nice what they come up with.
+ Show Spoiler +
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I don't think I'd be happy with a 940.
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On November 30 2015 23:57 DickMcFanny wrote:
I don't think I'd be happy with a 940.
Then select a Gtx 950. All possible.
I just compared the performance specs of those 2 and I can see now why you wouldn't want a 940. The 950 doubles most stats, for modest additional costs.
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I don't know, I'm somehow very hesitant to get a laptop of which I couldn't read any reviews beforehand.
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Fair point. Then here's a link to the gtx 950m graphic card specs. Most of it is boring numbers, but in the bottom there is a list with commercially available laptops that contain that GPU, including their weight (for quick filtering), and links to reviews.
http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-950M.138026.0.html
Going through that list, the Asus K502LX-NB52 looks sweet for 800,-
![[image loading]](http://s.s-bol.com/imgbase0/imagebase3/extralarge/FC/4/3/6/2/9200000047822634_1.jpg)
edit: that ASUS below looks awesome as well! 4K screen pushes up the price, but other than that it's great.
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Laptops with a dedicated GPU, big screen and 2nd hard drive all have terrible battery life. What you're asking for basically doesn't exist.
I think your options look like this:
1- Get a laptop with a single SSD and carry a USB HD around.
2- Get a laptop with a single HDD, and replace the DVD drive with a SSD.
3- a) Buy a laptop with a shitty HDD, and replace it with a 480gb SSD as a single drive. These can be bought for ~120$ USD these days.
b) Buy a laptop with a single 250gb+ SSD, but pay a premium for it.
FWIW, even the macbook pro 15" weighs in at 2kg+. 3kg is pretty standard.
Imo, Asus has the best finish to their laptop, and they have a lot of options with the 950m or 960m. They feel more like a macbook than a Dell. MSI has good keyboards and decent quality as well, but they are heavy and do look a bit clunky.
Something like this is probably your best bet if you can afford it. There are other options in the Asus lineup, even though they aren't the easiest to find. If money isn't a problem, you might consider the Asus Zenbook. Some of them include a dedicated GPU. They meet all your criteria, but are expensive.
Edit: Alternatively, you can go the Hybrid Drive way.
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Ah, that last ASUS ROG would have been perfect, but they chose to cut out a third of the battery (60wh instead of 96 from the original) to accommodate a second drive.
Still by far the best solution I've seen so far, I might go for that. The European version foregoes the 4k display and is 600 Euro cheaper.
If I order it now, with student discount and a 10% Black Weekend Voucher, it's 15% off, or 1180 Euro for the i7/GTX 960/128 GB SSD/1 TB HDD/FullHD configuration.
I'm assuming the power adapter will be bigger than my Macbook Air one as well?
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On December 01 2015 01:54 Pwere wrote:Laptops with a dedicated GPU, big screen and 2nd hard drive all have terrible battery life. What you're asking for basically doesn't exist. I think your options look like this: 1- Get a laptop with a single SSD and carry a USB HD around. 2- Get a laptop with a single HDD, and replace the DVD drive with a SSD. 3- a) Buy a laptop with a shitty HDD, and replace it with a 480gb SSD as a single drive. These can be bought for ~120$ USD these days. b) Buy a laptop with a single 250gb+ SSD, but pay a premium for it. FWIW, even the macbook pro 15" weighs in at 2kg+. 3kg is pretty standard. Imo, Asus has the best finish to their laptop, and they have a lot of options with the 950m or 960m. They feel more like a macbook than a Dell. MSI has good keyboards and decent quality as well, but they are heavy and do look a bit clunky. Something like this is probably your best bet if you can afford it. There are other options in the Asus lineup, even though they aren't the easiest to find. If money isn't a problem, you might consider the Asus Zenbook. Some of them include a dedicated GPU. They meet all your criteria, but are expensive. Edit: Alternatively, you can go the Hybrid Drive way.
Have to agree with Pwere when it comes to Asus' chassis build quality. Even their F205XA (a €200 11" netbook) had an amazing finish you don't expect on laptops of that price category.
Then again, if you don't really care about design or bulk, get a Lenovo thinkpad or HP probook. In terms of battery life, however, you have to make a choice: ultrabooks are rather low on performance (though it's still plenty if you don't play games) but high on battery life. Performance laptops on the other hand barely last 2-3 hours on one charge, usually not even enough to survive a layover at an airport.
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I do care about design and bulk, so I'll keep my eye on the ASUS ones.
Perhaps I can find one that only has an i5/950 and one drive, that should be a bit sleeker whilst still being enough to play Dark Souls.
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On December 01 2015 20:40 DickMcFanny wrote:
I do care about design and bulk, so I'll keep my eye on the ASUS ones.
Perhaps I can find one that only has an i5/950 and one drive, that should be a bit sleeker whilst still being enough to play Dark Souls.
See my previous post, the image I added there is an Asus with gtx 950.
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Thanks for that, didn't mean to ignore it.
That one is 800 USD in the US and 1200 Euro in Germany, which I think is a horrid deal.
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On December 02 2015 00:49 DickMcFanny wrote:
Thanks for that, didn't mean to ignore it.
That one is 800 USD in the US and 1200 Euro in Germany, which I think is a horrid deal.
Weird. Bol.com offers it for 800,- in the Netherlands.
(I'm stuck at home with a horrible cold, that's why I'm stalking this thread )
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Can you link that, actually? I can't find it. And I appreciate the stalking.
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I have an ASUS ROG and I wish I had waited a bit and gotten a Zenbook, it looks lighter/nicer.
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The Razer Blade will come out in Europe with only 8 GB RAM, half the storage (256 GB) and only a full HD display. I'll wait for prices on that.
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Here is the link to the laptop _fool said. I think this fits your requirements perfectly aswell.
(credits _fool)
http://www.bol.com/nl/p/asus-k501lx-dm104t-laptop/9200000047822642/
What are you going to do with your RAM? Are you an engineer/developer or anything of the sort that you are sure you need the extra RAM?
Getting more than 8GB RAM is one of the biggest misconceptions people have when building a machine.
As a (power) user/gamer, you will not need more than 8GB RAM period. I will try to explain it a bit quick and dirty so you can come to your own conclusion:
Let's say you have 8GB RAM DDR3, with a clockspeed of 1600Mhz(in reality this is half of that, but that's another story) and cas latency (CL) 9.
This is a pretty standard RAM stick, probably around 50-60$, also probably the one already in your new laptop (Mhz may vary slightly).
Such a RAM stick is ideal for everyday use, gaming etc. It will be highly unlikely that RAM will ever become your bottleneck. In the case of gaming more Mhz == more power.
So when I want a gaming machine. I would want 8GB RAM DDR3, with a clockspeed of 2133Mhz (fastest ddr3) and CL9.
Although if I want a machine for AutoCAD or engineering tasks etc, then this RAM stick wouldn't suffice. In this scenario you wouldn't need the fast Mhz, but you will need more RAM and less CL.
So in this case you would want 16GB RAM DDR3, with a clockspeed of 1066Mhz and a CL2-3-5-6-7.
Although if I want a machine that hosting a database or executing all kinds of SQL queries. My desires would again change into a 16GB RAM DDR3, with a clockspeed of 2133Mhz and CL9.
So long story short; for every configuration/needs you would need a different set of RAM Memory.
Size and CL are the least of your worries, since 8GB is more than enough.
I'd choose "8GB DDR3 - 2133Mhz - CL9" over "32GB DDR3 - 1333 Mhz - CL9", ten out of ten times.
As for DDR4... I'd rather stick with DDR3 for another few years.
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Sorry, I don't want one that has a Dutch keyboard layout. I need a German or English (UK) one.
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If you're willing to put down the money, would you consider a MBP? I bought one with my internship money I made last summer. Sure it's expensive as hell (cost me $2k), but it does everything I want without me having to compromise on anything (which you also seem to be unwillling to do). It has the sufficient graphics power to play my games, and retina screen + 16 GB ram + 512 GB SSD + amazing battery life + OS X makes it an excellent laptop for my computer science schoolwork too. I know you said you wanted a lower spec equivalent but it seems to me that whatever laptop you end up finding acceptable in the end will probably have a comparable price tag.
Either way, good luck in your laptop hunting.
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I've been using a Swedish keyboard for over 3 years now 
If you're able to blindly type it should be no problem, as the keyboard input is software (meaning you can adjust it to any language you want).
The layout also isn't "dutch" , but US/International (the most standard in the world). Ofcourse, I can understand you want your own layout, just specifying things a bit 
For example, this is the exact same laptop as _fool and me posted :
http://www.amazon.com/K501LX-Laptop-GeForce-Upgrade-Windows/dp/B00YR6BMS2
"ASUS K501LX" , if you insist on getting DE/UK keyboard, go search that laptop on some DE/UK sites. Or just go to the store locally.
(your initial "query" about having all the specs together wasn't as impossible. Combining this with a specific, not common keyboard layout might. :p)
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On December 03 2015 14:04 writer22816 wrote:
If you're willing to put down the money, would you consider a MBP? I bought one with my internship money I made last summer. Sure it's expensive as hell (cost me $2k), but it does everything I want without me having to compromise on anything (which you also seem to be unwillling to do). It has the sufficient graphics power to play my games, and retina screen + 16 GB ram + 512 GB SSD + amazing battery life + OS X makes it an excellent laptop for my computer science schoolwork too. I know you said you wanted a lower spec equivalent but it seems to me that whatever laptop you end up finding acceptable in the end will probably have a comparable price tag.
Either way, good luck in your laptop hunting.
Don't get me wrong, I love my MBA to bits, but I want to play games.
The cheapest Macbook Pro that has a dedicated GPU (and that one is closer to a GT940m than to a 950!) goes for 2400 €, that's just an absurd price for me to pay. I don't doubt that it's worth it for some professions, but not for me.
I'm putting this thread on ice until details of the Razer Blade in Europe come in, should be around the 10th of December.
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United Kingdom20322 Posts
@WonnaPlay it can still be nice to have >8GB of RAM for having multiple programs loaded etc. Some games today, particularly a few newer ones and large scale open world games like Planetside 2 will use >5GB of RAM, the OS likes a gigabyte or 2.
8GB won't really stop you from doing anything but it's a low enough number to have to clean up after yourself, while 16GB is nowhere near limiting for most users. I recommend it for higher performance systems anyway
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Especially if the laptop is supposed to last for a couple of years, unupgradable 2 GB might actually be a bottleneck pretty soon.
I hope to get at least two years out of the machine, is that a realistic aim with about an hour of gaming a day?
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Still no signs of a Razer Blade in Europe. Ballsack.
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I would like to just chip in about DELLs - I know people have the tendency to badmouth them because they don't "look and feel" like a MBP, but my experience is completely opposite. Maybe it is now different, but I have a 5-year old Latitude and it is literally the only piece of electronics I have to last me that long. It has a very plastic feel and looks on first sight as complete garbage, but not a single thing broke mechanically even though I am putting it through unseen levels of hell (it travels with me a lot and I use it outdoors often). I know that DELL has changed a lot as a company, but back in the day it was possible to arrange for a wide range of specific configuration changes by phoning a local DELL dealership (not a 3rd party reseller, but actual company branch), maybe it's still worth a shot when you have very specific demands.
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I bought a Dell desktop in 2007 (I didn't know how to build a computer back then) and when the GPU fried in 2012, the Dell support sent me a new one via express within 24 hours. So my only experience with Dell products was really pleasant.
The only laptop I ever owned is my Macbook Air 2013, and I like it so much that I'm afraid to go to a thick, blocky, plasticy laptop like the 3 cm thick Dell one.
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I bought my last laptop a 13 inch 2kg i7/SSD/dedicated gpu from xmg ( http://mysn.co.uk/ ) and still am really happy with it. You might want to check their current offers and play with the configurator.
edit:Checked specs weight is 2 kgs (with battery) as poster below noted
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I find that rather unlikely, even their lowest end notebooks have 1,8 kilos at least, and that's without a GPU.
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France12906 Posts
On December 02 2015 22:41 WonnaPlay wrote:Here is the link to the laptop _fool said. I think this fits your requirements perfectly aswell. (credits _fool) http://www.bol.com/nl/p/asus-k501lx-dm104t-laptop/9200000047822642/What are you going to do with your RAM? Are you an engineer/developer or anything of the sort that you are sure you need the extra RAM? Getting more than 8GB RAM is one of the biggest misconceptions people have when building a machine. As a (power) user/gamer, you will not need more than 8GB RAM period. I will try to explain it a bit quick and dirty so you can come to your own conclusion: Let's say you have 8GB RAM DDR3, with a clockspeed of 1600Mhz(in reality this is half of that, but that's another story) and cas latency (CL) 9. This is a pretty standard RAM stick, probably around 50-60$, also probably the one already in your new laptop (Mhz may vary slightly). Such a RAM stick is ideal for everyday use, gaming etc. It will be highly unlikely that RAM will ever become your bottleneck. In the case of gaming more Mhz == more power. So when I want a gaming machine. I would want 8GB RAM DDR3, with a clockspeed of 2133Mhz (fastest ddr3) and CL9. Although if I want a machine for AutoCAD or engineering tasks etc, then this RAM stick wouldn't suffice. In this scenario you wouldn't need the fast Mhz, but you will need more RAM and less CL. So in this case you would want 16GB RAM DDR3, with a clockspeed of 1066Mhz and a CL2-3-5-6-7. Although if I want a machine that hosting a database or executing all kinds of SQL queries. My desires would again change into a 16GB RAM DDR3, with a clockspeed of 2133Mhz and CL9. So long story short; for every configuration/needs you would need a different set of RAM Memory. Size and CL are the least of your worries, since 8GB is more than enough. I'd choose "8GB DDR3 - 2133Mhz - CL9" over "32GB DDR3 - 1333 Mhz - CL9", ten out of ten times. As for DDR4... I'd rather stick with DDR3 for another few years.
So if you want to do engineer stuff but play games as a power user, what do you buy?
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Be aware that lower to mid-range laptops will have shared GPU and system RAM.
This means with 8GB of system RAM reality might be 2GB is reserved for GPU usage
That said 8GB is enough and will be enough for the entire life of the laptop with the specs you are asking for.
Upgrading RAM will serve no purpose when your CPU and GPU simply won't be able to handle games or applications that require more than 8GB at present or in the future.
Also if you want looks over functionality/performance then stick with ASUS. They are nice looking and actually decents components without paying through the teeth like you will for a razer blade or apple
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Northern Ireland22208 Posts
On December 15 2015 06:30 Poopi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 02 2015 22:41 WonnaPlay wrote:Here is the link to the laptop _fool said. I think this fits your requirements perfectly aswell. (credits _fool) http://www.bol.com/nl/p/asus-k501lx-dm104t-laptop/9200000047822642/What are you going to do with your RAM? Are you an engineer/developer or anything of the sort that you are sure you need the extra RAM? Getting more than 8GB RAM is one of the biggest misconceptions people have when building a machine. As a (power) user/gamer, you will not need more than 8GB RAM period. I will try to explain it a bit quick and dirty so you can come to your own conclusion: Let's say you have 8GB RAM DDR3, with a clockspeed of 1600Mhz(in reality this is half of that, but that's another story) and cas latency (CL) 9. This is a pretty standard RAM stick, probably around 50-60$, also probably the one already in your new laptop (Mhz may vary slightly). Such a RAM stick is ideal for everyday use, gaming etc. It will be highly unlikely that RAM will ever become your bottleneck. In the case of gaming more Mhz == more power. So when I want a gaming machine. I would want 8GB RAM DDR3, with a clockspeed of 2133Mhz (fastest ddr3) and CL9. Although if I want a machine for AutoCAD or engineering tasks etc, then this RAM stick wouldn't suffice. In this scenario you wouldn't need the fast Mhz, but you will need more RAM and less CL. So in this case you would want 16GB RAM DDR3, with a clockspeed of 1066Mhz and a CL2-3-5-6-7. Although if I want a machine that hosting a database or executing all kinds of SQL queries. My desires would again change into a 16GB RAM DDR3, with a clockspeed of 2133Mhz and CL9. So long story short; for every configuration/needs you would need a different set of RAM Memory. Size and CL are the least of your worries, since 8GB is more than enough. I'd choose "8GB DDR3 - 2133Mhz - CL9" over "32GB DDR3 - 1333 Mhz - CL9", ten out of ten times. As for DDR4... I'd rather stick with DDR3 for another few years. So if you want to do engineer stuff but play games as a power user, what do you buy?
u get the best of both worlds??
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been looking for similar laptop and found msi gs40
It has a gt970m with skylake cpu
Portable (I have play around with one), very impressive weight for the hardware but I have heard bad thing about the battery
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United Kingdom20322 Posts
We don't have any new futuristic materials so lightweight is basically just another way of saying "bad cooling, low battery life" and often also low performance. Works for some people.
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On December 16 2015 11:58 Cyro wrote:
We don't have any new futuristic materials so lightweight is basically just another way of saying "bad cooling, low battery life" and often also low performance. Works for some people.
Yeah it works well for me when I was in uni.
Battery just enough for lecture, recharge in library for work purposes.
Go back home, and go gaming heavy with the additional cooling pad and power supply.
Otherwise I would have to do laptop at travelling and then a desktop at home.
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try the lenovo ones. Y50 is the model mate.
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On December 16 2015 11:58 Cyro wrote:
We don't have any new futuristic materials so lightweight is basically just another way of saying "bad cooling, low battery life" and often also low performance. Works for some people.
You're right. Since anything below 6-8 hours battery life is unacceptable for my school work, and since the Razer Blade is going to be at least 2200 Euros here, I think I have to kiss goodbye the idea of having a jack-of-all-trades laptop.
I might get the 15 inch ASUS UX501 one and try and use my tablet for coursework.
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Decided the Razer Blade is probably a pipe dream, so I got myself the ASUS UX501 and a 500 GB M.2 SSD to replace the 128 GB with.
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Now a new contender has arrived...
The Dell Inspiron 7559 has a Skylake i7 Quadcore, 8 Gigs of easily expendable RAM, a 960m with 4 GB, a larger battery than the ASUS one, also a matte 1080p screen...
However, it's uglier and bulkier.
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EPT![[image loading]](https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/images/products/8027/3_big.jpg)
